Ancestor Books

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We have had some questions about what an ancestor book looks like, so we made this video to answer that question. Our ancestor book is the middle ground between a research project and a typical family history book. Many family history books cost between $5,000 and $10,000 to write, but our ancestor book starts at $2,000. This option grabs the key details and documents from your ancestors lives and compiles that information in a book to share, while keeping the project within your budget.

Each project is custom to your family, so if you want something a little different we can do that too.

Learn more about our family history books.

Social Security Application

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Did you know that you can order a copy of your ancestor’s application they filled out when they applied for a social security number?

I just got one in the mail today for a man who was born in 1892. He immigrated from Turkey and later applied for a social security number in 1936. His application listed both of his parents including his mother’s maiden name. Not only that, but it listed the town in Turkey he was born in! I love it when immigration research works out.

To get a copy the applicant has to be more than 100 years old. If your ancestor meets all of the requirements, and you are looking for information on their parents or their birth, it is worth looking into. You can order the record from the Social Security website at https://secure.ssa.gov/apps9/eFOIA-FEWeb/internet/main.jsp

Citations Made Easier

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As genealogists and family historians there is always the question in the back our minds thinking, how will I cite this source? There are many different citation methods out there but many of them do not give guidelines for the same original records we look at. We are all taught to cite the records so another researcher could find it again. But we are also supposed to cite the record back to the original source, if we can. This has caused some headache to many researchers, including this one, as we have tried to cite the many different records we are using.

Elizabeth Shown Mills published a book called Evidence Explained: Historical Analysis, Citation and Source Usage a few years ago. In this book, she provides many examples of how to source the many different types of documents we look at and use in our research. It is a great book to base your citations off of when you don’t know how to do it. However, if you’re like me, you want to write down the citation while you are looking at the source. Well, the book is full of great information and examples but it is kind of bulky. It can be a hassle to carry around to every place you are going to do research. Luckily, she has since published a website that gives examples of some explanations and some examples of the citations. The original book provides a great quick reference pages and you can view many of them on the website.  It also is now available as an e-book and there are separate “cheat sheets” for different types of sources and research strategies.

One great feature on the website, that is likely looked over, is the forums page.  Here users can post questions, problems, etc. for people to look at and help with. I have done a lot of Native American Research and many of the records that I have searched do not have a set citation method. So I do my best to cite it so someone else could find it again. This website can be a great place to get others’ opinions and questions on your own citation questions. I think that those who use the forums page will find that many people out there have or are struggling with citations just like them. Here they can help each other out and get to know others doing similar research.