Going From Notes To A Finished Family History
Your interviews are done. You have successfully traced your family history back several generations. You even have stories and photographs to go along with birth records and more.
So, now what?
With the research in place, it's time to decide how to present your findings not only to preserve them for your personal use, but also to pass them safely along to other generations to come.
A simple flow chart family history might do the trick, but with the details you've uncovered, more might be better. After all, a good family history tells a story to go along with the dry vital statistic information. A family is about people, not numbers.
One of the best ways to create an all-encompassing family history that includes stories, photos and more is to handle the presentation in scrapbook form.
Your finished product can be as detailed or as simplistic as you'd like, but the following is an example of a layout that just might work.
First off, create a title page. "Jones Family History," for example. From here, begin with the first ancestors you've found. Include their photos if you have them, if not, maybe pictures of where they are from or of something they liked to do. On the page dedicated to this person or couple, include birthplace and date, dates of deaths, marriages and so on. Also include any neat information you've uncovered about them such as professions, family stories and so on.
From here, move on to their offspring and so on.
To help make the book flow a little more cohesively, and better explain the relations at a glance, do include a family tree flow chart, perhaps as the first page beyond the title.
Have fun with the book's creation and include as little or as much information about each generation as you'd like.
If you have such items as birth certificates, newspaper clippings and old photographs, be certain to use archival papers and acid-free pens, tapes and so on. Preserving what you've found will be half the battle, so make sure you don't skimp on this part. A baby picture of your great-great grandfather will be hard to replace. A written letter from his mother, even more so.
