Family History Chase High Tech and Low Tech
by SANDRA BROWN KELLY

You can find family memorabilia in the darndest places, suggests Karen Kappesser, past president of the Southwest Virginia Genealogical Society.

“People don’t often think to look on places like Ebay for things related to their families, but my husband found his great-great uncle’s Civil War enlistment papers there.”

Kappesser spoke recently to the Roanoke Valley Personal Computer Club on the basics of doing genealogical research. She has been researching her family for more than 15 years, and she encourages everyone to approach family history from his or her personal interest.

“If you have no interest in the begats, then do a medical family history,” she said.

Medical histories have become increasingly popular as families want to learn if there are diseases that might have a genetic link, she said.

Whatever your interests, at the very least, pass on your memories now to younger members of your family, she said.

“I wish I’d talked to my great aunts and uncles,” Kappesser said.

To get started in research, start with yourself.

“It doesn’t mean you have to write your autobiography, but you can if you want to. Just record special events. Where were you born? What is your family group?”

Record real names and nicknames. Genealogical research always works backwards. Where were your parents born? Who are your brothers and sisters?

In addition to the researcher’s memory and that of older relatives, address books or clipped obits can be great resources for family information.

“When you get to what you don’t know, then you begin to fill in that information,” she said.
This is also the time to get a genealogy program.

Family TreeMaker, which grew out of a business organizational chart, is probably the most popular software for purchase, but similar software is also available free from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints website, lds.org.

There, you can download Personal Ancestral File, which Kappesser considers an excellent program. Another program, Brother’s Keeper, is available from www.bkwin.net. It’s free to try; if you like it, its creator would like to be paid.

Once you select a software program, enter the data you have and think of ways to get more data.
“The Internet is not the be-all,” she said. “Seventy-five percent of what’s out there about genealogy is wrong. You always want to get proof.”

Proof of genealogy information consists of primary proof - official birth, marriage and land records - and second information - church records, news articles, obits.

“Keep a record of where you found the information so you’ll know where it came from - and also so you want go to the same place again.”

Throughout her research, which has taken her to records in Europe as well as the U.S., Karpesser said she’s learned the following:

Courtesy will get you more information; if she is seeking material from an out-of-town library, she will write and call to find out how to get the information. Some libraries will e-mail records to researchers for free, she said.

Need courthouse records? Write the clerk and learn when the least busy time for research there will be. Some libraries will e-mail records to researchers for free, she said.

It’s a little bit of a myth that immigrants’ names were changed when they came into the U.S. through Ellis Island. “Immigrants changed their names themselves.

• Google your own name and see what you find.
• Use the Google Images search, too.
• Try the name of the town you came from.
• Ancestry.com is a pay-per-view site, but most libraries have a smaller version of it that you can use for free. Also www.rootsweb.com, which is part of Ancestry.com, is free.
• Buy a Flash Drive (sometimes called a Thumb Drive) to use for transporting information between libraries and home or have a ZIP disk handy as many library computers have ZIP drives.
• Special files can be ordered from the Mormon Church and viewed at the Roanoke County LDS library. “You do not have to be a member of the Mormon Church to use the library,” she said.
• www.lds.org (www.familysearch.org) has a wonderful 1880 census index
• Roanoke City libraries, which can be accessed by anyone holding a library card at any Roanoke Valley library, recently bought HeritageQuest, which also has census materials.
• If you need to translate information from a foreign language, look for “cheat sheets” in libraries or from colleges.
• If you believe there are books that mention your family, then www.bookfinder.com is a resource.
• One of the best genealogical sites on the web is www.cyndislist, which has links to more than 200,000 genealogy sites.
• The Library of Virginia can be a great resource, www.lva.lib.va.us.
• To access any of the Roanoke Valley libraries, logon to www.rvl.info and have your library card number handy.

The Southwest Virginia Genealogical Society meets the third Saturday of the month, September through May, at the downtown Roanoke Library, 706 South Jefferson Street. The organization’s address is P.O. Box 12485, Roanoke, 24026. An application form for membership can be downloaded from www.primeliving.net.

The Roanoke Valley Personal Computer Club meets the second Saturday of the month at 9:15 a.m. at the Arnold R. Burton Center in Roanoke County. Learn more at www.rvpcc.org.

Comments or questions? E-mail to comments@primeliving.net.