I’m going to go link this on my blog. I’ll look forward to more. And I’d love that field trip idea you mention in part 2 — again, I would love the excuse to carve it into my schedule to actually DO some of what it takes, to learn how to use the software, etc. My experience with it all is very limited.

Can I send you a pic of my family history wall, though?

Really, the church’s focus on genealogy work was one of the things that really reasonated with me. My paternal grandma was the only one in her generation who did genealogy work. Her son, my dad was the only one in his generation who did it, and I was the only one who went with him. Really makes me think if there was some unseen hand in that!

I feel like I’m pretty advanced, but I’m going to do this “homework,” too. Thanks for doing this!

When I was a girl, my dad caught the genealogy bug. (We weren’t members of the LDS church.) I went with him to the genealogy library at the state capital and was his assistant scribe, my older siblings not wanting any part of this dorky endeavor. A few years ago when I started doing genealogy after I had joined the church, my dad gave me reams of paper, data written in my own nine-year-old hand so many years before.

There’s something to be said for computers, of course, but oh, how I cherish the hand-written information my grandma wrote out for me. And maybe someday, my own children will cherish those papers my dad gave me, and things I’ve written out now.

Yes, we’ll certainly talk about how to get information from relatives, especially from ones who never seem to get around to answering your questions or looking for that document they promised. And since one of the promptings to do this series was from a first-generation Mormon whose mother is likely to be suspicious of any attempt to get genealogical data, we’ll also talk about how to work around relatives who won’t talk. When we do that — or with any lesson, really — I welcome suggestions from old hands like you who have experience with those topics.