{"id":390,"date":"2011-12-12T18:42:00","date_gmt":"2011-12-12T18:42:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/genealogybank.com\/?p=390"},"modified":"2024-12-30T07:28:00","modified_gmt":"2024-12-30T12:28:00","slug":"how-did-you-get-started-as-genealogist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/how-did-you-get-started-as-genealogist.html","title":{"rendered":"How Did You Get Started as a Genealogist? Share Your Story with Us!"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Louisiana newspaper in 1853 said of family historians that \u201ctheir memory<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/a> is a forest planted with genealogical trees<\/strong><\/em>.\u201d How true that is!<\/span>
\n\"Daily<\/a>Daily Picayune<\/span><\/a> (New Orleans, Louisiana), 25 October 1853, page 5. <\/span><\/p>\n

After years of family history research many genealogists have had all types of \u201cEureka!\u201d moments and breakthroughs, when they found a particular newspaper article or government record in their genealogical research that filled in gaps on their family trees.<\/p>\n

My breakthrough moment as a genealogist was finding an 1811 real estate ad for my great-great-great-great-great grandfather\u2019s farm in Maine. Aging sea captain James Garcelon (1739-1813) was selling his farm and moving in with his son William. The newspaper ad gave a terrific description of my ancestor\u2019s property: a two-story house \u201cvery pleasantly situated\u201d on 150 acres \u201cwith a handsome young orchard\u201d and featuring two barns, outhouses, and \u201can excellent well of water.\u201d <\/span>\"Portland<\/a>Portland Gazette and Maine Advertiser<\/a>.<\/span> (Portland, Maine), 25 February 1811, page 4.
\n<\/span>
\nWhen I read this real estate ad, I could really picture my ancestor\u2019s farm. <\/span>I grew up on old farm property in New Hampshire. There were cellar holes where the homes and barns had once stood, wild apple trees, and with a little priming the well still gave ice cold water\u2014and all around us stretched the long-idle fields. Maybe it was like my ancestor\u2019s Garcelon Farm in the 1700s?<\/span><\/p>\n

Thinking back on your own family history research\u2014what first got you interested in genealogy? What was your most surprising genealogical discovery? What have you learned about your family along the way? What are your most prized genealogical discoveries? GenealogyBank wants to hear from you! Tell us your story.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Louisiana newspaper in 1853 said of family historians that \u201ctheir memory is a forest planted with genealogical trees.\u201d How true that is! Daily Picayune (New Orleans, Louisiana), 25 October 1853, page 5. After years of family history research many genealogists have had all types of \u201cEureka!\u201d moments and breakthroughs, when they found a particular […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12713],"tags":[1045,988,3,1129,1043,12,1758,2191,436,1044,5351,1041,438,5355,1082,1029,1047,421,1042,439,5430,5439,442,1046,5460],"class_list":["post-390","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-genealogy-research-tips","tag-alabama","tag-albert-frost","tag-ancestry","tag-family","tag-family-reunion","tag-genealogy","tag-grandfather","tag-history","tag-huntsville-gazette","tag-idaho","tag-james","tag-lewiston","tag-lewiston-journal","tag-long","tag-maine","tag-maryland","tag-nebraska","tag-new-orleans","tag-newport","tag-rebecca-adams","tag-research","tag-son","tag-united-states","tag-vermont","tag-young"],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=390"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":100109,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390\/revisions\/100109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=390"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=390"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=390"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}