Express Yourself!
By Jim Thornhill
In my experience, most of my friends outside of my fellow family historians don’t like to do research. Reading 200-year-old books, spending all day pulling heavy books off the shelf in the basement of a courthouse, or searching for hours online for that elusive ancestor is not their cup of tea! However, most of my friends and family do love to hear about my discoveries. I recently had a cousin tell me, much to my surprise, that she loved hearing me explain to her the reason our parents never talked about their father!
Another way to share your findings with friends and family is through writing. Writing has several advantages over telling our stories. For one thing, writing is much more permanent. Especially if we post our writings online, or attach it to our family tree, our writing becomes part of a record that can last for generations. Just think how thrilled you would be if you found an article, even a paragraph that was written by your grandmother about her father. What a goldmine! You can leave such a treasure for the budding family historian in your tribe.
Another advantage of writing is its ability to share ideas. One of the things I love about Genealogy is that it is a sharing community. We benefit daily from records that were preserved and indexed by others, and hopefully, we have the opportunity to do the same. By writing articles on records you have found, tips you have learned, and other discoveries you’ve made, you can add to the knowledge available for other family historians. After all, you worked hard to find that collection, why not make someone’s day by telling them all about it!
One myth about writing is that you must have a degree in literature or be a Pulitzer prize-winning author to write an article. Nothing can be further from the truth! I can tell you from experience that what it takes is practice and a critical eye (something we all have as researchers). Simply get on your computer and type out a paragraph or two about something or someone among your ancestors that interests you. When you are through, read back over it with that critical eye you use when doing research. Does it make sense? Is the grammar okay? Download a free program like Grammarly and let it check for sentence structure. Once you have written a few paragraphs about an ancestor, attach it as a fact, note, or document to your family tree. Believe me; your great-grandchildren will love the story you wrote about your time with your grandfather!
If you want to experience writing about more general topics, a great place to put your articles is in the DGS Newsletter. When you find that little known online collection, jot down a few hundred words (one to three paragraphs) and send it to publicationcontent@dallasgenealogy.org for publication. Who knows, maybe Family Tree Magazine will be asking YOU to write an article soon!
