Amen, Karen.  Many of my students later have given up the hobby because the
internet has failed to provide what they thought would be immediate answers.
So many "pay-for" websites have been revealed to provide so few "answers",
and those few only for ridiculously high prices, that folks who a) did not
learn how to do basic and thorough research and b) are very busy trying to
work and keep families going, simply give up the search, hoping for easier
and less time-consuming methods.

Considering that probably less than 5% of the research materials available
to us yet appear on the Internet, most folks who are newer to the hobby find
the censuses, give up those taken before 1850, look at some websites
postings and shotgun statements of where to look further, and put it aside.

I suppose the most fundamental rule that is NEVER learned by most genealogy
buffs is that the time-tested research methods have changed not atall!  The
Internet is but one more tool to accomplish what we have always done before
the "net".  I advise students and all of those to whom I speak that they
will be best served to procure any of the better "how-to-do" research guide
books, and as they read it search on the net for the materials there
recommended, making careful notes as to what they do NOT find there, leaving
those omissions for later.

The other most fundamental assumption we all need to remember (learn) is
that genealogy is about "where", since it is at the "wheres" - where they
lived - that ancestors left the vast majority of records of their lives.  If
we are not searching at the local level through societies, contacts, local
publications, in addition to our census and military records, there is NO
way we can even approach difficult "brick walls".  No small measures of the
available sources are available at the state's archives, especially at
Virginia.

In almost 60 years of research I have found that those who, for whatever
reasons, are not able to afford or otherwise find the time to search or make
contacts at those "wheres" quite usually find but a waning interest.  I
think there are as many "researchers" out there as always, however they (we)
find it most difficult to communicate with those who seem to have but little
interest in learning the fundamentals of genealogical research.  Some of
such basic rules are on the net now (and more will appear little by little),
but without following a research plan as set forth in the "how-to" books, it
will take years to ferret what has been made electronically available.  

If you open the back door and shoot at the woods, it is not likely that you
will bag breakfast.  On the other hand, if you go into the woods and hunt,
the odds of gaining something to eat are greatly increased.

Paul
www.DrakesBooks.com     

        

-----Original Message-----
From: Research and writing about Virginia genealogy and family history.
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of KAREN DALE
Sent: Monday, July 14, 2008 11:28 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [VA-ROOTS] Is Genealogy obsolete?

Certainly internet traffic has slowed down in the last five or six years,
and I do think it's true fewer and fewer "goodies" are being posted through
Genweb pages and archives. However, to me the real value of the internet was
the networking, the coming together of several people working on the same
family, although perhaps in different branches.  I'm a "whole family"
historian--I can't seem to stop once I start on a family. Really obsessed
with the "big" picture.   I post these extensive family histories on
Rootsweb--and I often get contacts from members of branches that are "lost"
or sketchy. Just the other day I got an email from a man who said he'd quit
working on our common family in frustration ten years ago--but he was
thrilled to find I had his gggf connected in a tree.  Now, I had all sorts
of disclaimers saying I THINK he belongs here based on the following
evidence--but with the additional evidence from my new contact, I've become
surer and surer--and he says he's been inspired to go back to work on the
family. 

There are always those of us who did the libraries and the
microfilm---butted our heads against those brick walls (and as my father
used to say, "Dummy, the wall doesn't bleed."). People who thought the
internet was going to eliminate that have probably given up, gone off to new
hobbies--but not all. And there are always new people whose "Oh, my God, you
know who my grandfather was!" emails appear in my mailbox.  

Not obsolete--just no longer a passing fad the media hypes. But those of us
who are serious are still out here--and there are always people for whom
genealogy is a new interest.  

Karen Dale


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