Graf #11 Research Genealogy

  My greatest research project to date has to be the record of my genealogy. Everyone always wants to know where they came from, after all Maslow may have deemed it number three on his hierarchy, in love and social belonging, myself, however, I would have placed it at number two, because it gives me a sense of safety and security knowing where I came from.
  My research would lead me to long Sunday drives with my dad to numerous cemeteries in Washington and Waldo counties. We purchased a laptop to document all of our findings. A whole new level of investigation was brought forth when I found out we could access vital statistic records in the town offices. In searches our eyes beheld the signatures of some of our dearly departed relatives. We had births, deaths, and marriages with true dates that could not be disputed. One lady at a town office told me that she knew the State of Maine had uploaded vital statics onto the world wide web and I should also search there. Because I am who I am, I raced to Augusta and spent two days in the archives. It was there I learned how to use a microfiche machine. The dusty old man at the archive building told me maybe I should try this new website he had heard scuttlebutt about called Ancestry.com, seems you could just enter your surname and see if anyone had information on you! Ancestry offered a subscription whereby you could have access to the United States census; the written copies of census records became real before my eyes! The information and dates started filling my computer, my dad purchased a software program, called Family Tree Maker, so we could store all our information. One of its best features is the relationship maker. If you select two names, it will tell you the relationship between the two people. This initial process took about four years to complete. Oh the fun we had, the information we gathered and the myths we discredited. Our greatest discovery was the line of royalty we are descended from, I am the 38th great granddaughter of William the Conqueror. My then teen children told me if I didn't stop soon eventually our genealogy would just say.."In the beginning" which are the first three words of the Bible, God's Holy Word. When we started we had no idea the adventures we would have going from place to place, it is truly a time with my dada I will hold dear for as long as I am able to remember.