Introduction

Haven't you finished the family history yet?

So comes the question from those who often proudly declare that their family history has been done by Aunt Sally or Cousin Bob and here it is! A chart full of names is displayed. No dates, no places, no evidence. Perhaps that all exists but it isn't in their possession - and they know nothing about their great great grandmother apart from her name.

I don't find such trees inspiring.

What about a copy of the family tree? 

Well that's a fair question since so much of the living family information has come from cousins. But ... What bit of the family tree do you want? And in what form? There is a limit to how avidly one reads a list of names telling when and where they lived, died and married and who their children were.
To produce a book with all the information I've collected is daunting. Books produced by my genealogy database, Legacy Family Tree, may look impressive on screen but are very large with the interesting stuff buried. Some years ago I made a CD with some PDF books, some photo galleries, a couple of Powerpoint summaries and a number of charts. Apart from an initial glance at particularly the photos and one cousin printing copies of the descendants of Grandfather Harris, I'm not sure whether the effort was worth it.

Are you only interested in the people you already know something about but have forgotten how they connect - or never knew?  Like the Uppill-Harris connections or the Clark-Lawrie connections? 

Or are you interested in where we came from? The lines of direct ancestors?

I do have bare bones family trees minus the living on the internet. One accessible to all is at My Heritage. The other is on Ancestry for which you need a subscription.

So I've decided to write a blog

My plan is to highlight particular people. In addition I'll highlight places and events from a family viewpoint. From time to time I will discuss how I found out.

Some of the entries will only interest the maternal cousins and other entries will only interest the paternal cousins but when it comes to the South Australian families I'm often uncovering more interconnections between the two.