Genealogical Tip: Why Genealogy? By Amanda Forson, www.WorldVitalRecords.com

A friend of mine recently asked me the following question: What does the past have to do with who he is today? This individual is not normally a fan of history and has never tried researching his own family. Although he does not assume that his family history is all done or someone else is doing it, he brought up a valid point from his perspective. I stammered my way through a personalized explanation, the fact that I did not have an automatic response ready to satisfy his question shook my bearings enough to generate this GenTip article.

I have many friends to whom genealogy seems not to matter at all. The fact that I love it, can not get enough of it, teach it, and work at a genealogical company are nice things to them, but matter little in their daily lives. My personal connection to genealogy does not influence them. Why should the past matter? What bearing does it have on people today? Does it matter? Is there a difference between what people think when they think of history, genealogy, and what happens when they are around their families talking?

I grew up listening to the stories of my grandmother, and during more recent years, learned through researching clues to uncover the past behind specific branches of my ancestry. Back then is not amorphous to me. It includes real people who dressed in clothes that today fetch high prices with re-enactors but otherwise are outdated, or who spoke different languages than I do, or spoke English with different slang or more formal terminology. Styles change. Languages follow the common thread of an area. None of those things have much of anything to do with me at this exact moment in time.

What matters to me today is how those people lived. I do not care whether they wore a fez or a sun bonnet; spoke French, Latin, or Swahili. I care about how they reacted to the situations where they found themselves, and I care about how they dealt with the joys and messes they created.

Some things that matter immensely to me today are genetic issues where the lifestyles of past ancestors made a difference either in favor of furthering their life spans or shortening them. It would be nice if I inherited something that would help me economically, but fiscal inheritance issues matter less than whether or not they were known for their moral character or whether they were restless wanderers seeking adventures for lesser-understood reasons.

The problems and triumphs I face in my life are not new. Plato stated that Those who forget their history are doomed to repeat it. Instead of repeating past mistakes I say, Those who do not know their history lack a true sense of self. Those to whom their history does not matter will find history forgetting them.

Genealogy and History Are the Same Thing

There are many aspects of history, but popular viewpoints usually limit to academicians in button-down shirts spouting about people, places, and ideas that have no bearing or concept on the present and often only matter to that particular author, tormenting their students without personal applicability. Genealogy is thought of as a hobby strictly for those of a geriatric nature. Although at WorldVitalRecords.com we see our more mature clients in the most respected manner, we also understand that the stereotype exists among many who do not understand the nature of the field.

What really is history and genealogy then? It includes the academicians and the senior citizens, and their families, and the families of everyone who gathers around a dinner table, television set, or drives to visit relatives. It includes all the stories that the great aunts tell, as well as PBS documentaries and museums. History is Lennin and the Kremlin, Red Square and rice fields. It is a Swedish girl in a little cap and dress following a dirt path in Iowa in the 1840s. It is an engineer in a foundry in New York State in 1867, and moving a family from Pennsylvania to Okinawa in 1967, or a little boy defended from bullies in first grade in Virginia in 1987.

History and Me

What I love the most about history is that it is changing on a daily basis. Not necessarily the events that occurred, although historical research often throws new light on traditional viewpoints on a regular basis, but the fact that every day there is a chance to make things better. No matter what, history is never doomed to repeat itself. Not every field involves every life, human or otherwise. That is why I love history. It includes everything and leaves out nothing. History always allows for back-tracking and re-writing. Its not just the past, but also the second that just slipped by. Its how yesterday connects with the present moving forward to tomorrow. How does genealogy matter for my friend? Maybe he does not see it, but it sees him.

Genealogical Tip: Slovakian Family Vital Records Link Generations By Amanda Forson, www.WorldVitalRecords.com

This past week, my father came into town to celebrate the holidays. As part of the celebration, I decided that he needed to see some of the discoveries concerning his familys direct lines. Researching last year, I found the proper microfilm for his grandfathers family in the town of Nadlice (Nadlany) in the area of Trencin, within Slovakia.

Scan of the record Translation of the record

Background Slovakian records are hard to find as a rule. Although the topography never changed, the geo-political boundaries fluctuated on a regular basis. Some of these changes include the Great Moravian Empire during the Middle Ages to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, to being swallowed up within Hungary, and then more recently being a part of Czechoslovakia until the early 1990s when it finally became the independent country of Slovakia.

Within this framework, there is the ethnic majority of Slovakians ruled by people (minorities within the territory when they settled there) who at different times spoke German or Hungarian. Besides these official languages, there are minor dialects of Slovakian depending upon the region within the geo-political boundaries. Religion plays a large role in the lives of the people. The majority of Slovakians are Roman Catholic. There are minorities of Lutherans, Eastern Orthodox, Jews, and other Protestants, but most church records for the majority of the inhabitants are recorded in Latin.

What I found was the baptismal record of my grandfather written in a combination of Latin with Hungarian and Slovak. I had not examined previously examined the record thoroughly, and explaining it to my father helped determine that this was the right child. Since there were two children born in the same year with the same name, my future research strategy included searching through other children of the same parents in an effort to establish family naming patterns utilizing already-known brothers and sisters of my great-grandfather. These children would be found in other parts of the towns metrical books within the collections of the Family History Library, ordered during the previous year to my particular local family history center.

Results Once shown, my father was interested in the record and would not have understood it had I not been there to explain it to him. Seeing that was the case, he had me write a transcription and translation of the document to email to other relatives who would also be interested in the found record. The transcription and translation are attached to this article along with the record image.

My father previously showed cursory interest in his familys history. He had interest, but neither the time nor patience to devote to the research required to prove the family lines. When he saw the results, however, he instantly decided to print the largest scale copy of the record that was possible. For the family history center where we viewed the record, that would be an 18 x 24 copy printed on vinyl-backed paper, a specialty of this particular family history center. From there, we continued with mounting the large copy onto foam board eventually framing it. Currently, the framed record and transcription copy hangs outside the office of WorldVitalRecords.coms chairman as an example of the kinds of records that WorldVitalRecords looks forward to aiding subscribers with using in the future.

A previous tip included the basic concept of sharing information once it is found. In the case of my family and this record, finding it was a personal victory, but sharing it brought my father, his sister, a great-aunt and daughter of the child on the record, and my fathers cousin to new levels of awareness about their family. Personal applicability is the most effective way of increasing interest in family history. During this holiday season of families gathering and visiting, share the information gathered during research and see what happens when records link generations.