Being a Young Genealogist

I want to take this opportunity to thank everyone for their comments on my blog, and I want to address a common theme in the comments; my identification - being a young genealogist.

I by no means meant to exclude anyone; in fact my aim was the opposite. I'm new to this and I want to learn everything I can, and this is why I became affiliated with GeneaBloggers. The site is fantastic as it takes me to blog posts that interest me, whilst drawing people to my blog where hopefully their (your) comments will aid my research.

Now for a little bit about me: I'm half way through a degree in Mechanical Engineering, and I watch motor racing all day every Sunday whilst cross stitching. I'm not your average 21 year old! I'm very used to being on my own and doing my own thing, but it's always nice to meet people like myself; whether it's girl engineers, motor racing fans, or genealogists that are close to my own age.


I want to thank Niall and Lauren for reaching out and letting me know I'm not the only young genealogist from the UK! And I also want to thank everyone else who has commented and put a smile on my face! Here's hoping I begin to talk about something interesting!

My Genealogy Slump

A few days ago I read a new blog post by Elyse entitled How to Recover from a Genealogy Slump. Now I recently had a four month genealogy slump, so I'm going to take this opportunity to explain what started mine, and how I recovered.

My slump began October 16th 2011. I should explain that I am a huge fan of motorsports, and that despite living in England, my favourite series is the IndyCar series because the people involved are hilarious and amazing, and the racing is hard fought. On October 16th, the Las Vegas Motor Speedway was supposed to hold the 2011 season finale, but on lap 11 there was the biggest crash I have ever witnessed which resulted in Dan Wheldon losing his life.

I remember in the direct aftermath of the crash thinking it would be nice to research his tree for his two young sons; I even found his birth record on Ancestry! I spent a few days coming to terms with what I had seen, and just when I was getting over it Marco Simoncelli was killed in a MotoGP race in Malaysia. I was distraught. And the last thing on my mind was genealogy.

Even now, when I think of genealogy my mind goes back to that week, and that was a big sticking point for my research; how can I research my tree when it just makes me sad? Genealogy should make me happy!

Then in January I received an email advertising Who Do You Think You Are? Live! I looked at the workshops on offer and saw one for tracing Yorkshire ancestors on the Saturday. A large amount of my ancestors are from Yorkshire, so that talk was a must see, and with living just north of London for the year, the 2012 is likely to be the last show I can attend for a few years.

I have to say that I wasn't really inspired in the morning; I had no set goal for the show, and so wandered around aimlessly all morning. Even the Yorkshire show didn't inspire me - in fact it just made me home sick! But then in the afternoon I listened to some Ancestry talks about how to get more out of the website and FTM 2012 (which I then bought!), and I also attended Lisa Louise Cooke's talk on Google Search Strategies & Tips. The information was excellent, but her passion and enthusiasm increased my passion and really cheered me up after a low few months.

But now my motivation is back, and I find myself re-reading wills and census' and finding new information; information that I had previously missed. And I'm excited! Excited to organise and consolidate all my research into one place, but also excited to further my research and make brand new discoveries!

From TheSun.co.uk

This post is dedicated to Dan Wheldon on the weekend a major race series returns to the Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Rest in Peace DW. #Lionheart #77