The Black Tree: Where are all of YOUR family tree clues?

Sunday, December 1, 2013

Where are all of YOUR family tree clues?

Among all of the treasured possessions found in your Ancestors home, especially Grandpa and Grandma, look you may find some the following items:

Birth Certificate
Death Certificates (of a spouse or family member)
Baptism Record
Pictures (with names and clues written on them)
Home Videos (listen for names and look for dates and information on the box)
Letters and Postcards
Holiday cards and greeting card pictures/Birthday cards
Scrapbooks (there will always be description in those)
Diaries (which are very rare now days)
Family account (such bank) Legends/Books
Business Cards (also check your local phone book) Look for the same names and addresses, they just may be a relative
Insurance Policies
Newspaper clippings (especially obituaries)
Family Bibles (sometimes not just on the first page)
Trophies and event pamphlets
School Withdrawal Slips
School Transcripts (the report card may provide some information such as age)
Enrollment Forms (school, activities)
Resumes (laying around or saved on the computer)
Driver's License/Identification Card
Work Badges
Passports
Retirement Forms
Wills and other Legal Documents
Writing on walls and behind pictures
Travel Souvenirs
Memberships to Clubs or other Organizations
Church Programs
Old stacks of papers in their drawers
Calendars (wall, purse size or desk)
Phonebooks (personal)
T-shirt that may have been made for a Reunion or Death
Photo Albums
Old purses and wallets (written on the back of something perhaps)
Quilted blankets can have clues as well, I have seen family tree ones

Don't take anything for granted. Though, I was adopted my Mother has a table with phone numbers and names of people engraved in that table. Check out the old pieces of furniture, it just might hold a clue.

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About Me

Hello Family Tree Researcher, my name is Jacqueline Joyce Thomas (born to Gene E. Thomas and Brendel Joyce Lewis) of Texas in '67 . I began doing my family tree search when my son (C. Hicks) was born. He was unfortunately born with Nephrogenic Insipidus Diabetes. When he was two weeks old I could not get him to take his formula, the only thing he would drink was water. We took him to the local emergency room, where the hospital staff spent hours doing test after test and the end result were "we are still uncertain of what is wrong with your son". My heart fell to pieces. The next few days, still nothing. Finally on the forty-fifth day of his prolonged stay , they decided to care flight him to a Children's Hospital where it still took nineteen days for the final results and even then they were not sure. The doctor came into the room with his long white doctor's coat and his glasses hanging from his nose with the final thought (not answer). Ms. Hicks (at the time), "could you have a seat?" My thought was, okay then comes "is you son mixed with Caucasian?" My reply with anger and confusion in my heart was, mixed, with who?...not what but who! And not that I was cared or anything, I have mixed nieces and nephews. Then he went on to explain to me that "that type of diabetes was uncommon, and that it only occurred in every three thousand children" annnnndddd'ah-Rah...here is the killer..."that it only occurred in Caucasian males." Gathering my thoughts and physical seemed to be out of the question. It was not until he turned four years old that I begin getting more and more curious. So next to my son being born with a rare type of diabetes that only (according the doctor) in Caucasian males and me being adopted, I became one curious Sista'. The search began.