Granduncle Mark's Genealogy Parlor
Conducting a Family History Interview
What Information About a Person is Helpful?
As you start to build your family history, you will have a focus on both
the overall picture
(family tree, patterns of relationships, ancestor charts,
descendant charts, etc.) and specific information
(details about individual
people in your family history).
Will you remember to ask Grand-Uncle Chester all of the important questions when
you travel 300 miles to interview him for your genealogy project?
Presented below is a guide to information that can be helpful to know about
individuals in your family tree.
If this list is helpful, you are welcome to print this page and use it for your
personal family research. (For any other uses, see my copyright page.)
- Full name of person
- First name
- Middle name(s)
- Surname / Last name
- Previous surnames (changed because of marriage, adoption or other reason)
- Nick Names (Your ancestors may have used a nick name on documents!)
- Titles (Anything from "Sir" to "Ms" to "Dr." to "Esq" could be informative.)
- Birth
- Date of birth (day, month, year)
- Place of birth
- Residences (Places the person lived)
- Education (What schools did this person attend? When? Where?)
- Talents of the person (e.g. "Everyone loved Aunt Nellie's apricot pie!"
or ... "Uncle Jack played the piano.")
- Interests and hobbies of the person
- Memberships (Whether this person belonged to the Teamsters Union, the
Presbyterian Church, or an environmental group, you're saving a bit of this person's
personality when you record such data!)
- Physical description of the person
(It will be interesting for future
generations to know where they got their hair color, body height, etc.)
- Military history of the person
(There may be many pages of records available
if this person, or one of his family members, served in the military!)
- Legal history of person
(Maybe there are court records to give you more
information)
- Medical history of person
(Maybe there are medical records to give you
more information)
- Religion of person (Maybe there are church/synagogue/temple records)
- Social Security number
(If the person is comfortable sharing this, this is
relevant for persons who've been around since the Social Security system was
introduced. For example, you can get a copy of the person's application for
Social Security benefits, which gives some personal data submitted by the
person himself or herself.)
- Occupation
(What jobs has the person had?)
- Marriages
- Full names of spouses
- Dates of these marriages
- Locations of these marriages
- Other significant relationships of the person
- Death of the person
- Date of death (day, month, year)
- Location of death
- Cause of death
- Funeral of the person
- Where? (e.g. name of chapel, town/city, county/parish, state/province, country)
- When? (e.g. dates of viewing and services)
- Burial of the person
- Date of burial (day, month, year)
- Location of burial (name of cemetery, town/city, county/parish, state/province,
country)
- Ancestors of the person
- Full name of father
-
with birth, marriage, death and burial information
- Full name of mother
-
with birth, marriage, death and burial information
- Full name of grandmothers
-
with birth, marriage, death and burial information
- Full name of grandfathers
-
with birth, marriage, death and burial information
- Full name of other ancestors
-
with birth, marriage, death and burial information
- Collateral relatives of the person
- Full name of siblings
-
with birth, marriage, death and burial information
- Full names of uncles and aunts
-
with birth, marriage, death and burial information
- Full name of first cousins
-
with birth, marriage, death and burial information
- Full name of nieces and nephews
-
with birth, marriage, death and burial information
- Full name of inlaws
-
with birth, marriage, death and burial information
- Children of the person
- Full names of children
- Dates of children's births
- Locations of children's births
- Grandchildren of the person
- Full names of grandchildren
- Dates of grandchildren's births
- Locations of grandchildren's births
- Grandchildren of the person
- Full names of great-grandchildren
- Dates of great-grandchildren's births
- Locations of great-grandchildren's births
- Antedotes / Interesting Stories
from the person's life (This kind of information
adds warmth, humor and color to your family history! And, major life events, such as a
disabling accident or a trip to a distant land, may help explain questions that arise
later about your data.)
NOTE: For more information about collecting
genealogical information, including tips for encouraging your relatives to participate,
see my "Getting Started in Genealogical Research" Web page at
http://grand_uncle_mark.home.insightbb.com/start.html
To sort out all those relationships, visit my
What's a Second-Cousin Twice-Removed Web page.
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