Starting on Ancestry.com

Back in April I got motivated by that NBC show to hop online and add my family tree. I had added 283 people in one day. With those Ancestry.com "hints" circling around that little leaf next to several of the names I'd just entered, I had to subscribe. I so wanted to see those hints. I paid for a full year and the hints just kept coming.

Many of them came from my uncle's tree. He's been working on our Vienop and Borchers line for years. His tree kept popping up as hints for mine. I accepted all of them and used the member connect to get his attention. Sure enough, I got a phone call from him. By the way, he's not a stranger. We used to get together with that side of my family on every holiday up here in Northern California whether it was in Pleasant Hill, Antioch, Pittsburg, Brentwood, or most importantly and frequently, Napa, CA. My uncle is pretty funny. He said that Ancestry.com is not what he would recommend for maintaining a family tree but it has merit as a research tool. I had a former co-worker allude to this too. Anyway, he told me not all of the tree information on Ancestry is correct for our Vienop's and Borchers'. He's had to correct some information along the way. I've left what I have out there but have made that tree private for now. I need to get together with him to coordinate that family line. He's back further into the 1700s apparently and has been working on our Jackel (pronounced Yackel) family line this year. It should be interesting to see what he has for my German family.

The main line that I entered was Flanagan from previous information that I'd written down and from a digital photo that I'd taken from one page of the Flanagan's bound book located at their farm in Ireland. That family tree photo has so much information on it. If I did not have that digital photo, I would not have much of anything about the Flanagan's.

I separated out my Flanagan Tree online to make it as exclusive as possible to that Family line. There are over 330 people on that tree back to 1670. The Flanagan's in Ireland have access to the tree on Ancestry. They actually sent me a DVD from 2004 that has a PowerPoint on it discussing our specific Flanagan Family tree. The DVD was authored by a descendant who apparently works for the Irish government on genealogy type projects. I so want to talk to Donald Murphy! I'm sure he's a very busy person. The DVD has a PowerPoint presentation that includes a discussion about it in the background. It's fascinating to sit and watch the DVD, listen, take notes, and review my family tree at the same time. There are some very interesting facts on that DVD that I did not know. It is long though....at least 2 hours. There are some pictures on the DVD including one of my great-great-grandfather, Patrick Flanagan, who emigrated from Ireland via Australia/New Zealand to Napa, CA.

The information that I have about the Flanagan's is quite a lot including letters and other documents plus that DVD. I decided to focus on some of my other lines in April. My husband reminded me that I would probably not have a similar experience with the level of detail and information that I have for the Flanagan's. I started to get my mind set with some realistic expectations.

And then.......My hubby was wrong, at least on one of my other lines.......next time.