out on a limb
As I’m writing this, the NCAA college basketball tournaments are underway. Schools of all different sizes compete in high-stakes, single-elimination games that are as heart-breaking as they are entertaining. Being a college basketball fan is great because, although there are nuances to each team’s playing style, the rules are consistent. No matter which teams are playing or where the game is held, the fundamentals are the same. Family history is not that way. All genealogists operate using the same basic principles: Start with the most-recent generation and move backward in time, look for original records, and so on. But just about everything else in research is specific to the time and place your ancestors lived. Records differ between places and time periods not just in format and language, but also in basic availability.…
