While riding on an elevator to the 8th floor of the Dallas Public Library, a young woman spying my equipment remarked, “You must be going to work on your genealogy.”
“Yes,” I replied. “It’s quite the obsession.”
“My mother used to be obsessed with genealogy,” she admitted. “But after she found what she was looking for she quit. Never touched it again.”
“Oh? What was she looking for?”
“My grandmother told her that she would like to have ‘Member of DAR’ carved on her tombstone. So Mom did the research, found the proof she needed for Grandma to join DAR before she died.”
My companion’s story rekindled a question that I ponder from time to time. Why do I research genealogy and family history? I suppose that for every genealogist the answer is different. Moreover, the reason we begin our long-term project often evolves into a different reason for continuing it.
For me, the research aspects of “doing” genealogy began later in life. But, my questions about family began in childhood. I knew my mother’s family well; we lived only blocks away from grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. Yet, my dad’s family existed merely as sparse stories about his boyhood antics. His parents died before I was born. He moved to Texas leaving extended family behind except for a brother and a sister. While I had paternal relatives, they were not part of my everyday experience.
It turned out that some of Daddy’s stories were—shall we say—fanciful? But as a young girl, I loved hearing them and embraced them as truth, something that hindered later research. I was about age sixteen when I asked him more seriously considered questions about his family. Until that moment, I was unaware that my dad had limited knowledge about his people beyond his parents and the one grandmother who were often the targets of his boyish pranks.
Although it was several years before I actually began researching family, it was that day that I was truly inspired to “do” family research. I wanted to connect with the family I did not know.
As if by conspiracy, my dad’s ancestors surely wanted to remain hidden in record. My grandparents lived before the idea of a legal name was formalized. My grandfather used various aliases on record, making research more difficult. When I finally located his death record and obituary, I hurrahed the achievement. A brick wall was penetrated. When I found the same records for my grandmother, his wife, I wept. I transcended time to encounter someone I longed to meet.
For me, researching ancestry is both a scholarly endeavor and a spiritual journey. Genealogy and family history research is a personal journey towards a pre-natal mountain. Some researchers aspire to claim the summit of that mountain. Some, like my elevator companion’s mother, trek only part-way.
Aside from the many details of where my ancestors lived and their occupations, I learned that my ancestral story is one of fatherless households, a pattern repeated through various lines of my father’s ancestry. Fathers who died or disappeared before their sons and daughters became adults, before their grandchildren could grow to remember them. The cycle repeated again when Daddy died at age 49. My children never knew him.
Despite my love for my children, they are not the primary reason that I continue my research. They are simply not interested in “dead relatives.” No, I continue because I thoroughly enjoy the process of research, the exploratory questions and the unexpected discoveries, such as the pattern of fatherless households. These modest achievements better motivate me to continue looking for clues to my pre-natal past. Still, it is not the most salient reason that I continue to research.
The most salient reason is the transcendent experience, that feeling that I get whenever my study touches upon a life, long gone from memory but not from record. The event is always a surprise when it occurs; it is always emotional to some degree.
