or
`An obsession with the dead`
Why did I start on a family tree one may ask, especially when I never really got started until I was the grand young age of 54, and both my parents were dead.
I had needed a `hobby` and this was it. Off I went to the library and borrowed several books on the subject, I also gleaned what useful information I could from my step-sister and then began the trips to the reference library on my days off from work using the GRO Births, Deaths & Marriages microfiche, the IGI and Census records in search of my ancestors. My wife, Kath, who had got used to being a computer widow whilst I whiled away hours in my `den` working on the computer, now had to contend with my going to the reference library one or two days a week for 4, 5 or 6 hours at a time in pursuit of my new found hobby. Or as she termed it
About the same time I had just become connected to the Internet and one evening entered "family tree" into the search engine and was surprised at the results. See my list to other sites for ones which I have found particularly useful.
Worse was to come for her, but something which is an absolute boon for those people engaged in tracing their family trees, was when the Church of the Jesus Christ Latter Day Saints released `Family Search` onto the Internet. This meant that the IGI, Ancestry Files and other indexes managed by them could be searched whilst on line. This also meant that the phone bill went sky high for a time, but enabled me to cut down on some of the trips to the library, but not all of them.
My main research should have been the namesWOOD and ROSS(my mothers maiden name), and have discovered ancestors called BARKER,BROTTON, BRUCE, CORNFORTH,FEATHERSTONE, GRAINGER, MARLEY, RIGG, ROWNTREE, SADDLER, SUGGETT, WARD & WELDON. All the above names come from North Yorkshire, mainly in the Great Ayton, Stokeley, Guisborough, Skelton, Liverton, Moorsholm, Loftus areas as well as the Slingsby & Malton areas, except for the name ROSS which I have traced back to Forfarshire (Angus), & Kincardine, Scotland.
I have up to July 2009 some 2293 individuals in my family tree, no doubt with more to find.