I'm trrying to research my family history and I keep running into deadends, Any suggestions?

You didn't mention what country you are in… Yahoo! Answers is a worldwide forum, so I am going to answer your question as if you lived in the US. If you don't then, kindly disregard my answer.

If you are interested in doing your genealogy, the best way to get started is to start with yourself. Write down everything you know about your parents, then keep going back until you run stuck. Most people can get back to their grandparents and maybe a set of great grandparents. At this point there are so many ways to get back further in your tree. Much of it depends on the records available. For instance, it you live in the United States, public records are only going to take you back so far. Many localities weren't required to keep records until the late 1800's or even early 1900's, and many courthouses were burned in the Civil War destroying many of the existing records that were already in place. In Europe and many other countries, records go back a lot further. Other avenues of getting information are studying old land records, wills, cemeteries, city directories, local histories and military records. Another gold mine of information is if your parents kept old letters of the family. It wasn't uncommon in the early twentieth century for women to have post card books. Some old post cards have some interesting information as well. If you are young, you may have the honor of being able to interview your grandparents for information. If you do this, I would recommend taping the conversation because often it is impossible to remember everything they said and you will have a treasure for future generations. Even though tracing your tree yourself takes a lot of time and a lot of effort, you learn so much and it is so much more worthwhile than pulling up a tree on a website and wondering where in the world the author got their information.

First, ancestry.com does have a 14 day free trial-BUT you must cancel before the end of 14 days or they will charge your credit card. Also, don't be suprised if they ask you to put your cancellation in writing and fax it to them. I have had friends tell me that they had to do it this way to cancel. I personally have found the information at Ancestry.com very helpful. A few years ago, I had a 14 day trial and didn't find them to be worth the money, but over the last couple of years they have added so much. They have all years of the census fully indexed, immigration records, military records, newspapers, family trees and the list goes on. They have truly evolved the last couple of years and they keep adding more information.

Here is a list of some of the free genealogy websites.

www.rootsweb.com -This is a good one that is free. It is run by Ancestry.com but shouldn't be confused with Ancestry.com- the pay site.

www.cyndislist.com

www.familysearch.org website for the Church of the Later Day Saints.

www.genforum.com This is a site that is full of individual message boards. You can search and post by last name, state, country, or county. This is a great one. Simply post your question on the respective board, and when people answer you will get a notification on your E-mail. I have had a LOT of success on GenForum.

I must say, however, that a good genealogy query, doesn't just say. " I need information on John Smith" Try to provide as many dates, places, and details as possible. One little thing can make the difference as to the answer you get.

a good query has

1) the persons name
2) all of the biographical information you know to date and
3) asks a specific question

The reason a query should be so specific is because people won't waste your time and theirs telling you what you already know. I have done lookups for people already and reported my findings only to be told, "Well, I knew that!" It would have been helpful if they would have told me that they knew that from the beginning. I probably would have checked a different set of sources to further the search. Also, by providing ALL of your known information (for example, the childrens names) it gives people alternate people to research to help arrive at your answer.

http://www.usgenweb.org/ -When you get to the main page, you can get to the state and individual locality pages by clicking on the appropriate links. Keep in mind that some towns are going to have more information than some smaller obscure towns. It all depends on what kinds of volunteers contribute information to their sites. Genealogy is very much a hobby that depends on people.

Check your LOCAL LIBRARY. Many libraries have subscriptions to Ancestry.com or hertiage quest that you can Access from home with your library card number. Heritage Quest is geared mostly toward the US records.

www.interment.net or www.findagrave.com These are cemetery sites that have grown by leaps and bounds.

http://ssdi.genealogy.rootsweb.com/cgi-b…

This is the link to the Social Security Death index. This is a very helpful resource to finding death dates of people who died in recent years (since about the 60's)

If your family immigrated to the US in the last 100-125 years you can try
www.ellisisland.org
This one is cool because you can actually have a look at the ships manifests!!

If you start your search for your ancestry, it will probably turn into an obsession. It is very addicting and it is like a big puzzle with so many benefits. You learn where your family came from, where they've been, often you can learn about family medical history. There just isn't a down side. Remember the old addage, "If you want something done right, you often have to do it your self." You are not going to just find your entire genealogy in one search. It is an ongoing puzzle. I tell people, if you can find one thing every time you are searching, you are doing GREAT. If you find any more than that at any given time you are LUCKY!! Write to me if you have any questions. I would be happy to help if I can. Blessings.

I wanna know some websites for genealogy that are free. They have to be good websites. And it has to give good information on my ancestors (such as eye color, hair color, i.e.).
I would be very grateful.

http://www.cyndislist.com/
the classic encyclopedia of genealogy sources (great beginner section).
As for appearance.. your best source on this is immediate or extended family, that may have old pictures. Older ones won’t be in color, of course. WW1 draft registration is one that has description.
And everyone wants free. There are some costs to research. Ancestry.com has the best collection of census records, so forth (draft cards are from there). If you want GOOD research, you will find that it is well worth the cost.

I have been researching my family tree for 12 years and have compiled over 12,800 names. I would like to post my file (or at least part of it) to a website, so that I can trade information with other researchers. Which website would be the best to post this info? I use Family Tree Maker program, so a GEDCOM format would be the easiest to upload. I don't want to sit & enter everything again! Tell me why you choose the particular website. Thanks!

RootsWeb World Connect is my first choice. It is insanely popular.

GenCircles has a neat feature called "Matching" – if your individual matches another person's indiviual, they put a little icon next to it.

If one of your lines goes back to Charlemagne you get a gazillion matches on the famous ones, but on the later, non-famous non-Charlemagne ones it is handy.

Talk to your relatives, gather evidence (i.e., birth, wedding, divorce and death records), organize your family tree, and when you run out of living relatives, use library resources to trace census data, etc. Lots on info i available online, but you need to talk to your relatives first, while they live, to get all the human-interest background you can.

Of course you need to be able to prove dates, etc., and that's what the paperwork is for.

It's a long, drawn-out process, but fun! I wish I'd started early enough to talk at length with my grandparents… but my parents are still kicking, so I'm not totally out of touch with the pre-WOrld War II era!

I am looking to purchase some sort of genealogy software, and I wanted to know which would be my best bet. Legacy, Family Tree Maker and Roots Magic seem to be popular when I do searches, but I want to hear what people who have used the software have to say. If you coud please write your recommendation and reason that would be great.

Here is Family Tree Magazine’s software guide they give you the pro’s and con’s of each program. They have a good site. Sign up to their e-newsletter. It’s free they only email you once a week and they haven’t given my email address out to anyone. I’ve been getting the newsletter for over a year.

I'm helping my nephew do a short family tree that he's doing for a school assignment. My grandparents divorced and my grandmother remarried. Is there some standardized way that a divorce and remarriage is written on the form? What is it? And should her second husband be on the form somewhere?

While many people like to use their own designs for visual interest.. the basic "tree" (or pedigree chart) is for tracing direct lineage back. I am assuming that grandma's first husband is the actual parent, so he is who would show on this style of chart. Grandma shows also, but using her maiden name (since that links her back to her parents, further on the chart). In this usage, 2nd husband does not properly show.
The 2nd form used in standard genealogy is called a family group sheet.. this one shows an immediate family.. husband, wife, and children.. but ALSO includes relevant info. That means names of both parents of the husband, and the wife. Other children of the (grand) parents are not here. those show on their own family group sheet. On this sheet, one would add a line like "married 2nd John Jones" with maybe the date and place of that marriage.
If John and grandma then have children from that marriage.. they appear on a family group sheet of their own.. where John is now the husband and grandma the wife. (with note again.. grandma md 1st.. to link it to the other group sheet).
All of this is built into standard genealogy programs.
www.familysearch.org is the LDS church site, and they have an excellent free program called PAF that you can download in a few minutes. It stores the information, and can print the charts out for you.

I need to know them for Daughters of the Confederate Veterans and my little brother. We’re both going into those areas (DCV and SCV) and we have to have an ancestor that was in the civil war, if I’m not mistaken. If you know of any site I would be very greatfull ^-^ Thanks!
I need the info for when I'm 16 and my brother is 13, but the SCV is letting him join at his current age.

When I start researching a new family line I go to these pages:

http://www.itd.nps.gov/cwss/ (civil war rosters)
www.nara.gov (military records)
www.familysearch.org
www.gencircles.com
www.rootsweb.com
www.usgenweb.com
www.census-online.com/links/
www.findagrave.com/
www.google.com

Can anyone help me find a free Genealogy program? One that has places where I can input detailed information about relatives with pictures? If anyone can help it would be great and please leave a link to the site.

http://www.familysearch.org/
will let you download Personal Ancestral File (PAF) for free. It has been around for 12 years or more. Stable, simple and free. I don't think it supports pictures, though.

Roots Magic supports pictures but costs $29. It has been around for ages too.
www.rootsmagic.com

Both do everything else you wanted. Family Tree Maker does too, but I think it is more expensive because they bundle a year's worth of Ancestry with it.

I have just lost a grandfather to lung cancer and I am realizing just how much Ive lost now that he is gone. I would like to create a family tree, but I need help getting started. Can anyone recomend software or a research site I can use? Thank you!

I'm sorry for your loss.
My suggestion is first you get a copy of unpuzzling your past by Emily Croom. It's under $20. It takes you step by step. I still use my copy even after 15+ yrs of research.

Then sit down with your living relatives and record what they know and any family stories. They may have documents like birth, death, marriage certificates, obits and family Bibles that you can make copies of.

Don't trust what you find online. There is a lot of bad research out there. Only use it as a tool, DOCUMENT everything. If you find something online that someone has submitted ask if they would send you copies of the documents. If they don't have them don't believe what they have until you prove it.

Documents 75 yrs and younger will be almost impossible to get. States have sealed them up unless you are a person on them due to identity theft.

Cemetery records are usually free so you can get lots of clues from those. Obits you will probably have to pay for.

Check your local library's homepage to see if they subscribe to heritagequest. If they do you can access it from home with your library card. This contains the census and other interesting stuff. They may also subscribe to ancestry. This you would have to use at the library.

Visit your local LDS Center. They have tons of stuff on film.

As far as software. I use family tree maker. Have for years. It is user friendly. But there are a lot of different ones out there that you may like. Try google. Put in genealogy software and read each one carefully. See if they have a try before you buy. Don't put much in it until you decide if its the one you want and then buy the software so if your computer ever dies you can reload it.

Make sure you back up your work on cd's or floppy's this is really important. If your computer dies you loose everything unless you have it backed up on cd's or floppy's. Nothing worse then having to enter all your info again.

Good luck on your quest. Just remember this is not a cheap hobby. But the rewards are priceless.

Ted Pack gave some good advice but there is more help available.

Completely Free.
I am a staff member of two local Family History Centers and have been for 15 years. It is our job and purpose to help everyone locate their ancestors. No matter who you are or what religion you belong to, and our services are free.

We can assist in locating records to search, and have access to the over 2.000.000 rolls of microfilmed records from all over the world. ( I have personally traced my German ancestry to 1549).

We can teach you how to use the software Personal Ancestral File, and search sources like Rootsweb.com and familysearch.org and to Google for your genealogy.

The local libraries can be found in the white pages of your phone book under Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. Family History Center.

Getting started can be confusing so let us give you a hand.

There are also lessons at Familysearch.org and free home study lessons from Brigham Young University continueing education department

A real interesting thing to do is Google your family history.
Go to google search and type in your name plus genealogy.
Example ("Daniel Boone" +genealogy). Use all varients of your name. Also Google the name of their towns and plus family history.

Have fun.