How do I track my ancestors down?

Question

Are there any sites I can track down my ancestry? I am a New Zealander with Dutch, Irish, Italian, Scottish and English background. What would be the best sites for this? Im new to working out Geneaology so any further help would be much appreciated

Answer 1

Hilarious.. yes, they are dead.  We trace dead people here in genealogy (that's what it is).  

http://www.cyndislist.com/

I'm sending you to my favorite place, which is a basic encyclopedia of research sources, world wide. There is a good section just for beginners. The core idea is that you work from you back, USING RECORDS, to prove each level back, and as individual persons. The idea of using records means that (1) you know for a FACT, each step, that you have the RIGHT John Smith (the one who died in such and such a year/place), and (2) no one remembers back 250 yrs.. so your relatives can't tell you. You have to use historical items.

WHAT records are used are distinct for every place. I normally know US stuff.. but the concept is that your preliminary records will be there in NZ.  At some point, you will verify (explicitly) that grandma Marie was the one born in a village in Italy, so now, you switch to the Italy resources. Same for each of the others, except you need to know who, when, where.

My advice is to NOT think soley of the best one site.. but as many as findable, since all will offer something. Nor should you expect all of it to be online. There are email lists also through www.rootsweb.com that come to your mailbox, allowing you to interact and network with people.

The key words... from you back; use solid records; keep an open mind.

Oh, hang out here with us, too.

Answer 2

http://pilot.familysearch.org

It is FREE

Answer 3

ancestry.com is one of the best I have used,be patient it takes quite a while to construct a family tree,and don't take all the records you find as absolute truth most of them are off with spellings and dates.