Perry County Chapter, Ohio Genealogical Society
P.O. Box 275
Junction City, Ohio 43748-0275

How to Start Your Family Tree

Step 1 Start with what you know (or think you know)

Begin by remembering what you can about each of your family members. Write down information such as full name, spouse, dates and places of important events such as birth, marriage, and death, where they lived and occupation. Use forms such as pedigree charts and family group records. Pedigree charts let you list your parents, grandparents, great grandparents, and so on, while family group records let you list an entire family and their information. Start with your family and work backwards. You will be able to see what information is missing or incomplete.

Step 2 Use sources you have at home

Useful sources you may have at home are birth, marriage, and death certificates, family Bibles, obituaries, wedding announcements, etc. Add this information to your charts.

Step 3 Ask relatives for information

Contact relatives with a visit, call, letter, or e-mail. Ask specific questions such as “Do you know when Uncle Harry was born?” Add this information to your charts.

Remember to list the source of the information as you go along. It is much easier to do it from the start then try to remember where you find that piece later on. All this information is a starting point for your research. The rule of thumb for genealogist is No Truth without Proof.

Step 4 Learning about an ancestor

Look for missing or incomplete information on your chart. It is easier to start with a generation close to you and work backward. Maybe someone else has already found the information. You can check our library holdings in the New Lexington library or search on the internet. There are many good sites such as the Mormon Church site at www.familysearch.org. This site also has forms you can download and print for free.

Step 5 Search records for information

Next you will need to go to primary records in local government offices. These include Health Department for birth and death, Probate Court for wills and marriages, and Recorder’s office for land records. Listed are some of the records and where they are located.

Step 6 Evaluate the information

After you have found information, you must evaluate the information to determine if this is your ancestor. This gets harder as you move farther back in time. Don’t discount various spelling of surnames. A lot of times it was some clerk writing how they thought it was spelled instead of asking. Enter the new information and sources on your charts.

Where to Search

Start at your local library. We maintain a genealogy collection in the Perry County District library in New Lexington. Ask at the main desk for the key.

Look for information about genealogical societies in the location of you ancestors. The Ohio Genealogical Society (www.ogs.org) has a list of all their affiliate societies. Check their newsletter at the library. We have newsletters from other counties in our collection.

Check out larger libraries such as those maintained by the Ohio Historical Society (www.ohiohistory.org) and the State Library of Ohio (http://winslo.state.oh..us) in Columbus. They have large collections from around the state as well as microfilm of newspapers and census.

Perry County started in 1818. Records before that may be in neighboring counties.

Census records

These are available for Ohio 1810-1930. Until 1850 only the head of the household was named while other members were merely listed in age categories by male or female. In 1850, everyone in the house was listed with ages and relationship to the head of house. Look for your ancestor in the printed index and then check the microfilm for the complete record.

County records (starting 1818 unless otherwise noted)

Check in the county for the following vital records:

· Probate Court-birth records (1867-1908), death records (1867-1908), wills and administration of estates, marriage records, naturalization records, and guardian records. Ph: 740-342-1493 105 N. Main St., New Lexington, OH 43764

· Recorder-land deed records, mortgages, soldiers’ discharge records, soldiers’ grave records Ph: 740-342-2494 105 N. Main St., New Lexington, OH 43764

· Clerk of Courts-Common Pleas criminal cases, suits, insolvency Ph: 740-342-1022 105 N. Main St., New Lexington, OH 43764

· Health Department-births and death records after 1908 to present Ph: 740-432-5179 121 W. Brown St., New Lexington, OH 43764

· Auditor-tax records Ph: 740-342-2074 105 N. Main St., New Lexington, OH 43764

Please come to these offices prepared. These people are concerned with the present and may be too busy or not inclined to spend much time with you. They will point you in the right direction but are not there to do the work for you. The cost of copying varies from office to office and may be high.