Prospective of the Son of a Genealogy Enthusiast

As a young man I can remember my mother pouring over census records printouts which she got from a long distance pen pal with whom she corroborated her genealogical studies. Sometimes I would be dragged down to the library to accompany her in her search through public records on microfilm. I can remember when I first learned about email and how it worked; this is because it was when my mother first started using email to connect with many more of those long distance corroborators. Then came the clunky software “Ancestral File” which was a database full of previously indexed records which came from microfilm and the likes from all over the world. I remember participating in an Eagle Scout service project in which we spent hours taking down names and dates on tombstones and then entering these vital bits of information into an online database. I have watched my mother in every phase of her genealogical revolution and the work to be done becomes easier and easier as technology advances. FamilySearch.org provides a wonderful service which is a culmination of these genealogical and technological advancements. It is hard to think of a way that one could say these advancements have a negative side. Perhaps only because of the lost opportunities to create memories spending hours in the dark corners of the library or in a cemetery looking for your ancestral links.