How the Journey Began

My love for genealogy has been around ever since I was a teenager. I stumbled across a packet of photocopied pedigree charts, family group sheets, family histories, and Tucker trivia that was sandwiched between two goldenrod pieces of cardstock. It was entitled "Some Tucker History" and was a compilation by my great uncle (or grand uncle) Kirtley E. Tucker of Kaysville, Utah.

I spent many hours examining the charts and reading the stories trying to figure out the relationships of each person to me and to each other. The more time I invested, the more I was hooked. And I have loved genealogy ever since. I discovered that my ancestors lived in central Utah but came from North Carolina and Maryland. The furthest back the pedigree chart went on the Tucker line was Thomas Tucker born 14 Oct 1750 in Calvert County, Maryland.

I learned how to do the basics of genealogy by trial and error. I had a few classes in college that taught me more. And I am still learning with each hour that I spend with it. One of the things that I have learned is to start from the present and work backwards - to start with what you know and what you can learn from others. At first, I had the desire to trace the Tucker line as far back as it could go. It was almost like a race to go as fast as I could. I am not sure why I had that feeling. Maybe I thought I would be the first one to discover what nobody else had found. But I soon discovered that there are plenty of mysteries to uncover along the way.

The best advice I received in my college genealogy classes was to stop at each family along the way backward in time and to gather as much information on the family as I could. This extra time with the family would build a solid foundation before continuing back another generation. Another thing that I learned was to document my findings so that I could prove relationships, events, dates, and places. It has always bothered me about my ancestor Thomas Tucker. How do I know that he is my ancestor? I am trusting that whoever provided the information had proved that relationship, but I don't know what that proof is. What I like to do is to pick an ancestor and gather enough information to get a copy of his death, then marriage, and then birth certificate. I use US Federal Census records to find locations and other members of the family.

In future blogs I will post the documents or transcriptions or abstracts for what I find. I am still trying to figure out what things are copyrighted and what things are public access.