Genealogy & Family History 21/07/14

On Monday, Irvine Seagate Rotary had a talk on genealogy and family history from Rotarian Alex Blair, a past president of Largs & North Ayrshire Family History Society. 

Genealogy creates the basic family tree, but family history fills in all of the details about individuals and makes it more interesting and personal.  There is a large amount of information available from statutory records and other sources, many accessible on line, but anyone thinking of looking into their past should start right away by talking to their older relations and recording their memories and family stories.  Make sure with their help that everyone in old family pictures is identified, otherwise in another generation they will just be anonymous faces in old Victorian photos. 

Alex had many stories and interesting details and coincidences he had discovered during his research, and at question time after the talk his audience had an equal number of their own anecdotes and experiences.  Eventually an vote of thanks was proposed by Hugh Hutchison.