My third great grandfather, Samuel William Settles | GenQuestDiary

My third great grandfather, Samuel William Settles | GenQuestDiary

Here's another one of my blogs; sometimes I use a blog to try and work things out on paper; rewriting your research as a narrative gives you a great setting for doing just that.  Of course, some software programs will do that for you, but you usually can save that as a document and edit it.

Ancestry.com will also "write your story for you", in the sense that they take all of the information you have put in, including facts generated by the documentation you've added in the process of utilizing the web site.

But, I promise you, whichever method you use to accomplish this, telling a story about your ancestor isn't just a tool for reviewing the research you've done, it's the end result of what we want to accomplish.  All the charts and research and relationships have to come together on a stage, on the stage of life.  I can look now at my blog about Samuel W. Settles and see, already, that I am not there, yet.  It lacks a lot!  So, back to the drawing board, folks.  I'm hoping I can pull out a rabbit or two and get a better grip on who great great great grandpa was.