I have read several blogs about people who started getting interested in family history in school when they were required to provide information for a class project. Unfortunately, my school never did that in any of the classes I attended. So many of you have had the chance to hear the stories from your family that will help in your search for your ancestors and add that "extra special" content to your genealogy research.
Most of my family passed away when I was young and my father passed away in 1999, which is before the genealogy bug bit me. My father was an only child and his father was an only child, therefore, I don't have anyone to provide me with those fun and interesting "family stories" on my father's side of the family (Modrell).
Please talk to your ancestors while you can, while they are still alive and able to give you all the fun and interesting information which will add some much needed "meat" to the "bones" of your family history. I think we can all agree that "just the facts ma'am" is boring - necessary, but still very boring.
There are a lot of great websites which provide questions to ask your family members to get their minds flowing with information. Just be sure to write the information as they provide it, or record that information and transcribe it as soon as you can thereafter. That way, your memory is fresh in cases where it is hard to hear what was said, which will prevent you from having to revisit that same question/answer in the future.
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