SGS member Mary Gill’s interest in family research has spanned more than 40 years.  She recalls the ‘early years’ when she and her husband spent evenings after a dinner out, with a stop at the Morman Church library or genealogy society to research their respective families.  Today, a cabinet in her home displays a total of 14 comprehensive binders of their research. Their children and grandchildren also possess a keen interest in their family history records.

Recently, Mary was surprised to learn her neighbor Cassandra knew very little of her father other than his name on her birth certificate. Having grown up in Shreveport Louisiana, she knew the maiden names of her mother and grandmother, but little else. When she was 6 years old, her grandmother died, then at 19 her mother died. Despite this limited amount of information, Mary began her research utilizing Ancestry.com and Family Tree to discovery Cassandra’s heritage.  Census records were particularly helpful with identifying race for family members. With determination, Mary traced Cassandra’s lineage back to the 1830’s, discovering her great-great-great-great-grandparents and used Family Tree to create a pedigree chart.

Cassandra was overcome with emotion when viewing the chart with names of family members she was seeing for the first time.

Stay tuned as we follow Mary’s path into her continuing research to reveal more of Cassandra’s family history.