Follow Friday or why I think Genes Reunited is essential for family history research

Again, I am taking inspiration for this blog post from @geneablogger.

For Follow Friday you 'create a post in which you recommend another genealogy blogger, specific blog post, a genealogy website or a genealogy resource.'

There is only one resource that I always refer to, and always maintain my subscription to (all £19.90 of it per year), and that is Genes Reunited.

In case you are new to family history research, or are not aware of Genes Reunited, here is the link - www.genesreunited.co.uk

Now, Genes Reunited have added a few features in recent years such as searching records and, I think, they have a community board but I have never used these features. I probably do not use Genes Reunited as it was, and is, intended.

You are also able to build your family tree in Genes Reunited. Again, I don't use it properly and I barely have 10% of my tree in it. This is rather lazy of me and it is good job the rest of the members of Genes Reunited don't take the same approach, otherwise I would not have had so much success with it. It is the family trees that makes Genes Reunited THE most value resource (IMO) for finding Living Relatives.

Anytime, I am faced with a new name, new branch of the family or am helping someone with their research I start off with a search of the family trees within Genes Reunited.

I have just reviewed my contacts list and I have found at least 16 living relatives over 11 branches of my family in the time I have been with Genes Reunited (my first message was sent in October 2007). I have not attempted to count the number of living relatives I have found for friends when I have helped them with their research. So for me Genes Reunited is an essential tool for researching family history as it is gives you the easiest access to living relatives.

There is only one thing that I find frustrating with Genes Reunited and that is sometimes you know there is connection with another member of Genes Reunited but you do not get a reply from them. I suspect that non family historians add their family details to Genes Reunited and then forget about it, change email address and then it is almost impossible to make contact. I am on the trail of one such case now but I'll leave that for another post.