Discover Photos of Your Ancestors

FamilySearch has a really cool feature.  If someone else has uploaded photos of your ancestors (your grandparents, great-grandparents, great-great grandparents, or their families), they will show up in a section under "Memories" called "People".

BTW, let me explain that FamilySearch groups the user contributed photos, stories, and documents under the heading of "memories."   The idea is that all of these are things that help us capture our memories of our ancestors and family members.

To get there, hold your mouse over the word "Memories" in the header and click on an option called "People."

When you click on that link, you will be taken to this page, which groups photos of your ancestors by person.

On this page, the memories (photos, stories, and documents) are grouped by person so each person above has at least one photo, document, or story, but may have many photos.

All of the people on this page that have a yellow banner across the bottom of the photo are ones where all of the "memories" for the person were uploaded by other people.

I clicked on Emma Louise Taylor and found others have uploaded eight photos of her.

Here, I can look at each photo in more detail by clicking on a photo.  I can also click "Linked to <person's name>, in this case "Linked to Emma Louise Taylor," and it will pop up some information and allow me to go see them in the Family Tree.

I can also click on the blue link called "View my relationship."  This shows me graphically how I am related to this person.  In this case, she is one of the wives of my great-great grandfather.

Go check out the memories option and see if others have uploaded photos, stories, or documents of your ancestors.  You may be surprised by what is already there.  Go ahead and post in the comments if you find something really neat or unexpected.

Getting Started in Family History

I am putting this blog together to help members of our ward, or anyone for that matter, learn how to do family history and use FamilySearch.org.  This opinions and information in this blog are my personal views and are not intended or represented as official views of FamilySearch.org or The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or any other company or website I write about.

For questions about information on this website, please contact Brian Edwards, bljedwards<at>gmail.com.

A question people commonly ask is “Where do I start or what should I do first?”  Believe it or not, I am not going to suggest you start entering data into the family tree.  In Doctrine and Covenants (and in similar verses in Malachi and a few other places), we read this:

1. Behold, I will reveal unto you the Priesthood, by the hand of Elijah the prophet, before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord.

2. And he shall plant in the hearts of the children the promises made to the fathers, and the hearts of the children shall turn to their fathers.

3. If it were not so, the whole earth would be utterly wasted at his coming.

So, part of the work of salvation is to turn our hearts to our fathers, or ancestors.  This is where we need to start. 

In the Family History Department, this is often referred to as “hearts before charts.”  That’s catchy but what does it mean?  How do we turn our hearts to our ancestors?

Turning our hearts to our ancestors means getting to know them, as real people, not just as names on a pedigree chart.  It means learning a little about who they were, what they did, or their situation.

I would suggest you gather your family and, if you can, talk to your parents or grandparents.  Ask them what life was like as they were growing up.  Ask them about how they met, what they did for a living, or anything else that interests you.  Then, ask them about their parents and brothers and sisters.  See if they have photos of these people.

Then, gather some of these photos and capture some of these stories and add them to FamilySearch.  Don’t worry if the temple work for these people is already done. The goal right now is to turn our hearts to our ancestors and begin to preserve some of these memories for our children and grandchildren.  To remember and memorialize who they were.