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Closing Out Another Year

Each year I spend ten months on genealogical research. I choose an ancestor as my annual project. Then I learn everything I can about him or her. At year’s end, I assemble the information and mail it around to relatives.

I began with more recent ancestors and worked backwards over the years. I have completed character sketches and photo collections for seven of my great-grandparents and their parents. This year I turned to the generation of my 3rd great-grandparents.

I spent most of this year working on Finnish lines, those ancestors of my 2nd great-grandparents Matti Lampinen (1835-1894) and Anna Miettinen (1832-?). Recently-discovered cousins in Finland who also descend from this couple have posted this family tree on the WikiTree website. Now I have most of it in my database, too.

Over the next couple of weeks, I will complete the data entry. The information consists of only the usual names, dates, and places. The family stories we all want to learn have not been preserved on WikiTree, and my family did not save them.

Finnish records available to me can shed no additional light on the lives of these ancestors. I have only church records to look at—birth/marriage/death lists and communion books that list family groups.

I cannot write any interesting character sketches from these basic facts. I will not send around a family story this year.

In its place I can create a massive family tree poster that reaches back into the late 17th century. I can also reproduce photos of family members who remained in Finland when my great-grandmother Ada Alina Lampinen (1879-1948) emigrated to America.

When the calendar turns to November, I will begin creating this year’s family history gift. It will go out with my Christmas cards in December.

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