What are the Advantages and disadvantages of a family tree?

Answer 1

The pros for having a Family tree (doing some genealogy) is to find out more about your past and to see how your great grandparents lived, what your great grandfather did for a living, etc. You may get lucky and have some pictures of them as well. I just did one up for my husband's sister and she was so thrilled to get it. It took me months to do it. I was able to search for information, but also have an 80 year old aunt that had so many wonderful pictures of past relatives of the family to the present and she told me stories about them which I included in my sister-in-law's album. The cons are that you will probably have loads of skeletons fall out of the family closet. LOL Personally I rather enjoy a little bit about that. I did a genealogy on my family and found out one of my aunts was having an affair (had a daughter by her lover) while her husband who was captain of a vessel went down with his ship. Certainly not funny, but it amazed me the family kept such a juicy piece of news from me! LOL I really dont think there are any disadvantages to a family tree unless you are ashamed of your family. Family history is cool and important to know. Tracing your families roots can tell you alot about how your family was established and where they laid there hats, it can also give you insight into how and why some in the family do the things they do. I agree with the first contributor as far as skeletons in the closet. I always though my maternal grandfather had died soon after my mother was born since no one ever talked about him. Through research for my family roots, I discovered that my grandmother and grandfather divorced shortly after my mother was born and he marrid another woman and had another family with her. Some relatives on my grandfather's side did not even know we existed until three years ago LOL. Also, one disadvantage is having more than one relative with the same name. My grandfather, great-grandfather, and great-great-grandfather had the same name - no JR or SR or otherwise! I always thought my grandfather had emigrated from Germany until I discovered he was born in TX, my great-grandfather was born in Germany and emigrated here as a young man with his father, whose name appears on the list of German immigrants in 1865. Talk about confusion during my quest LOL.