Family circles shrink.
Sometimes they seem to disappear. It might be scary to find out what unknown creatures are swinging from your family tree. American Demographics magazine estimates that more than 10 million people spend at least six hours a week retracing their past, making genealogy one of America's favorite pastimes. Alex Haley's book and television miniseries Roots ignited a genealogy boom about two decades ago. Haley spent 15 years plowing through research libraries and archives, finding the birth certificates, property deeds and ship's manifest that finally led him from a slave plantation in Virginia to his homeland in Africa.