Central Midwest Northeast Southeast by Alan Ross Joanne Cooper and her autograph book. These are questions some of us will ask ourselves or our oldest living relative at some point or another.
Genealogy is both a study of history and a resolution of one's personal quest.
Almost anything with nostalgic attachment can act as a touchstone triggering a desire to look into one's past. For Joanne Cooper of North Ferrisburg, Vt., it was an old autograph book from her mother's family in Pennsylvania that, incredibly, she wound up buying at eBay, the Internet auction site. The precious artifact contained not only her mother's and father's signatures before they were married but those of her grandparents and great-grandparents. The find launched an inquiry for Cooper into the great wide world of genealogy. My first efforts were mostly hunting and pecking.