Some folks make up a lot of their heritage as they go along. It is always amazing to me to listen to some folks expound on their family history from one occasion to another. Here in North Carolina, it is not uncommon to find families whose Scottish heritage takes on the trappings of royalty, depicting every clan as directly descended from Bonnie Prince Charlie himself. Other folks claim high-ranking descendants from various European families, African chieftains, and Asian princes. Ironically, these same folks say we should have stricter immigration laws.
Some folks get deathly serious about their ancestors.
However, genealogical searches are usually done by a member of the family being researched. For some unexplained reason, that person is usually an unmarried female cousin or an aunt. It was in my family. Appropriately, Cousin Helen was a librarian, someone not unaccustomed to looking through indices of names and familiar with the methodology of research. These seekers of pedigree can be found in the Register of Deeds office, in the newspaper archives and more recently, on the Internet.