Do you have a story of strong emotions arising from genealogical research?

Have you been known to tear up, perhaps with joy, perhaps with sadness, at something you’ve experienced while exploring your family history? Have you run into the bizarre, baffling or hilarious? If so Toronto genealogist Paul Jones,  “Roots” columnist for Canada’s History magazine, would love to hear from you.

Here Paul gives the details.

I’m inviting members of various genealogical groups to share their experiences for an upcoming “Roots” column in Canada’s History magazine. John Reid and his Canada’s Anglo-Celtic Connections blog are supporting the project.

The goal is to explore the extremes of emotions triggered during genealogical research, whether by unexpected findings, out-of-the ordinary interactions with others, the unintended consequences of your actions, whatever… To that end, I welcome your stories of “The Good, the Bad and the Ridiculous of Family History”

The Good: The most pleasant, satisfying or exciting moment that you’ve experienced as a result of doing family history.

The Bad: The most annoying, humiliating or upsetting.

The Ridiculous: The most bizarre, baffling or hilarious.

In the magazine column, which will appear during the summer, I will select and describe one exemplar in each category. I also plan to find another platform, perhaps online, for a lengthier analysis of the submissions.

If you have one or more experiences you’d be happy to share, drop me a line at pauljones@rogers.com indicating for each story whether good, bad or ridiculous. And, yes, a single-story could conceivably fall into a couple of categories.

Should your anecdote be chosen for commentary, please advise whether you’d prefer to be identified by your full name, your initials or Anonymous. (If you’d like to submit anonymously, feel free to do so, e.g., via a non-identifying Hotmail or Gmail account.)

You don’t need to provide more than 100 words per story. Point form will do if your feelings and the reasons for them are clear. I’ll get back to you if there’s something I don’t understand.

Best wishes. I look forward to hearing your stories.