Luring my Grandson into Genealogy

 My grandson Victor, who is now 20 years old, has always wanted to hear family stories, especially stories of the years my husband and I spent in the U.S. Coast Guard.  I have told him other family stories, as well.

He visited me a couple weeks ago or so, looking for instruction on how to apply the standards in the section of the Chicago Manual of Style on source citations for one of his college classes.  He had a paper to write, and needed the format for writing his source citations.  He mentioned that he had another paper to write, and would have to pick a topic.

Aha! thinks wily grandma.  Maybe I can get him interested in genealogy.  So I suggested that he write his paper on how to begin investigating one's family history.  Not a recitation of his family history, though he might include some examples therefrom, but the how-to of beginning to gather documentation, analyze it, and draw conclusions from it.  He said he would have to run that by his professor.

He called today and said the professor had given him the green light.  So he will be over sometime during the week or the weekend, and we'll talk about it.  I have a one-lesson talk called "Bare Bones," which gives the most basic information about the subject.  I think I'll use that as a basis for instructing him on how to do this.

And I'll give him a few family stories, too.  Not for the paper, but as an incentive to him to think about delving into his family history.