Question

How long did it take for you to find a connection?

Comments

I had it already when I joined and uploaded my gedcom, but disconnected very soon after and spent a year off wikitree proving it (thoroughly sourcing every person) before I came back and set to linking it back into the tree, person by person source by source. Gosh that was a great day! Until I came here I never use to keep my sources you see!! Learned the hard way!

Good luck connecting to the tree Dennis :)

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I started to put my familytreein Wikitree because I knew in the past a familymember had emigrated from the Netherlands to the USA. I hoped it would bring me into contact with descendants from him.

After four weeks I got an Email from a familymember in the Netherlands who told they had met some americans in the local restaurant who were looking for the place their family originated from. They happened to be the looked for descendant.

Via facebook I contacted them and other familymembers in the USA and one of them had a familytree in Wikitree. We could connect them. Just had to merge two profiles because of different spellings of names which due to that hadn't come up as matches.

So a bit more than four weeks.

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Thank you all for responding. I now know that it may take many years to make connections even with 5,000 person in my Gedcom.

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Actually we've just connected you now through the Earp family. Tomorrow you'll see the links at the bottom of your profile page showing connections to this week's featured profiles.

Answer 1

I would have guessed longer but after creating eight profiles I ran into a gedcom dump with my GG grandfather. Not sure if that connected me to the big tree but that was the first one already created.

The first really interesting surprise was connecting through my great uncle's wife to the Victors of Hilo (royal hobnobbers) at one end and Keanu Reeves at the other. My blood relatives pretty much all had to marry up to get to the interesting people!

Answer 2

Actually I was lucky.

When I joined Wikitree, the profile of the week was someone famous who happened to have married a woman who was my fathers cousin. So it did not take me long (An hour or two) to build my tree to get to my dads cousin and link my family to her and famous spouse.

If it were not for that famous notable, it is possible that I would never have joined Wiktree at all.

Answer 3

Still waiting, I fully believe my connection will be through a French profile so I guess I haven't gone back far enough yet.

Answer 4

Months and months! Can't remember exactly how many but probably 8 or so, working like a trojan every day.

Answer 5

Within minutes! My mother had already been added along with her father's ancestors back many generations in Sweden. And then several times on my paternal grandmother's side as I entered her genealogy from a family book. I just joined a month ago and this has really motivated me to keep working to fill out my tree because it's not just my family, but others who also care about these people too.

Answer 6

I don't remember how long, but I think it was with my first gedcom.  I found numerous lines that connected to the tree that I needed to fill in.  It seems no one is researching any of my lines at all.  I also found my uncle just rolling around under the tree's branches.  His profile was created from an obituary, so I hooked him right on up!

Answer 7

I put my direct ancestors in one at a time and it only took a day or two before I connected to an ancestor already in wikitree. I've been going a year now..and probably connected up to 4 or 5 lines already here...some are obvious gedcom dumps and need a lot more work.

Answer 8

The more you add to your tree, the more likely you are to connect, but there are strategies to increase your chances of finding connections.

Peruse the Surname Genealogy lists and categories for cemeteries and towns to see if they contain relatives -- or people who could be your relatives. Example: I clicked on the hyperlink for Earp in the profile you created for Abednego Earp. That took me to the surname page for Earp, which is https://www.wikitree.com/genealogy/EARP . I sorted that page by birthdate so I could focus on the time period when that man's parents and siblings might have lived, and I skimmed that part of the list. The profile https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Earp-344 jumped off the page -- an existing profile for your Abednego Earp. Merge the two duplicate profiles, and you'll be connected! (Paula Cullen proposed the merge, but you would need to approve it if you agree that these are the same person.)

Help your cousins find your ancestors (this is called "Cousin Bait"). Add location information, alternative name spellings, etc., to the profile data fields; put the profiles in cemetery and location categories; and fill in the biography sections of the profiles with the life details you have. The more information you provide in a profile, the more likely it is that another WikiTreer will find the profile and connect to it.

Answer 9

I added the parents of Eri Pickelsimer. I recognized the names as there are Picklesimers and Rogers intertwined in my tree. Now you are closer to being connected as they go back pretty far.

Answer 10

I was connected to the big tree long before we had the ability to check if we were connected. First thing I did when I joined WikiTree (maybe after creating profiles of my immediate family) was get to work merging the (at the time, MANY) duplicates of my Acadian ancestors. That would have been the first place I connected to existing profiles.

Answer 11

Yost Henckel is now your 6th GGF which means that you and Carrie Fisher are 7th cousins!   https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Henckel-1

Answer 12

The only time it took was the time to add profiles of my direct ancestors that were descendants of a person I found on Wikitree before I joined.  I already knew of my connection to him and his ancestors, and I had a lot of fun using the relationship calculator and connection calculator to connect him to pretty much anybody.  That's what convinced me to create an account and add my other ancestors to Wikitree.  

 After that though, I connected to another branch of my family that was already on here, I'd say either a few hours later or the next day.  

Since then though, I've added over 700 new profiles to the tree and have merged several more.  All because of my fascination with that first link! :)

Answer 13

I think it took about 8 months to connect my family. I know it took over a year for each of two different notables I worked on.

Answer 14

I joined after contacting the manager of the profile for a cousin of my grandmother, who had migrated from Switzerland to Canada and later Ohio and happened to marry the descendant of a very-well connected family. The first thing I did after joining was creating the handful of profiles from mine to the cousin in question. I've found two other connections since, but my shortest connection paths still invariably go through that first one, through the Crausaz/Obenour/Willson families.

But I was lucky. We have someone in the project who has 900+ profiles in his tree and we still can't connect him !

Answer 15

The first day I connected too a members branch thankfully. The branch needed and still needs a lot of work but it has very much improved due too hard work and collaboration since I joined in July last year. My great  aunt who is still alive at age 94(so she is not on wikitree)recorded her parents and grandparents on her fathers side,and has photos of her grandparents on her fathers side.Same with her brother Laurel who is my grandfather and the only grandparent That I had a close relationship with, growing up he told me many stories about him and his parents and grandparents,as well with photos. And I was thankfully able to verify the records of the people listed on my great aunts bible page too be correct.The ball started really rolling fast with her Grandmother "Mirillia(Youngs)Sherman" whose husband "Henry Justice Sherman" I  know the parents of and want too start working on his line as well.

As for my fathers line It's smith in 1800's New York so yeah,without leads can't verify any further into his line,the wives maiden names did not even help.