i am, and i have.

one difficulty is that the moms are often only named by a first name.

if your native relative lived on a mission (catholic run) reserve, as mine did, the church is the place for the records.

where they have inter married with whites, the usual sources--baptisms, weddings--from churches are applicable.

the no last name thing, tho makes it very tricky. but it can also be a clue.

if you are cherokee, they have an extensive census that was taken. i can find out more about this is that is your case.

knowing the history of the particular nation can also lead to sources. if you want to brainstorm this with me, i'd be happy to help in any way.

I am also having this trouble of connecting w/ my native american roots.Unfortunately,my paternal grandmother,my link to this bloodline,died when I was infant. Her children did not bother to get as much info as possible before this happened. Result is : don't even know where to start!

I suppose this is a common problem. We have a family story from my mother's mother, that we have ancestry going back to the Mohawk nation ... probably prior to the Civil War. Does anyone have any resources to the use of genetics to research this? Mitochondrial DNA will not help as I am male, I have no maternal line sisters, and my mother is dead. Y Chromosome DNA does not help as the native american ancestry (if it's there) does not come from the male line. I'd follow the thread if I knew where to pick it up. I'm hoping that DNA markers will be helpful.

really, the nuts and bolt thing to do is to to find out those family names and trace back the birth, death, wedding, and baptismal records. a website like ancestry.com, while it charges a fee, is linked to an amazing amount of documents and information. the mormon church, latter day saints, have an extensive database. it is a matter of getting the names and the states they lived in and threading your way back. very basic really.

That's right, Rose. How do we spell genealogy?

P-A-T-I-E-N-C-E !!!

like a puzzle. lie unravelling a big mess of yarn. takes time and detective skills but it is fun. you can also pay someone to do the work for you too.

Oh, what yarns our genealogy weaves

When we follow lineage our ancestors conceived

We start with yarn tangled and knotted together

And end with the story of a well knitted sweater.