Using Facebook as a Genealogy Tool
Jeanne Rollberg recently wrote a post called Harness Social Media to Connect to your Ancestors World. http://blog.ancestorcloud.com/2017/03/23/harness-social-media-to-connect-to-your-ancestors-world/
I can personally attest to the power of Social Media in genealogy.
In 2010, I started a Facebook Group for Cubba and Fiantaco genealogy. I was hoping to connect with my relatives across the United States. I purposefully set up the group with my family’s American names (instead of Cuba and Fiandaca) to make it easier for people to find it. Initially, the group’s members were just my children, siblings and a few local cousins. In 2011, a 2nd cousin in Minnesota discovered the group and soon more members of his family joined. Other cousins trickled in over the years and we started sharing photos and family stories.
On Christmas Eve, 2016, I got a request from a man in Belgium with the last name Cubba to join the group. Curious, I added him to the group and asked how he was related to us. To my astonishment, I discovered that he was my 2nd cousin, once removed! I learned that after the Second World War, the Belgian and French governments recruited Italians to work in the mines. His brother and cousin, who lives in France, also joined the group. More importantly, this connection has allowed me to fill in a huge gap in my family tree because I had next to no information for that branch.
If you are interested in using Facebook as a genealogy tool, I encourage you to look at Katherine Willson’s Genealogy on Facebook list https://socialmediagenealogy.com/genealogy-on-facebook-list/. Who knows? You may connect with long lost relative too! Buona fortuna!
Storie Di Famiglia 