Fifty years ago, the award-winning musical The Sound of Music premiered on the big screen. Even today, the musical story based on the real von Trapp family, continues to delight and entertain audiences. The real von Trapp family / Library of Congress The film starred Julie Andrews as the governess, Maria, and Christopher Plummer as Captain Georg von Trapp. The filmmakers took some creative liberties with the story, changing some facts to dramatize the family’s eventual flight from… Read the full story

Are you searching for your Irish ancestors? With millions of vital historical records destroyed and droves of Irish immigrants settled all over the world, many people researching their Irish heritage may find it to be a frustrating and challenging pursuit. In the U.S. alone, there are over 36 million people with Irish ancestry. That’s over eight times the population of Ireland! Here are a few tips to help you with your Irish genealogy research: Talk to your relatives – The… Read the full story

The Global Family Reunion is only a few months away! Will you be there? We’re excited to let you know that the Global Family Reunion has launched a crowdfunding campaign with two very important goals in mind: unite the world and battle Alzheimer’s. Throwing the epic family get-together is best-selling author A.J. Jacobs, and he’s inviting all 7 billion of his cousins to come to what will be the largest, most inclusive family reunion in history. The event… Read the full story

Today we are delighted to announce a long awaited new feature on Geni – adoption! We are releasing a great enhancement to the family tree that will allow you to show adoptive, foster and biological parent relationships when viewing your family on Geni. There are three changes you will notice in the tree view: You can now add parents to a profile that already has parents. A profile with multiple sets of parents will now… Read the full story

On February 27, 2015, the world lost beloved actor Leonard Nimoy. He was 83. With a career that spanned over 60 years, Leonard will perhaps always be remembered for his iconic portrayal of Mr. Spock on Star Trek. In honor of his memory, here are some things about his life you may not have known: Image: Wikimedia Commons 1. Leonard was born on March 26, 1931 in Boston, Massachusetts. He grew up in Boston’s West End and sold newspapers… Read the full story

It’s finally the end of February! Check out our recap of some of the most interesting articles from this month: 10 Odd Jobs From the World War II Military Classification Guide / mental_floss The Genealogy Sphere 10 Odd Jobs From the World War II Military Classification Guide (mental_floss) – Interesting list of odd jobs from WWII Whatever happened to ‘Cateryn, Jayne and Amee’? (DailyMail UK) – Haunting graffiti scrawled by tragic young sisters found on… Read the full story

Geni is the perfect place to collaborate on your family tree with your family. The easiest way to do that is to invite your relatives to join so they can contribute and help preserve your family history. But did you know you can also share your tree with other people not on Geni? Geni enables you to share a limited read-only view of your tree with your friends outside of Geni, either by sending them a link… Read the full story

Remember those school projects about your family history? Whether it was writing a story or mapping out your family tree, you’ve likely taken that dip into our family’s past in school. When Geni Curator Randy Schoenberg’s son, Joey, came home with such a project, Randy saw it as a great opportunity to make some new family connections. With the news that his son’s fifth-grade class was participating in the worldwide “My Family Story” competition sponsored by Beit Hatfusot, the Museum of the… Read the full story

What an amazing few days at RootsTech! This year saw the largest crowd ever with over 20,000 genealogists and family historians coming together for the largest genealogy conference in the world. The Geni and MyHeritage teams together again It was wonderful to be together again with our MyHeritage family, many of whom flew in from across the world! With offices in Israel, Utah and California, it’s a rare treat to have this many of us together in… Read the full story

Valentine’s Day is just around the corner! Will you be sending a Valentine to a special someone? If you need a little bit of inspiration, check out these Valentine’s Day greetings from the early 20th century: Will You Be Mine? Library of Congress, 1919 To My Valentine Library of Congress, 1919 Funny Valentine National Library of Norway, c.1900 Say You’ll Be Mine “Pray Sweetheart, send me just a line to say you’ll be my Valentine.” Library… Read the full story