Thought about using social media to help your family history research but don’t know where to start?
Worried by doom-laden headlines about social media?
This five part series of articles will take take you through the basics – from creating an account, to posting safely, to making the most of social media
Connecting with the Past – Social Media for Family Historians – Part 1
Is it safe? The truth about social media for family historians
You may have seen the headlines. “Facebook sells your data.” “Scammers target older users online.” “Identity theft is on the rise.” If stories like these have put you off joining any social media platform, you are certainly not alone – and your caution is not unreasonable. But there is a strong case that for family historians in particular, the benefits of getting online are substantial, and the risks – if you follow a few straightforward guidelines – are very manageable. There are strong social benefits from these platforms too because they allow you to engage with others who share your interests, from the comfort of your home. This is a real bonus if the passage of time has left you with some mobility issues.
This article is the first in a short series about how social media can really help your family history research. Before we get to the exciting part, though, we want to address the fears head-on, because they need addressing.
The single most important distinction
The first thing to understand is the difference between reading and participating. Most people assume that joining a platform like Facebook means broadcasting your life to the world. In reality, you can join, set your privacy to maximum, and spend years reading fascinating discussions, watching helpful videos, and following organisations you care about – without ever posting a single word yourself.
Think of it like attending a public meeting, or one of our Zoom talks. You do not have to contribute to benefit from being there.
What you actually need to share
To create a Facebook account, you need:
- A first name (it does not have to be your full legal name – many people use a nickname or initial for a surname)
- An email address (a free Gmail or similar address works perfectly well, and keeps your main address separate)
- A date of birth (Facebook requires you to be over 13, but it is not verified and does not need to be accurate to the day, or even the year and month)
- A password
That is genuinely it. You do not need to provide your phone number, your address, your workplace, your relationship status, or a photograph of yourself. Every field beyond the essentials is optional, and you can leave them all blank.
Locking down your privacy
Once you have created an account, the next step – before you do anything else – is to visit the Privacy Settings. On Facebook, these are found in the menu under Settings & Privacy. The key settings to change are:
- Who can see your future posts? Set this to “Only me” or “Friends” – never “Public”
- Who can send you friend requests? Set to “Friends of friends” rather than “Everyone”
- Do you want search engines to link to your profile? Turn this off
- Who can look you up using your email address or phone number? Set both to “Only me”
With these settings in place, a stranger searching for you will find nothing. Your profile will be effectively invisible to anyone you have not chosen to connect with.
Five things you never need to share
Wherever you are online, these rules will serve you well:
- Your full date of birth. Month and year are more than enough for any platform that requires it and, for extra security, you don’t even have to use your real birth date.
- Your home address. No legitimate social media platform needs to know where you live.
- Your financial details. Social media platforms will never ask for bank or card details. If something does, it is a scam.
- Your passwords. No one legitimate will ever ask for these.
- Personal details in public posts. Even in a genealogy discussion, there is no need to share information about living relatives – stick to the ancestors.
What about scammers?
Scammers do exist on social media, just as they exist on the telephone and in the post. The good news is that the tactics are easy to recognise once you know them:
- Unexpected friend requests from people you do not know, often with sparse profiles and suspiciously attractive photographs. Simply ignore them.
- Messages from “Facebook” or “your bank” telling you there is a problem with your account and asking you to click a link. Legitimate organisations do not contact you this way. Go directly to the website yourself rather than clicking any link.
- Prize notifications informing you that you have won something you never entered. Delete and move on.
The key insight is this: a scammer can only harm you if you engage with them. Ignoring an approach costs you nothing. The adage ‘If it looks too good to be true, it probably is’ is very relevant on social media.
A word about X (formerly Twitter)
X requires even less than Facebook to get started – just an email address and a username. Many people use X purely as a reading tool, following organisations and individuals whose posts interest them, without ever posting anything themselves. If the idea of Twitter-style public posting makes you uncomfortable, that is completely fine – you can follow @BerkshireFHS and other accounts of interest while remaining entirely silent. No one will know you are there. From the society’s perspective, we are present on X because organisations such as WhatsOn Reading are there too, and they frequently repost our posts, which allows us to reach a wider audience.
The bottom line
Social media is a tool, and like any tool it can be used well or badly. Used with a little care and the right privacy settings, it opens up a remarkable world of research, community, and shared enthusiasm for family history. The rest of this series will show you what that world looks like – and we think you may be pleasantly surprised.
There is a longer-term benefit worth mentioning too. Once you follow an organisation like BerksFHS on any platform, the platform itself begins to show you related content – other groups, pages, and accounts that overlap with your interests. You do not have to go looking. Over time, simply being present builds a spider’s web of connections to family history topics, local history, heritage organisations, and fellow researchers, all delivered into your feed without you having to lift a finger. What starts as following one page quietly becomes a rich and personalised window onto a world you may not have known existed.
Next issue: Following BerksFHS – what you are missing on our own channels.
Connecting with the Past – Social Media for Family Historians – Part 2
Following BerksFHS – What You Are Missing
In the last issue, we looked at how to get started on social media safely and with confidence. This time, we want to focus closer to home – on a few of the channels that Berkshire Family History Society runs, and what you will find if you choose to follow us. We’ll start with the main ones and tell you about the others in a later article.
We are not a large organisation with a dedicated social media team. We are, like everything at BerksFHS, run entirely by volunteers. But we do maintain several online spaces, and each one serves a slightly different purpose. Here is a guide to what is where, and what you will get from each.
The BerksFHS Facebook Group – ‘Berkshire Genealogy’
The Facebook Group Berkshire Genealogy is open to members and non-members alike. This is our most conversational space – the online equivalent of chatting at one of our events or meetings. It has existed for many years, facilitated by a couple of our volunteers who do a great job.
What you will find there:
- Queries and discussions. Members post research questions – “Has anyone come across the Higgs family in Newbury in the 1840s?” or “I can’t make out this word in a burial register – can anyone help?” – and other members respond. The collective knowledge in a group like this is genuinely impressive.
- Interesting finds. Members share photographs, transcriptions, and discoveries that they think others will enjoy.
- News and links. Relevant articles, newly released record sets, and items of local historical interest get shared here.
- A friendly atmosphere. This is worth emphasising. Family history communities tend to be extraordinarily welcoming, because everyone has been a bewildered beginner at some point.
You do not need to post to benefit from the group. Many members read along quietly for months before they pluck up the courage to post a query – and when they do, they are rarely disappointed.
The BerksFHS Facebook Page – ‘Berkshire Family History Society’
The Facebook Page is a different beast from the Group. Where the Group is a conversation, the Page is more like a noticeboard. It is where you will find:
- Events posted automatically as we add them to our calendar – talks, workshops, fairs, and social events.
- Society announcements and news.
- Links to articles and resources we think members will find useful.
The Page is public, which means you do not even need a Facebook account to read it – you can visit it directly in a web browser. However, if you follow the Page while logged into Facebook, new posts will appear in your feed automatically, which is much more convenient than remembering to check.
The BerksFHS Forum
Our website includes a long-established members’ Forum, which you can find at berksfhs.org – use the menu option Community > Community (Forum). This is perhaps the least well-known of our online spaces, and it deserves more attention than it gets.
The Forum is better suited to longer, more in-depth discussions than social media. If you have a complex research problem you would like to work through in detail, or if you want to search back through previous discussions on a topic, the Forum is the place to go. Unlike a Facebook group, where older posts gradually disappear from view, Forum threads stay organised and searchable.
Every member has automatic access to the Forum – there is no need to register separately.
Which should you choose?
You do not have to choose just one – but if you are new to all of this and want to start somewhere, we would suggest:
- Start with the Facebook Page (Berkshire Family History Society). You can read it without an account, and following it will keep you up to date with events.
- When you feel ready, join the Facebook Group (Berkshire Genealogy). Even as a quiet reader, you will find it rewarding.
- Explore the Forum if you have a research question that would benefit from a longer discussion.
In a later article we will introduce you to the full range of platforms where BerksFHS has a presence – there are more than you might expect. But these three are the best place to start.
In the next article, we will venture beyond BerksFHS and explore the much wider world of family history communities online.
Next issue: Beyond BerksFHS – the family history internet.
Connecting with the Past – Social Media for Family Historians – Part 3
Beyond BerksFHS – The Family History Internet
So far in this series we have talked about safety, privacy, and our own BerksFHS channels. This time, we want to open a much bigger door.
The internet – and social media in particular – has transformed family history research over the past decade. The days when progress meant a long drive to a county record office, followed by hours squinting at microfilm, are not entirely gone, but they have been supplemented by something extraordinary: a global community of researchers, specialists, and enthusiasts who are often willing to help complete strangers unravel their family mysteries.
What follows is a tour of some of the best places to explore – all of it available from your armchair.
Facebook groups for family historians
Facebook hosts thousands of groups dedicated to genealogy, and the quality of many of them is remarkably high. Here are some categories worth exploring:
County and local history groups
There are active groups dedicated to Berkshire history, Berkshire ancestors, and specific towns and villages within the county. These are invaluable if you are trying to understand the world your ancestors lived in – local knowledge that simply cannot be found in any national database. Search Facebook for “Berkshire ancestors” or “Berkshire local history” and you will find several options.
Beyond Berkshire, every county has its equivalent. If your research takes you to Wiltshire, Somerset, or anywhere else, there will be a group for it.
Occupational history groups
If your ancestors worked in a particular industry, there are groups dedicated to exactly that. Railway workers, agricultural labourers, servants in country houses, watermen on the Thames, coal miners, lacemakers – specialist groups exist for all of these and many more. Members often have access to records, knowledge, and contacts that go far beyond what any general genealogy database offers.
DNA and genetic genealogy
If you have taken a DNA test with Ancestry or another provider, you may have found the results simultaneously fascinating and bewildering. Genetic genealogy has its own vocabulary and its own logic, and it can take time to understand what your matches actually mean.
Facebook groups dedicated to genetic genealogy are enormously helpful here. There are general groups for DNA beginners, groups specific to each testing company, and specialist groups for techniques like chromosome mapping and identifying unknown parentage. Members range from absolute beginners to highly experienced researchers who volunteer their time to help others work through their results.
A good starting point is searching Facebook for “genetic genealogy” – you will find several large, active, and welcoming groups. Tip: Debbie Kennett, one of the volunteers that facilitates our Facebook Group, is a DNA expert and author. Debbie also runs our quarterly DNA Special Interest Group – an online meeting/workshop where you can get your questions answered. Check our What’s On listing on the website or look out for our newsletters. We will also post details of the next event on our Facebook Page.
Photo identification and restoration
This is one of the genuine delights of online family history communities. Groups dedicated to old photograph identification – working out when a photo was taken from the clothing, hairstyles, and photographic format – can help you date an undated portrait with surprising accuracy. Members include professional photographers, costume historians, and enthusiastic amateurs with decades of experience.
More recently, groups focused on AI-assisted photo restoration have emerged. Free and low-cost tools now exist that can restore damaged photographs, repair tears and foxing, and even add colour to black-and-white images with impressive results. If you have a box of old family photographs in poor condition, these communities can show you what is possible.
Search Facebook for “photo detective genealogy” or “genealogy photo restoration” to find active groups in this area.
One-name and one-place studies
If you are pursuing a particular surname or a specific parish in depth, one-name and one-place study groups can connect you with other researchers who are working on exactly the same ground. These are often small but highly specialist communities where extraordinary progress can be made.
The Guild of One-Name Studies (GoONS) has its own Facebook presence and can point you toward registered studies for thousands of surnames.
YouTube – the family historian’s classroom
YouTube is not social media in the interactive sense, but it deserves a mention here because it has become one of the most valuable educational resources available to family historians.
Tutorials exist for almost every aspect of genealogy research – how to use Ancestry, FindMyPast, and the Genealogist; how to interpret census records, wills, and parish registers; how to understand DNA results; how to restore old photographs; how to research specific occupations, regions, or time periods. Many of these tutorials are made by experienced researchers who are genuinely expert in their subject.
The great advantage of YouTube is that it is entirely passive. You watch, you learn, you pause and rewind as needed, and you share nothing about yourself at all. It is also free. Search for “genealogy tutorial” combined with whatever you are trying to learn, and you will almost certainly find something useful.
Channels worth exploring include those run by the major genealogy platforms themselves (Ancestry, FindMyPast, MyHeritage all have official channels), as well as independent researchers and the larger family history societies.
A note on quality
Not everything online is reliable – this is as true of genealogy as of anything else. Groups and channels vary in quality, and it is always worth applying the same critical thinking to online information that you would bring to any other source. A helpful rule of thumb: treat an online suggestion as a pointer toward a primary source, not as a primary source in itself. If someone in a Facebook group tells you your great-grandmother was born in a particular parish, treat it as a lead to follow up, not a fact to record in your family tree. The ABC golden rule for family historians is very relevant – Accept nothing, Believe no one, Check everything.
With that caveat, the overall quality of family history communities online is high. People who give up their time to help strangers with research tend to take it seriously.
Where to start
If this article has piqued your interest but you are not sure where to begin, here is a simple suggestion: think of one research problem you are currently stuck on, and search Facebook for a group that might be able to help. It might be a county, an occupation, a DNA puzzle, or an unidentified photograph. Join it, have a look around, and get a feel for the kinds of discussions that take place there.
Whether you post something straight away or read quietly for a few weeks first is entirely up to you. Either way, you have made a start.
Next issue: Once you are in – getting the best from online communities.
Connecting with the Past – Social Media for Family Historians – Part 4
Once You Are In – Getting the Best from Online Communities
In the last article we opened the door to the wider world of family history communities online and encouraged you to find one that suits your research and join it. This article is about what happens next – how to read the room, get the most from the communities you have joined, and recognise the occasional bad apple before it wastes your time.
Finding us on Facebook
If you have not yet found the BerksFHS Facebook Group, search for “Berkshire Genealogy” in the Facebook search bar. Click “Join group” and you may be asked a couple of simple questions – these help the administrators confirm you are a genuine researcher rather than a spam account. Answer briefly and honestly and your request will be approved, usually within a day or two.
Read before you post
Whichever community you join, spend a little time simply reading the posts already there before you contribute anything yourself. This will give you a feel for the tone and the kinds of discussions that take place. Most family history groups are warm and informal – more like a friendly chat than a formal meeting – but they each have their own character, and a few minutes of reading will tell you a great deal.
Do not worry about looking foolish
Family history communities are among the most welcoming on the internet, precisely because the research itself is humbling. Every experienced researcher has spent years being confused, hitting dead ends, and asking what turned out to be very basic questions. No one will judge you for not knowing something.
If you are worried about whether your question is too simple, or whether you have missed something obvious, post it anyway. The worst that happens is that someone points you gently in the right direction.
Making a good query
The best queries give other members something to work with. Whether you are posting in the BerksFHS Facebook Group, a county history group, or a specialist community, include:
- The full name of the person you are researching
- Approximate dates and places (birth, marriage, death if known)
- What you already know
- What you are trying to find out
For example: “I am trying to trace Thomas Watkins, born around 1845, probably in Wokingham. He appears in the 1871 census working as a bricklayer, but I cannot find him in 1881. Has anyone come across this family?”
A query like that gives other members enough to go on. You may get a response within hours.
Asking in the right place
Different questions suit different spaces, and it is worth knowing which is which:
- A quick query – something that can be answered briefly, or a photograph you would like help identifying – suits a Facebook Group well.
- A long, complex research problem – something that requires a detailed back-and-forth discussion, or where you want the thread to remain searchable for future reference – is often better suited to the BerksFHS Forum on our website.
- A DNA puzzle – one of the specialist Facebook groups mentioned in the last article will usually be more helpful than a general genealogy group, simply because the members there have specific expertise.
There is no wrong choice – but matching your question to the right community will generally get you a better answer.
A word about unhelpful responses
The vast majority of people who respond to queries in family history groups are genuine enthusiasts who simply want to help. However, it is worth knowing that a small number of responses – in any online community – come from people with less honest intentions, and they are easy to spot once you know what to look for.
The typical pattern goes like this: someone posts a question and receives a response that sounds plausible but is notably vague – full of general suggestions rather than anything specific to the names, places, or dates in the original query. The response often ends with an invitation to “DM me” (send a direct or private message) if they would like further help. This is the clearest warning sign of all. People who genuinely want to help do so publicly, in the thread, where their answer benefits everyone reading it. People who want to move the conversation into a private channel are usually looking to establish a paid relationship – often without being upfront about that from the start.
A quick look at the responding person’s profile will usually confirm your instinct. A genuine researcher, even one who keeps their personal details private – as we recommended in article one – will have a visible history of engagement: past posts and comments, questions as well as answers, and interactions with other members of the community spread over time. What you are looking for is not personal information but history. A profile with almost no posts, no community engagement, and a join date of last month is a thin profile in the way that matters, regardless of how much or how little personal detail it contains.
It is also worth being aware that AI tools are increasingly being used to generate these kinds of responses. A fluent, well-structured reply that manages to say nothing specific about your particular query is not necessarily a knowledgeable one. If an answer does not engage with the actual details you provided – the names, the dates, the places – treat it with scepticism.
None of this should put you off. These responses are easy to recognise, easy to ignore, and vastly outnumbered by the real thing.
The bigger picture
Family history has always been a communal activity – we share records, we correspond with distant cousins, we help strangers who turn out to be researching the same family. Social media has simply given us faster, richer, and more far-reaching ways to do the same thing.
The communities that exist online for family historians are genuinely extraordinary. Somewhere out there, someone may already be researching the same family as you, holding a piece of the puzzle you have been missing for years. The only way to find them is to show up.
We hope this article has helped you feel ready to make the most of it. If you have questions about anything we have covered, the Forum on our website is a good place to ask, or raise it at one of our online talks.
Next issue: Spread your wings – BerksFHS across the internet.
Connecting with the Past – Social Media for Family Historians – Part 5
Spread Your Wings – BerksFHS Across the Internet
If you have been following this series, you will by now have a Facebook account, perhaps a growing list of groups you are quietly reading, and a better sense of where to take a research question online. This final article might surprise you.
One of the things that many members do not realise is just how widely Berkshire Family History Society is represented across the internet. Beyond the Facebook Group, the Facebook Page, and the Forum that we introduced in Article 2, our website footer lists a further range of platforms where you can find us. This article takes you through each one – what it is, who tends to use it, and whether it is worth your time.
X – @BerkshireFHS
We touched on X (formerly Twitter) in the first article, but it is worth a fuller mention here. Our X account is particularly useful for event announcements, and following us there connects you indirectly to the wider network of Berkshire cultural and heritage organisations who share each other’s posts. If you are already on X for any reason, we are there. If you are not, the platforms below may suit you better.
Bluesky
Bluesky is the platform that feels most like Twitter did in its earlier, friendlier days – before it became X. It is chronological, conversational, and considerably less noisy than X has become. If you tried Twitter years ago and found it overwhelming, or if you have grown weary of the atmosphere on X more recently, Bluesky is worth a look.
The genealogy community on Bluesky is still relatively small but growing steadily, and the general tone is noticeably civil. You can find us there and follow along as the community develops.
Threads
Threads is Meta’s answer to X – built by the same company as Facebook and Instagram, and linked to an Instagram account if you have one, though it can be used without. It sits somewhere between Facebook and X in character: more conversational than a Facebook Page, less frenetic than X at its busiest.
The platform is still finding its feet in terms of the genealogy community, but it is growing, and having a presence there means we reach people who have drifted away from X but are not ready to commit to somewhere entirely new.
Pinterest tends to get overlooked in conversations about social media, but it has a quietly devoted following among genealogists and it is worth understanding why. Unlike the platforms above, Pinterest is not really about conversation – it is about saving and organising visual content. Think of it as a vast, searchable pinboard.
For family historians, this turns out to be surprisingly useful. People share images of old maps, historical photographs, examples of particular record types, guides to reading old handwriting, infographics about research methodology, and countless other visual resources. You can save anything you find useful to your own boards and return to it later – a kind of visual research notebook.
Pinterest also has a notably broad age range of users, and the atmosphere is unhurried and entirely non-confrontational. If social media has felt like a noisy room you are not sure you want to enter, Pinterest is more like a library with good pictures.
Blogger
Our Blogger presence is rather different in character from the social platforms listed above. Blogger is Google’s long-established blogging platform, and what you will find there is longer-form content – articles, research notes, and pieces that benefit from more space than a social media post allows.
It is not social in the interactive sense – there is no feed to scroll, no algorithm deciding what you see – but it is a useful archive of content, and it is indexed by Google, which means articles posted there can be found by anyone searching for relevant topics. Think of it as our extended reading room.
Google Business Profile
You may not have heard of Google Business Profile, but you have almost certainly encountered it. When you search for an organisation on Google and a panel appears on the right-hand side of the results showing the opening hours, address, contact details, and reviews, that is a Google Business Profile.
Ours means that when someone searches for “Berkshire Family History Society” – or simply “family history Berkshire” – they find accurate, up-to-date information about us immediately, without having to dig through search results. It is less a social platform than a signpost, but it matters because it is often the first thing a potential new member sees. It will feature events that are hosted at the Family Research Centre in Reading.
Wherever you find us – follow us
The practical upshot of all this is simple: wherever you already spend time online, there is a good chance we are there too. You do not need to join every platform – choose the ones that suit you, find us there, and follow along.
Each platform attracts a slightly different audience and carries slightly different content, so following us in more than one place is not repetitive – you will find things on Pinterest that do not appear on X, and vice versa. But even following us in just one place keeps you connected to the society between magazines and events, and that connection matters.
The bonus is that following us will give you access to the network of people, groups and organisations that also follow us and will create a spider’s web of connections to family history related topics, delivered into your feed without you having to lift a finger.
The bigger picture
The internet can feel like an overwhelming place, and the warnings about it are not entirely without foundation. But for family historians in particular, it represents something remarkable: a global community of people who share your curiosity, your passion for the past, and your willingness to spend an afternoon trying to decipher a two-hundred-year-old burial register.
BerksFHS is part of that community, and we are working hard to be present wherever our members – and future members – choose to spend their time online. We hope this series has made the prospect of joining us there feel a little less daunting, and a great deal more inviting.
We will see you online.
This article concludes the five-part series “Connecting with the Past.” We hope you have found it useful. If you would like to share your experience of joining an online family history community, we would love to hear from you – post in the Berkshire Genealogy Facebook Group.