A genealogy site for my personal family history and the wider Gilks & variants family
Family is History
From my research into my family and the surname in general.
I started researching my personal family history about 40 years ago. Back then most of my research involved visiting churches, graveyards and county record offices. In the last 20 years gradually more and more of this data has become available online along with amazing increase in the breadth of information available and often the chance to see original documents online.
My fascination started with being able to search for my relatively rare surname and this inevitably extended to a much much wider family. As with other genealogists the task is never ending but the journey still fascinates me.
I have also realised that Gilks’ and all the variants of the name are scattered throughout the world and how we are related is of great interest to me.
Alan Gilks
Thinking of the future ..
Have you ever thought about this?
In 100 years, by say 2123 we will all be buried with our relatives and friends.
Strangers will live in our homes we fought so hard to build, and they will own everything we have today.
All our possessions will be unknown and unborn, including the car we spent a fortune on, and will probably be scrap, preferably in the hands of an unknown collector.
Our descendants will hardly know who we were, nor will they remember us.
How many of us know our grandfather’s father?
After we die, we will be remembered for a few more years, then we are just a portrait on someone’s bookshelf, and a few years later our history, photos and deeds disappear in history’s oblivion.
We won’t even be memories.
If we paused one day to analyze these questions, perhaps we would understand how ignorant and weak the dream to achieve it all was.
If we could only think about this, surely our approaches, our thoughts would change, we would be different people. Always having more, no time for what’s really valuable in this life.
I’d change all this to live and enjoy the walks I’ve never taken, these hugs I didn’t give, these kisses for our children and our loved ones, these jokes we didn’t have time for. Those would certainly be the most beautiful moments to remember, after all they would fill our lives with joy.
And we waste it day after day with greed, greed and intolerance.
Anon
Studying our family history and documenting it gives us a chance to leave a tangible record of our lives. Hopefully through genealogy our descendants will at least have a glimpse of the key moments in our lives and folk will at least know we existed!
As family historians we understand the pleasure we have in finding out how, where and when our ancestors lived, and in a minor way their loves, careers and families.
hose would certainly be the most beautiful moments to remember, after all they would fill our lives with joy.
And we waste it day after day with greed, greed and intolerance.