What was life like for your ancestors? Wouldn’t it be fun to go back in time and see the inventions and events that happened during the lives of your ancestors? Good news! I have three easy ways to discover what your ancestor may have been excited to go watch, read, or otherwise talk about. The historic events and inventions can give you insight into the opportunities available to your ancestor, and what types of fears and hopes they may have had.
The most exciting way I have discovered to view these events is through FamilySearch‘s All About Me activity. This is available through their app, or by following this All About Me link. It starts out with your information and then you can select other years. This is a small sampling of what is available – there are over 20 activities available as of this posting.
When you are viewing your results, you can view the info at birth, age 8, and age 16 so you can see how things change throughout time. It will also show your family so you can easily compare what things are like in your lifetime to to theirs. This is a super fun activity to do with your children or parents!
The kid in me loves the multiple choice options – you get confetti when you guess the right answer!
The FamilySearch activity seems to work best for people who were born in the 1900’s, so if you would like to explore similar information for older relatives there are a couple more options.
If you want a very simple timeline that gives you the major events in a timeline (including your ancestor’s age at the time) I recommend using the timeline available at BillionGraves. The catch to this one is that it is only available for ancestors who have a headstone listed on BillionGraves.
I also really like using onthisday.com, which allows you to search for events by year or date. Searching a particular year gives you the results in an overview, and then you can view more results by categories of history, film & TV, music, or sports.
Have fun exploring the historical events during the lives of your ancestors, and be sure to share your discoveries with your family members! And you know I love to see what you’re up to, so if you try this out tag me on Instagram for a shoutout!
