More Genealogy Humor, Part 3 :-)

From message posted on soc.genealogy.german newsgroup:

LAWS OF GENEALOGY

  1. The document containing evidence of missing links in your research invariably will be lost due to fire, flood or war.

  2. The keeper of vital records you need will just have been insulted by another genealogist.

  3. Your great great grandfather's obituary states he died leaving no issue of record.

  4. The will you need is in the safe on the Titanic.

  5. The ancient photo of 4 relatives, one of whom is your progenitor, carries the names of the other 3.

  6. Copies of old newspapers have holes occurring only on last names.

  7. You learn that great aunt Matilda's executor just sold her life's collection of family genealogy material to a flea market dealer in New York City.

  8. No one in your family tree ever did anything noteworthy, always rented property, was never sued, and was never named in any will.

  9. Yours is the only last name not found among the 3 billion in the Mormon archives.

  10. Ink fades and paper deteriorates at a rate inversely proportional to the value of the data recorded.

  11. The critical link in your family tree is named "Smith."

  12. The 37-volume, 16,000-page history of your county of origin isn't indexed.

From a message posted to the soc.genealogy.misc newsgroup 11-Mar-98

The Van Gogh Family Tree

After much careful research it has been discovered that the artist Vincent Van Gogh had many relatives. Among them were:

His obnoxious brother:  Please Gogh
His dizzy aunt:  Verti Gogh
The brother who ate prunes:  Gotta Gogh
The brother who worked at a convenience store:  Stopn Gogh
The grandfather from Yugoslavia:  U Gogh
The brother who bleached his clothes white:  Hue Gogh
The cousin from Illinois:  Chica Gogh
His magician uncle:  Wherediddy Gogh
His Mexican cousin:  Amme Gogh
The Mexican cousin's American half brother:  Grin Gogh
The nephew who drove a stage coach:  Wellsfar Gogh
The constipated uncle:  Cant Gogh
The ballroom dancing aunt:  Tan Gogh
The bird lover uncle:  Flamin Gogh
His nephew psychoanalyst:  E Gogh
The fruit loving cousin:  Man Gogh
An aunt who taught positive thinking:  Wayto Gogh
The little bouncy nephew:  Poe Gogh
A sister who loved disco:  Go Gogh
His Italian uncle:  Day Gogh
And his niece who travels the country in a van:  Winnie Bay Gogh

Genealogical taglines saved from
defunct National Genealogical Echo

50% of my ancestors were female.
6 months ago I couldn't even spell genealogist—Now I are one.
A family history shows you lived!
A family tree can wither if nobody maintains its roots.
A family tree may be trimmed, but not decorated.
A job is nice, but it interferes with genealogy.
Add to your Genealogy the easy, fun way. Have Grand Children!
All children are essentially criminal.
All family trees, like real trees, are God's creations—Protect them.
Ancestor not found. You do not exist! Good-bye!
ANCESTORS: They can hide, but they can't run anymore.
Bad day! When your twin sister forgets your birthday.
Blessed are the Stonemasons for they have recorded our past.
Blessed are the young for they shall inherit the national debt.
C:\> COPY A:\MOTHER.DNA+B:\FATHER.DNA C:\BABY.EXE
Can a first (or second, or third) cousin, once removed, return?
Cheap way to trace family history—run for public office.
Children are curly, dimpled lunatics.
Climbing my family tree was fun until the nuts appeared!
Climbing your family tree can be fun, but don't get out on a limb!
COLE's LAW: Thinly sliced cabbage.
Copy from another: plagiarism. Copy from many: research.
Cousins marrying cousins makes for VERY tangled roots!
Cussin — what genealogists do when they can't find one.
Did you expect mere proof to sway my opinion?
Discovering an ancestor forges another link with immortality.
Even a family tree with good roots can yield a rotten apple.
Every Family tree has its sap.
Family trees cast shadows of forgotten ancestors.
Finding a new relative is like needle in haystack—you may get stuck.
Friends come and go, but relatives tend to accumulate.
Friends:  family that you can choose for yourself.
Genealogist:  A person who collects ancestors.
Genealogists are always "gone fiche'n"
Genealogists are ghost-a-holics.
Genealogists are like monkeys; always in the trees.
Genealogists are time unravelers.
Genealogists Do It in the Library—SNEEZE!!!!!
Genealogists looking for dead people are not ghouls.
Genealogists never die. They just lose their census.
Genealogists never die—they just haunt cemeteries!
Genealogists never lose their jobs, they just go to another branch!
Genealogy ** It maintains my sanity...at times.
Genealogy is a marriage of a jigsaw puzzle to a dungon & dragons game.
Genealogy is an Addiction that is untreatable!
Genealogy is not a hobby, it's a disease!
Genealogy is RELATIVE only to the persons involved.
Genealogy is T-R-E-E-rific!
Genealogy Lotto: XXXXX (Scratch here to reveal ancestor!)
Genealogy:  A hay stack full of needles. It's the threads I need.
Genealogy:  Chasing your own tale.
Genealogy:  The theory of relativity!
Genealogy:  fun for the WHOLE family!
Genealogy—where you confuse the dead and irritate the living.
Genetic engineering:  heir styling.
Grafting family trees is illegal, unethical, and immoral.
Graveyards are full of the indispensable.
Happiness is a completed genealogy.
Happiness is a genealogist who just found their lost ancestor!
Happy clan diggin!
Have WALKUP with View of No. Ireland and PA!
HELP!  I'm stuck in my family tree and can't get down!
Help!  I've been kidnapped by Genealogy Deprogrammers!
HEREDITY is okay until your children act like fools!
Honey, I ZIPed the kids !!!
I am in total control, but don't tell my wife.
I have seen the truth and it makes no sense...
I JUST WANT TO FIND MY ANCESTORS, NOT JOIN THEM!
I looked into my family tree and found out I was a sap.
I still miss my ex-wife, but my aim is getting better.
I think my family tree is a few branches short!
I think that I shall never see / a finished genealogy.
I used to have a life, then I started doing genealogy.
I'm not living in the past...just making payments on it.
I'm not old... I'm chronologically disadvantaged.
I'm not stuck, I'm ancestrally challenged......
I've traced us back to Adam & Eve..NOW what do I do ????
If it's available, the most important page will be torn out.
If marriage was outlawed, only outlaws would have inlaws!
If your son ate the last of the corn flakes, is he a cereal killer?
I'm always late. My ancestors arrived on the Juneflower.
In my family, all of my roots went underground.
Insanity doesn't run in my family. It positively gallops!
Insanity is hereditary....You get it from your children.
Isn't there something a bit morbid about collecting dead relatives?
It's search and search some more, then I find and search some more...
Job security? Try genealogy. You can't get fired and you can't quit!
Just 5 more minutes in the library, please!!!!!!!!
Just HEIR out all your problems here...someone may help!
Living with saints is tougher than being one.
LOST BUT NOT FORGOTTEN: Family Ties
Love is grand. Divorce, twenty grand.
Luck often wins out over science and technology!
Marriage starts with passion and leads to laundry.
Money is the root of all evil; a man NEEDS roots!
MY GENES ARE GREEN!
My Ancestors are more famous than yours!
My ancestors aren't dead, just metabolically challenged!
My ancestors must be hiding in a witness protection program.
My family came on the Mayflower; or was it Allied?
My family coat of arms ties at the back.... is that normal ?
My family tree is a few branches short! All Help Appreciated.
My family tree is crazy; all branches, no roots.
My family tree is full of NOT holes...it's NOT him, it's NOT her!!!
My family tree is in the forest, SOMEWHERE!
My family tree seems to have a bumper crop of nuts.
My mother founded a travel agency for guilt trips.
mythtake: n. Item found in many Family Histories.
Not crazy, just almost lost my census!
Nothing is work unless you'd rather be doing something else.
Nothing ventured, nothing gained, no one found!
Oh where, oh where has my lost ancestor gone, where, oh where
Pedal faster, our past is catching up on us....
Researching Families... Now THAT's something I can "Relate" to!
Searching for roots beats chasing dust!
Snobs talk as if they had begotten their own ancestors!
Snoopers welcome! Feel free to provide comments & relatives!
So many ancestors, so little time!
So simple a child could do it...go find me a child.
Spread of your family tree's branches shows the depth of your roots.
The past is recorded in HISTORY—what about HERSTORY?
The problem with the gene pool is that there is no lifeguard.
They're all dead; at least now they're not moving from State to State.
This conference is a good place to HEIR out your problems!
This family tree is sapping all my strength.
Thrift is a wonderful virtue—in an ancestor.
To a genealogist everything is relative.
To forget one's ancestors is to be a brook without a source.
To marry is to halve your rights and double your duties.
too wiks aygo, aye cudt spll geeneollojist an now i r wun
WARNING! Genealogy Pox carrier, NO KNOWN CURE!!!
Warning: There are no lifeguards in the gene pool!
We shall find no ancestor before his time. Galliano...
WHAT DO YOU CALL A RETIRED GENEALOGIST? DECEASED!
What do you mean my Birth Certificate expired?
When tracing Ancestors, please stay within the lines!
When you marry, your family tree can become a forest.
When you search for ancestors, you find friends!
Whoever said "seek and ye shall find" was NOT a genealogist.
Why are there so many gnarly limbs on my family tree?
Why look for my relatives in LDS library—Why would they go there?
Why trace my ancestors? I need to know who to blame!
Yankee found in Family Tree, will trade for horse thief.
You can always find what you're not looking for.
You never know a man until you have divided an inheritance with him.

The following wry essay was posted to the GEN-NYS-L mailing list in 1998:

Changing Light Bulbs

Q:How many Genealogy internet mail list subscribers does it take to change a light bulb?
A:1,331:
1To change the light bulb and to post to the mail list that the light bulb has been changed.
14To share similar experiences of changing light bulbs and how the light bulb could have been changed differently.
7To caution about the dangers of changing light bulbs.
27To point out spelling/grammar errors in posts about changing light bulbs.
53To flame the spell checkers.
156To write to the list administrator complain­ing about the light bulb discussion and its inappropriateness to this mail list.
41To correct spelling in the spelling/grammar flames.
109To post that this list is not about light bulbs and to please take this email exchange to alt.lite.bulb.
203To demand that cross posting to alt.grammar, alt.spelling and alt.punctuation about changing light bulbs be stopped.
111To defend the posting to this list saying that we are all use light bulbs and therefore the posts **are** relevant to this mail list.
306To debate which method of changing light bulbs is superior, where to buy the best light bulbs, what brand of light bulbs work best for this technique, and what brands are faulty.
27To post URLs where one can see examples of different light bulbs.
14To post that the URLs were posted incor­rectly, and to post corrected URLs.
3To post about links they found from the URLs that are relevant to this list which makes light bulbs relevant to this list.
33To concatenate all posts to date, then quote them including all headers and footers, and then add "Me Too."
12To post to the list that they are unsubscrib­ing because they cannot handle the light bulb controversy.
19To quote the "Me Too's" to say, "Me Three."
4To suggest that posters request the light bulb FAQ.
1To propose new alt.change.lite.bulb newsgroup.
47To say this is just what alt.physic.cold_fusion was meant for, leave it here.
143Votes for alt.lite.bulb."
Author unknown

Here's a seasonal humorous genealogy poem from a message posted to soc.genealogy.australia+nz on 17 Dec 1997:

THE TWELVE DAYS OF A GENEALOGY CHRISTMAS
On the Twelfth day of Christmas,
My true love gave to me,
Twelve census searches,
Eleven Printer ribbons,
Ten e-mail contacts,
Nine headstone rubbings,
Eight birth and death dates,
Seven town clerks sighing,
Six second cousins,
Five coats of arms,
Four GEDCOM files,
Three old wills,
Two CD-ROMS
And a branch in my family tree.

Another seasonal poem posted to the PACHESTE-L mailing list on 13 Dec 1998:

A Christmas Story

Twas the night before Christmas when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even my spouse.
The dining room table with clutter was spread
With pedigree charts and with letters which said...
"Too bad about the data for which you wrote
Sank in a storm on an ill fated boat."

Stacks of old copies of wills and the such
Were proof that my work had become much too much.
Our children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of sugarplums danced in their heads.
And I at my table was ready to drop
From work on my album with photos to crop.

Christmas was here, and of such was my lot
That presents and goodies and toys I forgot.
Had I not been so busy with grandparent's wills,
I'd not have forgotten to shop for such thrills.
While others had bought gifts that would bring Christmas cheer;
I'd spent time researching those birthdates and years.

While I was thus musing about my sad plight,
A strange noise on the lawn gave me such a great fright.
Away to the window I flew in a flash,
Tore open the drapes and I yanked up the sash.
When what to my wondering eyes should appear?
But an overstuffed sleigh and eight small reindeer.

Up to the housetop the reindeer they flew,
With a sleigh full of toys, and old Santa Claus too.
And then in a twinkle, I heard on the roof
The prancing and pawing of thirty-two hoofs.
The TV antenna was no match for their horns,
And look at our roof with hoof-prints adorned.

As I drew in my head, and bumped it on the sash,
Down the cold chimney fell Santa — KER-RASH!
"Dear" Santa had come from the roof in a wreck,
And tracked soot on the carpet, (I could wring his short neck!)
Spotting my face, good old Santa could see
I had no Christmas spirit you'd have to agree.

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work
And filled all the stockings, (I felt like a jerk).
Here was Santa, who'd brought us such gladness and joy;
When I'd been too busy for even one toy.
He spied my research on the table all spread
"A genealogist!" He cried! (My face was all red!)

"Tonight I've met many like you", Santa grinned.
As he pulled from his sack a large book he had penned.
I gazed with amazement — the cover it read
"Genealogy Lines for Which You Have Plead."
"I know what it's like as a genealogy bug,"
He said as he gave me a a great Santa Hug.

"While the elves make the sleighful of toys I now carry,
I do some research in the North Pole Library!
A special treat I am thus able to bring,
To genealogy folks who can't find a thing.
Now off you go to your bed for a rest,
I'll clean up the house from this genealogy mess."

As I climbed up the stairs full of gladness and glee,
I looked back at Santa who'd brought much to me.
While settling in bed, I heard Santa's clear whistle,
To his team which then rose like the down of a thistle
And I heard him exclaim as he flew out of sight
"Family History is Fun! Merry Christmas! Goodnight!"

Here's another Christmas Carol that pokes fun at computer genealogy programs, posted to the defunct FidoNet National Genealogical Echo on 16 Dec 1994 by Sandy Clunies
"Christmas Carol" 1994
'Twas the night before Christmas when all through the house,
Just one creature was stirring, my serial mouse.

When out from the keyboard, there came such a clatter
That I sprang from my bed to see what was the matter.

Away to the 'puter I flew like a flash,
To see what came after the busy back\slash.

The moon on the monitor started to glow,
Gave a luster of midday to C-prompts below.

When what to my wondering eyes should appear
But a screenful of sleigh and eight tiny reindeer.

With little old driver, and elves, and a gnome
All colorfully marching 'cross my monochrome!

More rapid than eagles, his cursors they came
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name:

"Now, TMG!   Roots IV!   And BK, let's laugh!
On Family Ties!   Family Edge!   GEDCOM!   And PAF!

To the top of the screen! To the top of the file!
Let's give all those family researchers a smile!"

They've worked hard all year, their persistence is awful —
Let's give them a gift of a new ahnentafel

That solves all their puzzles, that fills every gap
In their pedigree chart." Then he turned with a snap,

And laying a finger aside of his ear,
And giving a nod, he made the screen clear!

But I heard him exclaim, 'ere he scrolled out of sight,
"Better backup that data one more time tonight!"

(with apologies to the descendants of Clement Clarke MOORE)

Posted to PACHESTE-L mailing list 9 Dec 1998

All I Want For Christmas

Dear Santa:

Don't bring me new dishes;
I don't need a new kind of game.
Genealogists have peculiar wishes;
For Christmas I just want a surname.
A new washing machine would be great,
But it isn't the desire of my life.
I've just found an ancestor's birth date,
Now I need the name of his wife.
My heart doesn't yearn for a ring
that would put a real diamond to shame.
What I want is a much cheaper thing:
Please give me Martha's last name.
To see my heart singing with joy,
Don't bring me a red leather suitcase.
Bring me a genealogist's toy:
A surname, with dates and a place.

— Author Unknown