Find the History of Any Date in Your Family Tree

I gave birth to my first child on my mother's birthday. I had my second child on my grandmother's birthday, and last week he had his first child on his own birthday.

While sitting in the maternity waiting room, I saw a stack of local newspapers on the table. That reminded me of something a relative said when I had my firstborn in 1989. She said I should save a newspaper to commemorate what was happening in the world on that date. The big story I remember was the demonstrations and massacre in Tiananmen Square. That story made the front page when my son came along and continued into the next month.

If you don't have a time machine at your disposal, here's a great way to add historical context to your family tree.

Your Date in History

There is a website you can use to find out interesting tidbits about any date in your family tree. It's History.com. Go to https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history, and it will default to today's date. Next to the page's headline, "This Day in History", there is a square with today's month and date. You can change that to any month and date you choose.

When you choose a date, you'll see:

• a top story from that date
• a short list of famous people born on that date
• a fact of the day
• a timeline of key events in history (along with a video summary)

This can be a lot of fun. For instance, my father shares his birthday with Bruce Willis, Glenn Close, and Wyatt Earp. My mother and first son share their birthday with Willie Mays, Orson Welles, and Sigmund Freud. Plus, the Hindenburg disaster happened on that date when mom was a little girl.

You can click each event in the timeline to read more about it.

When I put in my birthday I see:

• The United States established the first Supreme Court in 1789.
• I share my birthday with F. Scott Fitzgerald, Jim Henson, and John Marshall. He was the fourth Chief Justice of the United States.
• President Teddy Roosevelt proclaimed the country's first national monument. It was Devils Tower as seen in "Close Encounters of the Third Kind".
• The timeline of events on this date includes:
  • the incorporation of the Honda Motor Company
  • the delivery of the Warren Commission report to President Johnson
  • the first episode of "60 Minutes"

Was your ancestors' wedding date historically significant? Did something special happen on your birth date? This website gives you the full story for your family tree.

Since the owners of history.com are in the United States, you may see more U.S. history results than you want. But there's so much more to explore. Look at the second-line menu at the top of the web page. You can choose "World" or "Eras & Ages" to find content that can add context to your family tree.

Choose any item from those lists (or the U.S. list) to find a host of articles and videos that will interest you. You can also use the search area to search for anything you like. (Look for the magnifying glass near the top right corner of the web page.) I decided to look into the Boston Tea Party, which happened on this date (16 Dec) in 1773. The short article includes links to more information, and a short video.

Today's History Channel features programs about aliens, ghosts, and weirdos with odd jobs. But years ago, I admired them for their well-produced, engaging story telling. These video clips put their true professionalism on display.

Which generation of ancestors in your family tree need more historical context? If History.com has the content, you're sure to enjoy the learning experience.

And speaking of history:

• Hardship Lessons Your Ancestors Learned
• Putting Yourself in Your Ancestor's Shoes…Historically
• What Was Happening When Your Ancestor Died?
• What Was it Like When Your Ancestors Lived Here?

Your Family Tree's Top 10s

At the end of each day that I work on my family tree, I export a GEDCOM file from Family Tree Maker. Any family tree software program and some online trees give you this option. Today we'll use that GEDCOM to highlight trends in our family trees.

First, open your latest GEDCOM in the free Family Tree Analyzer program. The main screen has some interesting numbers. Here's what it finds for my tree:

• Direct Ancestors: 418
• Descendants: 2
• Blood Relations: 18,520
• Married to Blood or Direct Relation: 5,226
• Related by Marriage: 50,035
• Linked through Marriages: 10,343
• Unknown relation: 189

Let's use Family Tree Analyzer to discover the Top 10s in our family trees.

Follow a few simple steps to discover the Top 10s in your family tree.

Top 10 Jobs in Your Family Tree

In Family Tree Analyzer, click the Main Lists tab and then the Occupations tab beneath it. This displays 2 columns: Occupation and Count. Click the arrow next to Count and choose Sort Z to A. Now the list shows you the most common jobs in your family tree.

Note: If Sort Z to A doesn't look like it worked, change it to Sort A to Z and then back again. That should do the trick.

For a long time, I didn't bother adding a particular occupation to my Italian relatives. Contadino (masculine) or Contadina (feminine) is a farmer or peasant. I come from peasants. They were almost all contadini! But I have tried to add them lately. Here are the Top 10 Jobs in my family tree:

• Bracciale (farmhand or laborer), 718
• Contadino and Contadina (both mean farmer or peasant) combined, 338
• Custode di Pecore and Pastore (both mean shepherd) combined, 186
• Calzolaio (shoemaker), 109
• Sartore (tailor), 97
• Filatrice (cotton spinner or seamstress), 93
• Proprietario and Proprietaria (both mean owner, proprietor, or landlord), 101
• Tessitrice (weaver), 72
• Massaro (steward or farm manager), 59
• Massaro di Campo (farm owner), 54

I'm surprised to see that the occupations I pulled from U.S. Census records have such small numbers. Then again, I had no one in the U.S. until the 1900 census, and many of them changed jobs often. Here are the Top 10 U.S. Jobs in my family tree:

• Laborer, 14
• New Worker, 10
• Shoemaker, 9
• Farmer, 7
• Chauffeur (truck driver), 6
• Clerk, 6
• Barber, 6
• Operator at a Dress Factory, 5
• Telephone Operator, 5
• Carpenter, 5

Most of the people who make up that list lived in New York City where jobs of all types were plentiful. The farmers were my husband's relatives in California.

Top 10 Sources in Your Family Tree

If your number of sources is low, you owe it to everyone with any connection to you to work on your source citations! My family tree uses 565 different sources.

To the left of the Occupations tab, click the Sources tab. The label on the last column in this table is Num Facts. Click the arrow next to Num Facts and choose Sort Z to A. Now the list shows the most-used sources in your family tree.

Here are the Top 10 Sources in my family tree:

• State Archives of Benevento, town of Colle Sannita, 54,560 (and I have SO many more to add)
• State Archives of Benevento, town of Baselice, 8,514 (many facts still need this source)
• State Archives of Benevento, town of Pescolamazza, 7,748 (many facts still need this source)
• State Archives of Avellino, town of Santa Paolina, 6,931 (many facts still need this source)
• 1940 U.S. Federal Census, 2,509
• the book "Colle Sannita nel 1742" by Dr. Fabio Paolucci, 2,337
• State Archives of Benevento, town of Apice, 2,037
• State Archives of Benevento, town of Sant'Angelo a Cupolo, 1,827
• State Archives of Benevento, town of Circello, 1,708
• 1930 U.S. Federal Census, 1,442

As usual, Italians dominate my family tree. The #1 source is not a surprise to me, but the amount is staggering. This is the hometown of the paternal side of my family tree, and everyone's related to me somehow.

Top 10 Last Names in Your Family Tree

For this list, we can restrict the results to our blood relatives. Click the Surnames tab next to the Main Lists tab. In the Relationship Types section, choose (1) Direct Ancestors, (2) Blood Relations, and (3) Descendants. Now click the Show Surnames button. This will take a while to display if your family tree is very large. Watch the progress bar in the lower left corner of the program to see that it's working.

Once your table displays, click the arrow next to the Individuals column and choose Sort Z to A. Now you can see the most common names in your family tree. Here are the Top 10 Last Names in my family tree:

• Pozzuto, 889
• Mascia, 861
• Zeolla, 833
• Martuccio, 772
• Piacquadio, 673
• delGrosso, 562
• Iamarino (my maiden name), 489
• Pilla, 481
• Palmiero, 472
• Basile, 382

Every one of those last names comes from Colle Sannita. Three or four are also found in my other ancestral hometowns. This list surprises me because I restricted the results to blood relatives. The results look very different if I include spouses and their families.

Now try this. Clear the sort from the Individuals column and sort the Families or Marriages columns from Z to A. For me, the Families have the same Top 10 Last Names, but in a different order. The same is true for the Marriages column—same names, different order. Is that true for your family tree?

Top 10 Treetops in Your Family Tree

A "treetop" is the eldest person on each branch of your family tree. They represent the furthest back you've gone with your research. Click the Treetops tab that's way to the right of the Surnames tab. In the Relationship Types section, choose (1) Direct Ancestors, (2) Blood Relations, and (3) Descendants. There are 2 more options that are pre-chosen, and you can leave them that way:

• Include Unknown Countries in Treetops Filter
• Include Individuals that have only one parent known

Now click the Show People at top of tree button.

This table loads fast, and at the bottom left I see my tree has 284 treetops. Let's see which last names can boast the deepest roots in our family trees. Click the arrow next to the Surname column and choose Sort Z to A.

In my family tree, some of my treetops are living DNA matches. I chose to research only the side of their family that's related to me. To filter these people out, let's restrict the results to direct ancestors only. Leave the Surname sort in place. Over in the Relation column, click the arrow and choose only Direct Ancestor.

Here are the Top 10 Direct Ancestor Treetops in my family tree, sorted by last name:

• #1: Zullo, Giuseppe. He's my 6th great grandfather born about 1711.
• #2–10: Zeolla, born as early as about 1646. They are my 4th through 9th great grandparents. Talk about deep roots!

It's only now, looking at these results, that I realize how important the name Zeolla is in my family tree. The 4 names I grew up knowing are way down the list:

• Iamarino, my maiden name, has four 7th and 8th great grandparents at the treetop. The Iamarino name was in the town of Colle Sannita for centuries, but never in huge numbers.
• Leone, my maternal grandfather's name, has one 5th and one 6th great grandparent at the treetop. The Leone name was in the town of Baselice for centuries, but in very small numbers.
• Sarracino, my grandmother's father's name, has one 5th great grandfather at the treetop. This family came from a very small town that didn't start keeping civil records until 1861. Discovering that fact was a devastating blow.
• Saviano, my grandmother's mother's name, has one 3rd great grandfather at the treetop. The Saviano family came from the same undocumented town as the Sarracino family.

I'm sure you'll find surprises when you generate your Top 10 lists. You may even uncover areas that need your research attention. I'd love to hear what you've found and if any of the names or towns I've listed mean anything to you. Please leave a comment below.

Six 2025 Articles to Elevate Your Family Tree

Whenever I review the articles I've published in this blog, I discover tips I've forgotten. My own tips—forgotten! As I explore a new resource or technique to share with you, I often say in the article that I need to do this, too. Then I forget to follow my own advice.

I have to imagine this happens to you, too. You read lots of family tree articles, but you don't always put what you've learned into use. So let's do this together. Let's review 6 articles from 2025, pick the ones that apply to us, and get to work!

Here's your chance to put 6 kinds of genealogy tips to work to fortify your family tree.

5 Steps to Making a Cousin Connection

If you've taken a DNA test, you'll have many matches you can't place in your family tree. If they are a decent match sharing 30 cMs or more with you, don't give up! Even if they don't provide a family tree, you can use your research skills to get some traction. In this article you'll find 5 steps to help you turn that interesting DNA match into a documented cousin.

You Must Find Your Ancestor's Hometown First

When our ancestors came from another country than ours, we have a disadvantage. We don't know enough about their country. Until we have a good understanding of their homeland, our research may be at a standstill.

This describes my earliest days of family tree building. My grandmother's generation said the family came from two places. The first was a town that had a soundalike. They were from Pastene, but I started looking into Pastena. That was a wild ride because both town have our family name of Sarracino.

The other place was Avellino, but I soon found out that's like saying you're from New York. The city or the state? Avellino is both a city and a province in Italy. It took a lot of research to find the real town: Santa Paolina.

This article has 5 tips you can use to pinpoint your ancestor's hometown, the same as I did. And that's the key to finding their vital records. Once you know the town, and you see it on the map, you can identify your relatives.

4 Reasons to Digitize All Your Genealogy Work

Have you digitized your genealogy assets yet? If you're a huge fan of color-coded binders, that's fine. But if your work isn't digitized, too, it's at risk. Fire, flood, and other disasters could destroy your tremendous discoveries.

This article explains 4 important reasons to digitize your work. Find the tips and techniques you need to get the job done.

How to Share Your Family Tree With Cousins

Genealogy is all I do and all I want to do. I get so deep in the weeds that the bulk of my family tree isn't going to interest my 1st and 2nd cousins. But sometimes those close cousins have questions. They want me to share my tree with them.

My 84,000-person family tree would overwhelm them. There isn't a printout I can share. But I have found ways to give them exactly what they each need. Find out how you can create a self-serve option for the cousins who want to see "their" family tree.

5 Discovery Techniques for Your Family Tree

Has your family tree research has stalled? Are you unsure how to fill those empty branches? Then this is a good article for you. Looking back at my research, I can identify 5 discovery techniques that made my family tree grow to such a big size.

Take a look at these 5 techniques, and find out which ones can help you grow and fortify your family tree.

How Reliable Is Your Family Tree?

Wouldn't it be amazing if every distant cousin and DNA match shared a robust family tree? Well, the first step in reaching that ideal is to publish your own reliable family tree for others to find.

In this article are several tips to help your family tree attract those cousins and DNA matches. Be the ideal and they'll strive to do the same.

I encourage you to explore my blog for your specific needs and questions. Use the search feature on this page to find what you need. If there's a topic I haven't covered yet, please let me know!