What better way to stay motivated with your family tree research than a magazine every month? Personally, I love magazines and am subscribed to many of them. Keep up-to-date with the latest resources and websites.
I've recently been reading two popular genealogy magazines and wanted to share my opinions. The first is Family Tree Magazine, and the other is Family Chronicle.
Ironically, both issues had articles on the Civil War and on DNA genealogy services. In fact, both magazines were extremely similar in tone, style and content, so I'll just lump my comments together instead of reviewing them separately.
Though all articles were presented with a (sometimes slight) genealogy slant, these were more history magazines than anything else. Of course, genealogy is all about history but I really didn't find many articles that would actually help me with my research. Maybe I'm just more interested in practical information rather than the surrounding historical lore of my ancestors.
There were some articles of a more practical nature, such as how to find and access private archives, how to handle old home movies, and how to research Swedish ancestry. Both magazines are packed with URLs to various online resources as well.
One more thing about Family Chronicle. This is a Canadian magazine, but you wouldn't know it by reading the content, with articles on the Civil War and the history of Jamestown, among others. I was hoping to find a magazine that offered more Canadian resources rather than the usual (and useless to me) American ones. Then again, just because its printed in Canada doesn't mean they are intending to reach a Canadian audience.
Other genealogy magazines you might find on the rack:
Oh, one other valuable feature in magazines is the ads. I found a couple of other good sources of information from a couple of little ads.
Though I enjoyed reading both Family Chronical and Family Tree Magazine, I wouldn't subscribe to either of them. I can see myself buying an issue occassionally if the mood strikes me.
Basically, I found that the excessive coverage of American history to be less than helpful. There seems to be an assumption that everyone who studies genealogy is American, and their families have been American for hundreds of years. I think a more realistic picture is that most Americans have ancestors who immigrated here, and that most of their research actually takes them to other countries after 5 or 6 generations. Magazines should be more international in order to really be helpful.
