Family Tree Template Form: Fill & Download for Free

Back in 1991, before Ancestry dot com was a thing, I got interested in genealogy… my family’s, in particular. So, I set out on a mission to find out all I could, and put together a family tree. Less than two years after the World Wide Web was created (aka: WWW). So, I wasn’t really on the internet yet. I had to do it old skool; although I did use a computer to draw the actual “tree”, as there were no genealogical tree templates that I knew of, yet. I sent out a form letter to every single person I knew, who was even remotely related to me. I even had to take a quick crash course in Russian Cyrillic, so that I could communicate with my relatives behind the Iron Curtain (which was half of them, in various countries). The curtain fell the following year, which made communication much easier, but at the time, I wasn’t even sure if any of my correspondence would get there and back. Amazingly, it all did. I sent out these form letters with pre-drawn, empty “trees”, for everyone to fill out. I also included a self-addressed stamped envelope, to make things as easy as possible for everyone.By the autumn of that year, I had received nearly all my templates back, all filled out as best as everyone could manage. Then began the task of making sense out of all of them, and compiling them into one massive tree. I ended up with nearly 600 people to list. For every person, I listed 6 bits of information: Name, place & year of birth, place & year of death, and their occupation. It took me about 6 months, but by Christmas, I had a surprisingly full family tree. I printed these all out on 17″ x 24″ sheets of parchment, rolled them up into scrolls, and handed them out to everybody as Christmas gifts. It was a big hit, as no one had ever seen the big picture yet. This is my Pociask Family Tree:This was in 1991, so I suggested everyone add to their branches by hand, as the years go by. By now, there are probably another 100 or more kids and grand-kids born. But that’s me, in the lower-right corner, above the block of text. I drew a chain of heavy links around the whole thing to signify that we were all linked together.The furthest back I got for my lineage was 1796, in Prussia. My great-great-great grandfather, with the last name of Busz, was born there. This part of Prussia had previously been part of the Polish Kingdom, and afterwards, once again became part of Poland after WWII. They eventually moved to the Kingdom of Bohemia, which became Czechoslovakia. My four grandparent's lineages basically hailed from 4 places: Prussia/Bohemia, Ukraine, and two from southern Poland, in the mountains. So… I am pretty much Prussian/Bohemian/Ukrainian/Polish. The late 1700’s was as far as I could get back for my family. My daughter, on the other hand, through her mom, I could trace back through Stephen Austin, one of the founders of Texas, and then all the way back to Mary Queen of Scots.As far as my family… they were refugees after WWII. They lost everything there, and both my father, and my mother came to America as Displaced Persons, although they came separately. My father alone, and my mother with her parents and 9 siblings. This is my grandfather’s “Reiseausweis” or Travel ID Card for the voyage from post-WWII Germany, to NYC in September of 1952:And here is the ship they came over on, the USS A.W. Greely, that was named after a US General, Polar explorer, and Medal of Honor winner:This ship was in service from 1944, all the way to 1986. It had a pretty good run, and was an important ship, as it brought my family to America! They all came here under the sponsorship of a farmer near Buffalo, NY who would house and feed them in return for a couple years of what was basically indentured servitude on his farm, picking lettuce, strawberries and all of that kind of stuff that many migrant workers from Mexico and Central America do today.So… how far back do I have to go in my family tree before I get to someone whose first language was not English?Well… that would be me!I didn’t really learn English until I went to kindergarten in Buffalo, NY. We were a bi-lingual family. Actually, tri-lingual, unbeknownst to me. You see, my grandmother only spoke Czech, while everyone else spoke Polish. Somehow, I spoke in Czech to my grandmother and Polish to everyone else, without even knowing it! Yeah, I didn’t realize that until I was in my teens. That was kind of a weird revelation.So… yeah, there’s that.

One of the coolest things about MediaWiki, the software that runs wikipedia and other Wikimedia Foundation (organization) projects is how extensible it is. This is an example of a family tree template that someone made for the project.The other cool thing is that you can see the code behind and page, by clicking Edit (go check it out) at the top. Hint this is how you edit articles and contribute to Wikipedia.That particular template is call Ahnentafel its based on family tree style of the same name, they're of german origin and you can read more about them here.More about Family trees on Wikipedia.More about Template on Wikipedia.To your specific question about can you use it in Wordpress, no not likely, but you could install MediaWiki on your own site (its free and open source) and use the family tree templates.

Depending on what type of family tree chart you’re interested in, there are a couple options:Printable family tree chart — Pedigreeable: Personalized Family Trees makes it easy to pick a template online, personalize it, and have a beautiful family tree that you can share or print.Online family tree — FamilySearch.org makes it easy to start you family tree online and do research. They have some nice charts / diagrams you can visualize online.