When it comes to history it's hard to know where to start when you want to trace your family tree.
There is a place in our own backyard that can make it easy to discover all you could want to know about the history of your family.
"My Grandmother came from here in 1898,” said Richard Peterson.
The here that Peterson is talking about is Blountville. He and his wife Agatha have made the trek from Minnesota to the Sullivan County Archives every year for the past decade. The couple from Minnesota is searching papers, manuscripts and records for the limbs and branches that make up the history of their family tree.
"It opens a lot of new avenues about where you came from,” said Peterson. “I find that very interesting to know that I had a relative ... yeah he lived right out here … he walked on the same ground that I'm walking on."
The Sullivan County Archive is making it easy to walk in your families' history as well. They have census data going back to the 1700's, family records and all sorts of pictures and documentation available for anyone with a hunger to find out more about their own genealogy.
"It just brings so many rewards,” said Sheila Steele-Hunt the Executive Director of the Sullivan County Department of Archives and Tourism. “When you know who you are it’s kinda like Patrick Henry said ‘If you know who you are, you can go forward.’”
The Sullivan County Archives are a great place to begin your search for your family history. The archives have historical documents for Northeast Tennessee, Southwest Virginia and Western North Carolina available to the public, and the best part its free of charge.
The Sullivan County Department of Archives and Tourism invites you to attend Family History at the Archives." You can do your family history research tomorrow night. The event begins at 7 p.m. at the department of archives and tourism office in downtown Blountville.
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