User Story: Printing a MyHeritage Family Tree Chart – Lynn’s Experience

If you’ve ever thought about creating and printing a MyHeritage family tree chart then here’s a story from a MyHeritage community member who has gone through the process.

But first, a bit of background info…

MyHeritage has, for a long time now, provided tools for members to create fantastic family tree charts.

Late last year however, we added a range of new chart styles and also introduced a professional printing service for those who wanted their charts to come to life in high quality.

In January this year, we ran a competition, which offered a chance to win a free family tree chart to anyone who retweeted a simple message on Twitter.

One of the first winners of that weekly competition was Lynn Corrigan.

Lynn recently got back in contact with us to let us know she’d finally printed and received her chart and that she was over the moon with the results.

Below is a quick interview we did with Lynn about her experience.

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Hi Lynn. So let’s begin at the beginning…How’d you get into Family History research?

Researching the family history had been at the back of our family’s minds for a long time, but no-one had every done anything about it.

Last September I went to the Doors Open Day at the ScotlandsPeople Centre in Edinburgh.After the architectural tour, visitors got 20 minutes of searching for free. I realised I could actually go back further than I expected, originally I would have been happy to put names to great-grandparents.

My final chart now goes back to the Fifteenth Century!

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How long have you been a MyHeritage user and why did you start using it? Do you use Myheritage.com / Family Tree Builder 5 or both?

I had an account with another site which was taken over by MyHeritage, but with only a handful of entries, so really I only started using it seriously in October 2010.

My family are spread out, so I wanted an online solution that everyone could easily access and contribute to, but also also one that we had control over privacy and security for living relatives. I found MyHeritage easy to use, and even in the short time since I’ve started improvements such as citations and improved Smart Matching have been very much appreciated.

I’ve also just started using Family Tree Builder, initially for showing family where there was no internet access, but starting to explore it more for general management

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What made you decide to enter the Free Family Chart Friday competition?

I’m just starting out so I’m always looking to learn from blogs etc, and when I saw the competition, I thought , why not?

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Tell us about the process of creating the chart and why you chose the style you did

I was delighted when I was told I’d won, and then started worrying! I’d only just started, there were so many gaps in my chart. I started then working a bit harder, since I had 3 months to claim the prize. I found chart creation is easy enough,

I tried out quite a few different versions and backgrounds before I decided on one of the simpler designs. Mainly this was due to size, at over 140 names and dimensions of 237×85 cm, I thought the clearer the better.

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How long did you have to wait for the chart to arrive?

So I finally decided I was as ready I as would be at this time and ordered the chart at the end of April, it arrived  two weeks later, which I thought was a good turnaround time given there were several public holidays in between. I suspected it wouldn’t fit through my letterbox, so had it sent to my office  and you can see in the picture below the interest it created.

As a matter of fact I’ve already got one of my colleagues using MyHeritage to research her family tree.

Any tips / final thoughts for people thinking about putting together a MyHeritage Family Tree Chart?

I was very pleased with it, very high quality paper and well packaged. It really makes a difference being able to see the whole line on a single sheet, and just brings home the centuries of history it represents, much more than just seeing it on screen.

For me it was quite early in my research, I’ve still got gaps to fill, so my biggest tip would be, if possible, don’t rush into it. Only include those family lines you are confident of, and check your data. You can preview as many different chart versions as you like, and it’s well worth doing so, until you find one you are happy with.

In itself a well done chart could become a family heirloom, so I think it’s worth that bit of extra effort and cost. Especially if you have a family gathering coming up, it would make a real talking point

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A big thanks to Lynn for sharing her experience and tips.

If you have any other questions that weren’t covered off here, please let us know in the comments and we’ll do our best to answer them for you