Genealogy as practiced by Manuel Andrack is breathless and risky. Actually, families are per se delicate. But there are also many questions everybody would like to have answered: What was my grandfather like? How did my great-grandparents live? Whoops, my grandfather indeed was married twice. Why do I not know this? Andrack – does that name not sound slightly French? But why do all traces lead into the East? How about the Andracks who emigrated to America?
Manuel Andrack combed through baptismal and parish registers, searched for traces in field work and met distant relatives. But could he really be related to somebody who can do the two finger whistle? He had never managed to do that. Neither did his father. Familiy trees dating back to the 18th century are supposed to bring some clarity.
Even a manual had to be translated with some difficulties in order to avoid any mistakes in collecting saliva samples since the aim is to find out how the Andrack gene spread over the world. How helpful is the internet for ancestry research? And how about hypnosis and systemic family setup? Genealogy is more than just drawing family trees. Each step into the past tells a piece of history, and in the best case, you learn something about yourself.
