My family history research isn't going so well. Advice?

Question:I've been researching my family using Ancestry.com and several other recommended links for about a year, but the farthest I can find are (about half of) great-great grandparents. I have a particularly hard time because my great-great grandfather died before my grandparents could remember him, and his name appears to be completely obliterated! With the oldest living generation growing older and more forgetful, I've gotten almost all of the information I'm going to get from them!

Any advice?

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: I've been researching my family using Ancestry.com and several other recommended links for about a year, but the farthest I can find are (about half of) great-great grandparents. I have a particularly hard time because my great-great grandfather died before my grandparents could remember him, and his name appears to be completely obliterated! With the oldest living generation growing older and more forgetful, I've gotten almost all of the information I'm going to get from them!

Any advice?

The web should only be used as a tool, not your main source of research.

Check your public library and find out what all they have.

You need documentation. Actually, you shouldn't take as absolute fact everything you see in family trees on ANY website, free or paid. The information is user submitted and mostly not documented or poorly documented. Even when you see the same info repeatedly by many different submitters, that is no guarantee it is correct.
A lot of people copy without verifying. Use the information as CLUES as to where to get the documentaton. There are errors in internet family trees.

Ancestry.Com is great for its records but no way are all the records online. You need birth, marriage and death certificates. Birth and death certificates give you the names of both parents including mother's maiden name. The two applications for a social security number I have seen also gives both parents' names including mother's maiden name and their places of birth. He would have given the info for the social security number application, not one of his children who couldn't remember their grandfather's name.

Now each state has its own laws about who, when and where a person can get birth and death records. Also governing bodies(state,county,city) in many states did not start recording vital info until the first quarter of the 20th century. Even once they did, a lot of people who were born at home or died at home did not get recorded.

However for the gggrandfather you cannot get anything on, if your ggrandfather died in the 20th century you possibly can get his death certifcate and it will probably shows his father's name. If not, if he applied and got a social security number, that application most likely will give the parents' names and places of birth.

So, if you have ancestors that you cannot find vital records on, church records might help, Baptisms, First Communion, Confirmation, Marriage and Death. In some faiths these will give the names of both parents including mother's maiden name.

http://www.cyndislist.com

Remember Census Records - don't give up on the memories of relatives sometimes it takes awhile to recall things. Ask your relatives whom to ask who may know the information you seek if they can't remember a name do they know an occupation or where he was from, anything story they told about him? maybe a cousin or someone else can help with the information

Adivce-
post what you do know, along with any specifics or clues on location especially. We might be able to pinpoint some sources for you.
Are you coping with Holocaust issues? It is true that many European records were destroyed, however there are groups that focus entirely on preserving what they can from surviving records.
Toss it out on the table, and see if someone here can find a place for you.

Just pretend you're from a more interesting family.. say you're related to Dubya in some convoluted way. Or failing that, Stallone