My first foray into the field of writing was an article for Ancestry Magazine, which involved research on my grand-uncle, Edwin Dyer, and his service in World War I. (“Somewhere in France”). It also marked my first research venture into cyberspace.

It was late in 1996 and we had a baby in the house. (We still do, but now that she’s ten, she balks at being called “a baby.”) By this time my husband had listened to several months worth of lectures from yours truly on how wasteful he was being, spending all this money hooking us up to that Internet thingy. What possible use could it be?

Needless to say, he is still doing the “I told you so” dance over that discussion. As he set me up on the computer and began showing me how to search for things, I was amazed at all the cool things I found within an hour or so. (It may have been longer, because I can also recall that we had an incredibly slow connection and had to constantly re-dial when I lost that connection.)

My, how times have changed! It seems like eons ago that I sat in front of that tiny monitor and began exploring the few resources that were available for military research online. At the time I had no idea that I would be sitting here now with access to images of actual records online. The completion of the World War I Draft Card database at Ancestry.com for Veterans’ Day reminded me of those early days, so I spent a little time exploring the database and thought I’d share some tips for using this collection.

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