Ancestry.com and Family Tree Maker

Biff83 · V.I.P. Joined: Jul 10, 2007 Posts: 1263 Location: Florida

I could use your help/advice/guidance.

I have subscribed to Ancestry for the past couple of years and still have a subscription but currently I'm at the point where I've located the records that I need. I've kept my subscription since it was only costing me $8.95 a month (billed monthly) but my renewal rate has now more than doubled to $19.95 per month (billed montly). I also have the option of renewing for a one time payment of about $155 for a year and will likely renew for that rate. For better or for worse--and it's for worse--my tree with all its sources, pictures, etc. is only on Ancestry and I need to somehow back up all the work I've done onto my computer.

My tree now has over 500 people, 250 plus photos, a number of stories, and an enormous amount of sources--manifests, draft cards, census records, naturalizations, passports, etc. Images of the overwhelmingly majority of the sources are attached to individuals and can only be accessed via Ancestry although I have saved jpeg files of a few manifests and passports. All the pictures on my tree are saved as jpegs in a Genealogy folder on my computer, and the stories are on my computer as word documents.

Here's the $64,000 question. Is there any way I can save what I've done to my computer using Family Tree Maker? Not only the data and source details but also the stories, pictures and images of the sources. I'm guessing that the only way to attach those sources that I haven't saved as jpegs is to save them and then add them individually later to the appropriate people in my tree. Although my OS is Windows XP, I'm pretty sure I've got enough RAM, storage etc. to handle any of the Family Tree Maker programs and software which is available. And once I've backed everything up and added the images, stories, etc., will I be able to make CD copies which I can give to family?

Thanks,
Biff