My family history research

My interest in who went before me was sparked after the 1995 death of my mother. Amongst her papers was a copy of a Whelan family history compiled by my father's cousin Eileen for the occasion of my grandparents' 60th wedding anniversary in 1976. It seems likely that the material she gathered was by word of mouth; most of those who contributed to that material are now dead, and their other memories gone forever.

During 1996-1999 I focused my research on my fathers parents' names (Whelan and Hildebrand). There are of course many other names recorded, the most common of which are Williams (in the USA), Notman and Kelpe (in New Zealand),  and Davis (Australia), all being related to the Hildebrand line.

In 2006 I started investigating the family of my father's maternal grandmother, Ellen Ballantyne and in 2007 made contact with a number of the descendants. The spelling of the surname changed in the mid 19th century for some family branches, and is now often spelled Ballintyne. Unlike my other families, who tended to stay put, the Ballantyne/Ballintyne lot spread out all over the country, showing up at various stages in every state and territory. 

I have quite a bit of information about some of the Ballantyne marriages, including the Maclaurin, McAlister, Mulvahil and Morris   families, and of course the Hildebrand families.

This website contains only a summary of our family history. There are no details of living persons. Family members and history researchers wishing to know more about a family group should email me. (see the "About the Author" page for address). I am happy to provide descendant charts in PDF format for any family branch relevant to your research, and am keen to get more information to fill in the "gaps" that inevitably exist.

In particular I dearly want to get more photographs of the older generations of ancestors. If you have photos of our ancestors, please get in touch with me; we may be able to help each other.

Tony Whelan

Canberra, July 2008