When I was in sixth grade, my Social Studies project was to recreate my surname’s coat of arms and research its origin. At the time, the only spelling I knew was Shockey, and the one book available to me said it was of English origin. I couldn’t find an actual coat of arms for Shockey, so I created my own: a shield with a lightning bolt striking a key.
Fun fact: my cousin, Leslie Kay Shockey, later had a very similar design made for her cattle brand.
Fast forward to 2002. After I got married and we moved, I began scrapbooking. One of my pages included a pedigree chart, and it sparked the idea to start building both of our family trees for our future children.
I searched online as much as I could—especially for my side—using every free resource available at the time. Along the way, I was fortunate to connect with just the right people who helped link me to different branches of my family.
One cousin provided the final generations needed to connect my Shockey line to the main family tree. I also came across the Shockey Chronicles (the green set), which became a key resource as I continued building out the tree.
It wasn’t until 2012 that I attended my first Shockey reunion, then in 2021 I finally was able to join the Shockey board, and in 2025 I became President of the Shockey Family Memorial Fellowship.
Don’t be afraid to put your tree online, whether on Ancestry, FamilySearch, WikiTree, or all three. It’s one of the best ways to connect with cousins and uncover new information. Just remember: source, source, source, and pay it forward. If someone helps you, pass that help along to the next person.