Bals Family History

Welcome to my genealogical research website.
The site is rather sparse at the moment as I work on it in spare time, but if I wanted until it was finish, it would never be published, so here we are.
I’m still fiddling with layout and formatting until I figure out more of the Squarespace tools and determine what I like.

Purpose
The purpose of this site to share my genealogical research, but more importantly, collaborate with fellow researchers and/or distant relatives in a quest to assemble a vast puzzle and retain the family history.

Like many researchers, I started on the well-known sites like Ancestry, MyHeritage, and FamilySearch quickly became frustrated. Multi-tiered paywalls for documents and storage capacity, strangers editing my tree with incorrect data, and the inability to curate the information as I desire.

Introduction
My name is Bryan Bales and I am a Great-Grandson of Ferdinand Bals, who immigrated to Nebraska, USA from Schmerlecke, Germany in 1885.
I was born and raised in Iowa and I currently reside in Massachusetts. My Father legally changed the surname from Bals to Bales, but that’s a story for another time.

Jürgen Baltz > Tonnies Baltz > Johannes Antonius Baltz > Franziscus Henricus Baltz > Johannes Henricus Baltz > Franziskus Josephus Balz > Theodore Balz > Peter Ferdinand Balz/Bals > William Ferdinand Bals > Elmer “Bud” Fredrick Bals > Larry Bals/Bales > Bryan Bales

Call To Action
If you have information which I’m missing on this site, I would absolutely welcome the knowledge. My only request is that you provide sources so that it can be factually verified.

Photos: Individuals and families, houses and farms, artifacts and possessions. Please include as much detail as possible [Full names of people, location names, artifact data and ownership, etc]
Documents: Ship passengers lists, immigration records, military records, marriage records, death records, etc. I’m especially interested in the immigration records of Ferdinand and Henry coming to America in the mid to late 1880s.
Information: Family stories and facts. Ex. Why did the surname change? Who brought Bertha Bals to the USA? Who came to America before Ferdinand?
Corrections: Surely I’ve made data entry mistakes, so if you catch one and want to help me get it fixed, that’s fine by me as well.

Contact Me
Fill out the contact form below and I’ll get back to you via email