Thank You, Thank You, Thank You

As I look back on the past year, I want to thank all of those who were part of my genealogy world, particularly as our world in general changed so much.  First I would like to say thank you to those conferences and societies that chose me to be a speaker.  I am honored to have been part of their educational programs during the year.

• RootsTech/FamilySearch
• Legacy Tree Family Webinars
• Genealogical Forum of Oregon
• IAJGS International Conference on Jewish Genealogy
• Sacramento Public Library
• Jewish Genealogical Society of Washington State
• Linn Genealogical Society
• Genealogical Society of Washington County (Oregon)

And because 2020 was the pandemic year, some groups that chose me as a speaker had to cancel or significantly rearrange their events, and I didn't end up giving presentations to them after all.  I still am proud that they chose me for their original plans.

• Oregon and Southwest Mensa Regional Gathering
• Vancouver Community Library
• Federation of Genealogical Societies Annual Conference
• Genealogical Forum of Oregon Open House

Thanks go also to the genealogical societies for which I volunteered during the past year.  I continue to serve on the board of the San Francisco Bay Area Jewish Genealogical Society and also have responsibility for editing the quarterly journal ZichronNote, programming, and publicity.  I am the very active coordinator of the African American Special Interest Group (AA SIG) of the Genealogical Forum of Oregon.  And I am still involved with the Jewish Genealogical Society of Oregon, although I moved from board member to vice president, and then to president when the previous president had to step down for health reasons.  If it weren't for genealogical societies, many people would have even more difficulties accomplishing their research.  I am happy to be associated with thriving groups filled with other energetic volunteers.

And as my blog continues to plug along, I very much appreciate my readers.  Your comments, both online and offline, let me know that you find it worthwhile to spend some of your time reading my commentaries about our shared hobby.

I learn something from everyone I interact with, and I'm glad I leanred with all of you during 2020.  The adventure of 2021 will probably keep us on our toes, but at least we have genealogy to keep us sane at the same time.

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun (on Sunday!): RootsTech!!

Here I thought Randy Seaver wasn't going to have a Saturday Night Genealogy Fun during RootsTech, but what does he do?  He makes RootsTech the theme!  But I had no chance to answer the questions yesterday, so I'm playing catch-up today.

Your mission, should you decide to accept it (cue the Mission:  Impossible! music here), is:

(1) Have you gone to Rootstech?  If so, which years?  

(2) Describe your experience.

(3) Who was your favorite speaker?  

(4) Did you talk with any genealogy "rock stars?"

(5) What was something you learned that you use over and over?

(6) Describe something you enjoyed in the vendor area.

(7) Do you watch the streamed classes live? 

(8) Did you visit the Family History Library?  Describe your experience.

(9) What was your favorite Salt Lake City experience not genealogically related (a restaurant, a landmark, etc.)?

(10) What was a pleasant surprise about your visit that you did not expect?

My thanks to reader Jacquie Schattner for creating this list of questions!!

Okay, here are my answers.

1.  Yes.  I went for the first time in 2015, because I won a contest through Randy's blog, and I have been to the last four, 2017–2020.

2.  I try to attend as many sessions as possible, because I want to get the most out of this kind of educational opportunity.  I usually make a pass through the exhibitor hall once or twice.

3.  My favorite speaker from all the RootsTechs I have attended is probably Myko Clelland of FindMyPast.  I have attended several of his sessions over the years.  I really enjoy his presentation style.

4.  I have spoken with Blaine Bettinger, Thomas MacEntee, and Judy Russell.

5. I learned invaluable information about FamilySearch's Freedmen's Bureau online records collection in 2017 when I attended Ken Nelson's talk about how the collection was assessed, digitized, and indexed.  Because I teach about the Freedmen's Bureau records myself, learning this background information helped me understand the collection better and therefore teach about it better.

6.  My all-time favorite vendor experience at RootsTech was in 2015, when E-Z Photo allowed attendees to scan as many photos as they wanted on very cool Kodak scanners (which then became available in many Family History Centers).  I was able to scan about 350 photos in half an hour, two sided, at high resolution, and 500 total before the end of the conference.

7.  Nope.

8.  I didn't visit the Family History Library this year, but I have during my previous RootsTech trips.  I always found something related to my research.

9.  My favorite Salt Lake City experience not related to genealogy was when I was able to attend concerts by the Utah Symphony, which I did twice.

10.  I had a very pleasant surprise this year, when by pure chance I met someone who is helping coordinate a genealogy society for research in India and the Indian diaspora.  I am still working on trying to find more information about my stepsons' grandfather's family (he was from Punjab).  The group had a meeting on Saturday evening this year, which I was able to attend.  I'm optimistic that this will help a lot of people learn more about their families.

RootsTech 2020: I'm Back in Salt Lake City!

Yes, it's that time of year:  time to travel to beautiful Salt Lake City and join something like 25,000 other genealogists for that over-the-top production known as RootsTech!

I'm here because I was again fortunate enough to have the program committee accept one of my presentations for the conference.  My talk isn't until Saturday, however, so I have been attending other people's talks and learning all sorts of interesting things.

The conference started Wednesday morning, bright and early at 8:00 a.m., but I decided I couldn't face the world quite that early.  9:00 sounded much more reasonable.  That's when I went to a discussion session organized by FamilySearch.  They were talking to people who volunteer in their communities doing things related to genealogy.  The idea seems to be to find ways volunteers can help each other, both in joining forces and in sharing ideas.  It was an interesting and refreshing way to start the day.  I look forward to seeing what comes of it.

After I enjoyed a leisurely buffet lunch, I attended an informative session with Lara Diamond, who spoke on how to find relatives in Russian-language records if you don't speak (or read) Russian.  She discussed why it's helpful to learn how to recognize terms and your ancestors' names so you can identify them in records (coincidentally, some of the points I will be making in my Saturday presentation).  She also mentioned Genealogical Translations, a free translation group on Facebook that appears to have replaced one that was closed last year, which was great news.

Thursday morning at the conference once more started at 8:00, but I still couldn't make myself get going.  This time I began my day at 9:30 with Thom Reed's presentation about a FamilySearch initiative called Reclaiming Our African Roots.  One focus is preserving records and collecting oral histories in several sub-Saharan countries, many of which were the sources of people captured for the historic slave trade.  As much as I have enjoyed working with Thom over the past few years in relation to Freedmen's Bureau records, and while I hope the initiative does well, I have to admit I was frustrated at the use of marketing hype and imprecise terms used to generate enthusiasm.

An interesting and potentially very useful talk was given by Amy Williams, an academic at Cornell University, who spoke about a method to reconstruct an ancestor's genome by using the DNA of that person's children.  I'm hoping to be able to use the process to put together my mother's genome using my DNA and that of my two siblings, but I need to get conversant in Linux first.  The program used is not currently designed to conduct the process using DNA from half-siblings but might be in the future, so maybe one day I'll be able to do the same for my grandfather using the DNA from three of his children, each of whom had a different mother.  That could be extremely helpful in my search to find his biological father.

Of course, one of the best things about going to conferences is getting to see your genealogy friends face to face.  So far I've been lucky enough to run into Thomas MacEntee, Luana Darby, Sheri Fenley, Elizabeth O'Neal, Tierra Cotton-Kellow, Alice Burch of Utah AAHGS, Randy Seaver, Robinn Magid, and Nicka Smith (in addition to Lara and Thom) and finally have met Ellen Kowitt, Kim Thurman, and Rebecca Koford in person.  I can hardly wait to see who I run into during the rest of the conference!

Tierra and Janice at Wednesday's ProGen gathering

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: Accentuate the Positive Geneameme 2019

I always have fun with lists of questions for Saturday Night Genealogy Fun, but I have to admit I've never heard of the word "geneameme" before.

Here is your assignment, should you decide to accept it (you ARE reading this, so I assume that you really want to play along; cue the Mission:  Impossible! music!):

(1) Jill Ball reconstituted her "Accentuate the Positive Geneameme 2019" on 30 December 2019 and invited readers to participate.  

(2) This week, let's contribute our answers to her questions about our genealogy accomplishments in 2019.  Copy the questions below and add your own responses.

(3) Share your responses on your own blog, in comments on this blog, or on Facebook.  Please leave a comment on this post so readers can find your post, and please let Jill know about your efforts by e-mailing her at jillballau@gmail.com.

Here are mine.

1.  An elusive ancestor I found was:

I did not discover the names of any unknown ancestors in 2019.

2.  A great newspaper article I found was:

I found several interesting newspaper articles about my cousin Sam Brainin on Newspapers.com, including one about a bad car accident he was in as a child.

3.  A geneajourney I took was:

I took three geneajourneys, to RootsTech, the Ohio Genealogical Society conference, and the IAJGS International Conference on Jewish Genealogy.

4.  I located an important record:

Yes!  I found the passenger list for my great-great-grandmother Ruchel Dwoire (Jaffe) Brainin immigrating to the Untied States with four of her children.

5.  A newly found family member shared:

A cousin I discovered through a DNA match shared lots of information on his branch of the family, plus a photograph of my great-great-grandparents Gershon Itzhak Nowicki and Dube (Yelsky) Nowicki from about 1915, while they were still in Russia.

6.  A geneasurprise I received was:

When I posted a family photograph that I love but didn't know who was in it, one of my cousins recognized her grandmother and grandaunt, which was totally unexpected.  Plus the photo is probably of her father's bris!

7.  My 2019 social media post that I was particularly proud of was:

I am glad I took the time to write up all my family connections in "Now That's What I Call a Blended Family!"  It takes a genealogist to keep track of a family as complicated as mine.

8.  I made a new genimate who:

I've gotten to be friends with someone who comes regularly to the African American Special Interest Group at the Genealogical Forum of Oregon.  We're even working toether on a few genealogy projects.

9.  A new piece of technology or skill I mastered was:

Well, not quite mastered, but for the first time I was the speaker for a Webinar, and I did all the computer stuff for it.

10.  I joined:

Well, I rejoined the Jewish Genealogical Society of Oregon.

11.  A genealogy education session or event from which I learnt something new was:

I always learn something from every conference and Webinar, but one of the standouts last year was Judy Baston's presentation on the Vilna Ghetto Library, which I attended at the IAJGS conference.  It was fascinating to see the kinds of documentation that have survived.

12.  A blog post that taught me something new was:

Jennifer Mendelsohn's "No, You Don't Really Have 7,900 4th Cousins:  Some DNA Basics for Those with Jewish Heritage" has incredibly useful information on how to work around the overabundance of matches that endogamy produces.

13.  A DNA discovery I made was:

For the first time, a DNA match connected me with someone on the Jewish side of my family I was able to place in my family tree immediately but didn't know already.

14.  I taught a genimate how to:

I did 25 presentations at conferences and genealogical societies, in addition to my volunteer work at the Gresham Family History Center and "Helping Hands" sessions for the Jewish Genealogical Society of Oregon.  I think I taught several "genimates" how to do a lot of things.

15.  A brick wall I demolished was:

I had been looking for my great-great-grandmother's arrival into this country for about 20 years (see #4).

16.  A great site I visited was:

"Old Photographs of African Americans" is a site that displays unidentified photographs for free.  People have been able to find their relatives' photos, which is wonderful.

17.  A new genealogy/history book I enjoyed was:

I found a copy of London:  Then and Now by Diane Burstein at a thrift store, and it was a bargain.

18.  It was exciting to finally meet:

Like Randy, I also can't think of someone new and exciting I met in 2019.  I'm sure there was someone, but my memory is blanking.

19.  I am excited for 2020 because:

I am really looking forward to working more on figuring out who my paternal great-grandfather Mr. X was.

20.  Another positive I would like to share is:

I'm always excited about a new year of opportunities to learn about and share genealogy!

RootsTech 2020 Is Coming and You Can Register Now!

Next year is the 10th anniversary of RootsTech.  It has changed quite a bit since its beginnings and is now the largest genealogy conference in the world (as far as I know).  And I will be there, because I had a presentation accepted!

I will be talking about how useful it is to learn something about the languages your ancestors spoke, as doing so increases the chances you will be able to find them in records and have better results from your research.  It's a brand-new talk, and RootsTech will be the first time I present it.

And if you are planning to go to RootsTech, you can register now!  Registration opened on Wednesday, and almost a thousand people signed up within the first few hours.  I don't think it can run out of spots, but better safe than sorry, right? You can click on the registration link on the RootsTech home page or go straight here.  The super special early-bird discount pricing is good through October 11, so do it soon if you want to save some money.

And I hope to see you next year in Salt Lake City!

RootsTech 2019: I'm Back

The announcement recently went out that registration for RootsTech 2019 is now open, and I have my own RootsTech announcement to make.  I am proud to say that for the third year in a row I will be at RootsTech to give a presentation on black genealogy (so my reviews from this year must have been good).  Next year I will be talking about records of the Freedmen's Bureau and their importance in breaking through the 1865 research barrier, to find information about family members who were enslaved.  This was a subject I spoke on in 2017, but it's an important one, particularly to the LDS church, which coordinated the digitization and indexing of the records.  I'm looking forward to another great learning experience and the opportunity to spread the word about using Freedmen's Bureau records!

RootsTech 2019 will take place from February 27 through March 2 at the famous Salt Palace in Salt Lake City, Utah.  There's an early bird registration price for the conference, but you'll need to register before October 12 to take advantage of it!

So far my talk is scheduled for 9:30 a.m. on the last day of the conference, but speakers have been warned that the program is still preliminary.  I'll need to keep an eye on it to see if my time changes, as last year I wasn't notified at all what time my talk was set for.

RootsTech 2018: Days 3 and 4

The second half of this year's RootsTech was just as much fun as the first half, and I continued to find opportunities to learn.  On Friday I was having trouble deciding which session to attend, and I finally went to Myko Clelland's talk on the "hidden" British and Irish gems on the FindMyPast site.  Great choice!  I particularly enjoyed learning about the older parish records available on the site, especially the marriage record of a deaf man in 1576, because it included a description of how the man communicated during the ceremony.  I didn't catch the groom's name, so I've sent Myko a message asking that, as I want to read the record myself (I've taken American Sign Language classes for many years and am always on the lookout for historical mentions of deaf individuals and communities to share with my teacher).  Hey, if anyone reading this happens to remember the groom's name in that record, please let me know!

During the lunch break on Friday I participated in a focus group for MyHeritage.  I can be very opinionated (which I'm sure will surprise everyone who reads my blog), so that was a lot of fun.  I was even asked to stay a few minutes after the others had left to give some additional insights.  I hope some of my suggestions turn out to be useful.

The big MyHeritage party was Friday evening, which was a blast, as usual.  I remember seeing Thomas MacEntee, Lisa Hork Gorrell, Jacqueline Henderson, Banai Feldstein, Debra Robinson, Michelle Goodrum, Leslie Lawson, Jamie Mayhew, Sheri Fenley, Dan Earl, Randy Seaver, and Robert and Alice Burch, and as usual I know I've forgotten people (I must be getting old).  Along with several tasty food offerings (was that actually a pork sausage served on the antipasti tray?) and yummy mocktails (I particularly liked the frozen mango lemonade), there was a hat-decorating station and a video set-up.  I, of course, wore the hat I decorated for the video.  (I learned that only Banai Feldstein and I took the time to sew the decorations on our hats; everyone else used glue.  I guess we wanted our hats to last longer than the party.)

Saturday morning started with a MyHeritage Friends breakfast, where attendees were asked to give our thoughts about the company's current and future directions.  MyHeritage really seemed to be trying to find out what its users think of its offerings.  Some of us started talking about a possible conference in New Orleans in October 2020.  Would you go?

I am very happy I went to Dan Earl's class on "Funeral Homes and Family History", which he had listed as being suitable for beginners but which covered a lot of interesting material about the history of funerals and of the funeral home industry.  He has an uncommon perspective on the subject, his father having owned a funeral home.  I learned some new stuff, which is always a good thing.

My session, on copyright and its impact on genealogists, was in the very last time slot on Saturday.  I had been joking that only half a dozen were going to show up, but I was happy to see about 30 people in the room, including artist and author Kathy Marshall, whom I know from the African American Genealogical Society of Northern California.  She even had a real-life copyright question she asked me and then allowed me to use as an example during my talk.  Many people asked good questions, and it was clear they were thinking seriously about how copyright issues could affect their work.

After that it was back home to Portland and my boyfriend, cats, and birds.  I'm glad I had the opportunity to go to RootsTech this year, and I hope I'll be back next year.

RootsTech 2018: Days 1 and 2

Well, here I am again at RootsTech!  How could a year have gone by so quickly?  My presentation isn't until the last day of the conference, in the very last time slot, which is giving me a lot of time to do my own research, go to other people's talks, and generally goof off and enjoy myself.

I like having a full day of sessions on Wednesday.  I went to presentations on German records, American Civil War records, and slavery records, but the standout was the talk by Brian Donovan (of FindMyPast) on "security" records that can be used in Irish research.  Security in this instance is essentially a euphemism for police, and he explained a lot about how effectively the English policed the Irish between 1836 and 1922, including the impressive (and frightening) amount of time during which habeas corpus was suspended in the country.  The positive aspect of that is that the English created many, many records relating to their mission to keep Ireland "secure."  I have several new directions in which to look for my research on the families of my half-sister, my boyfriend (whose family members were said to have been involved in various Republican activities), and another friend.

The other event I attended on Wednesday was the African American Welcome Reception, hosted by the Utah chapter of the Afro-American Historical and Genealogical Society and the LDS Genesis Group.  I was very happy to renew my acquaintance with Robert and Alice Burch of the AAHGS chapter; Robert actually recognized me from last year!  We also had Gene Stephenson, president of the AAHGS national organization, in attendance, along with Utah State Representative Sandra Hollins.  It was a wonderful social event, and even Representative Hollins is interested in her family history.

Thursday's education included two impressive talks.  Tony Burroughs, the preeminent researcher in the country for black genealogy, discussed "Platting Plantations", which included important material about identifying an ancestor's slave owner, that owner's property and whether it was a plantation, and tools to plat and map the property.  I'm always happy to learn more from Mr. Burroughs.

The other great talk was about World War II research and was given by Jennifer Holik.  It was immediately apparent that she is passionate about the subject.  She recommended many record sources to learn more complete information about your relative's military service during the war and ways to honor that service.

I have to admit that I blew off one session that I had planned to attend because I ran into my good genealogy friend Nicka Smith, whom I have barely seen since she moved from California to Tennessee.  Not only did I get to hear about her current research, which is really interesting, but as we walked around the exhibitor hall we ran into True Lewis, whom I have now finally(!) met in person.

Other genealogy peeps I've seen so far are Ken Bravo, Jay Sage, Jan Meisels Allen, Thomas MacEntee, Dear Myrtle, Kathy Cortez, Leslie Lawson, Thom Reed of FamilySearch, several staff from the Oakland FamilySearch Library (including director Ralph Severson), and I know I've forgotten a few more.  But the conference is definitely off to a great start!

RootsTech 2018 Schedule Available

Even though I'm a speaker at next year's RootsTech conference, I did not receive a notification from FamilySearch that the schedule is now available online.  I'm lucky that I read about it in a couple of other bloggers' posts, so I headed over to find out when my talk is scheduled.

I am teaching one class at RootsTech 2018:

Online ≠ Free: Copyright Issues for Genealogy
Saturday, March 3, 3:00 p.m.
Session RT9427

So if you plan to attend the full length of the conference, think about coming to my session, in the very last time slot.  Registration is also open, so you can take care of that now, before you forget.  There is a huge variety of classes on the schedule, with something for just about everyone.  I look forward to seeing lots of my fellow genealogists in Salt Lake City at the conference!

RootsTech Ruminations

I am really surprised how quickly time has passed since RootsTech ended.  I planned to post about it right after the conference, but somehow a week and a half has slipped by while I've been catching up to my regular life.

This year's experience was quite a bit different from when I attended two yeas ago.  That year the FGS conference was held in conjunction with RootsTech, which worked out well for me, because three quarters of the sessions I attended were FGS ones.  I found the vast majority of the RootsTech sessions so basic that I didn't feel I would learn anything from them.

Being a speaker this year was the biggest difference, of course.  I had to pay much more attention to the time on the two days of my talks!  (I'm glad both were in the afternoon, as I'm not much of a morning person anymore.)  I'm happy to report that both talks went well, with good questions from attendees and many thank yous for the helpful information.  I was even interviewed about my classes for the RootsTech Facebook page!

One negative aspect of the conference was like "déjà vu all over again."  My talks (on Freedmen's Bureau and Freedman's Bank records), along with almost all other presentations that were part of the Africa-focused research that was heavily promoted this year, were in the very, very, very far end of the Salt Palace, closer to the Family History Library than to the main hub of activity for the conference.  (This is where the FGS talks were in 2015.  I joked then about FGS being the red-headed stepchild.)  That meant that none of the talks (that I know of) had as good attendance as they should have.  It isn't as though there aren't appropriately sized rooms closer to the main hall that could have accommodated our sessions.  And I'm not the only person who has commented.  One has to wonder why FamilySearch would market African Heritage Day so much and then put the classes that supported it so out of the way.

Another thing that was (happily) different this year was that several RootsTech sessions were actually geared for intermediate and more experienced researchers.  I found quite a few presentations to attend and learned a fair amount.  By far my favorite speaker during the conference was Myko Clelland of FindMyPast.com.  I missed his first talk — on the British Newspaper Archive collection on FMP — but I did attend his talks on British crime and punishment records and on British research beyond the census.  He was knowledgeable, entertaining, and a great presenter.  I never did figure out what he thinks is so difficult to pronounce about his name, however.

Another standout session, primarily because of my own presentation on the same subject, was the talk by FamilySearch's Ken Nelson on Freedmen's Bureau records.  He was the coordinator of the Freedmen's Bureau digitization and indexing project for FamilySearch, and he explained how he assessed the records and decided which ones would be prioritized for the project.  This helped me understand what is and is not indexed and why, and I've been able to share the information with others.

I also learned a lot in Bernice Bennett's session on the Southern Claims Commission.  Hers was the best talk I have heard on this subject.  I feel much more comfortable now with beginning my research into these records.

I had a great time meeting and networking with other genealogists.  Not only did I get together with other genealogists about potential future projects, I saw people I know leaving behind-closed-door meetings.  Lots of business was going on at the conference, on many levels.

Unfortunately, not everything was good.  Besides the "afterthought" location of the black genealogy programming, one major bone I had to pick with the conference was the decision to make handouts available only via the app.  I don't have a smartphone, which meant I didn't get to have handouts.  And the handouts for my sessions weren't even available through the app when I taught my first class!  I guess this is RootsTech's way of saying that if you don't have a smartphone, they don't want you to bother coming to the conference; you are not their target market.  The only place I could find information about this policy was buried near the bottom of the FAQ online, though I freely admit I may have missed it somewhere else.  Personally, I think this is shortsighted of FamilySearch, but my opinion carries no weight.

And not all classes were as good as Myko Clelland's.  I think the worst I went to was one by a prominent British genealogist who claims to be "the best genealogist in the UK."  That person's session covering what was supposed to be "unique" and "unusual" records spent half the time rehashing records that are basics of research and are known to most researchers.  A lot of ego but not much substance.  Another woman in that session and I had a running commentary during the talk, as one common record after another was discussed in great detail.  (That attendee is a missionary working at the Church History Library; she has an ongoing project to identify and find detailed information on all the members of the Mormon Battalion.  There was so little of substance in the presentation that she worked on her own research during the entire talk.)

My other big beef with the conference is the large number of sessions presented by company employees that weren't always clearly noted as such.  I think every talk that is essentially advertising for a company's site and/or services should be marked as "vendor session" in the program.  Then at least you know what you're in for.

I was so busy at the conference, I had hardly any time for the Family History Library.  I did get over there for a few hours to work on my Mundy research, in my search for my grandfather's biological father.  I didn't make huge progress, but every little bit helps.

Notwithstanding the problems I experienced at the conference, overall I had a great time, and I'm very happy I was able to attend.  I hope my talks were reviewed well by attendees, and maybe I'll have presentations accepted next year on my own merits.

I Will Be Presenting at RootsTech!

I received a phone call late Thursday afternoon.  Due to another speaker having to cancel at the last moment, I was asked if I could step in and give two presentations.  I'm sad that my opportunity came became someone else wasn't able to go after all, but I'm happy to report we were able to work everything out.  I will be presenting at RootsTech this year (my first time as a speaker there).  The two sessions will be on Freedmen's Bureau records and Freedman's Bank records.

You know, it's amazing what you can accomplish in a short period of time when you need to.  We were trying to get everything done in time to get my session information into the printed program, and I think we made it.  I wrote and rewrote my session descriptions (including the Twitter versions), updated and uploaded my handouts, and completed all the other tasks on the speaker list.  Plus I booked my airline ticket, found a hotel that still had rooms available (!), and made boarding reservations for my birds.

And since I'll be in Salt Lake City, I'll have to find some time to go to the Family History Library for research.  I just have to narrow down what to work on, since I'll only be in town for a few days.

Genealogy happy dance all around the house . . . .

Wordless Wednesday

FGS and RootsTech: Saturday and Overall Impressions

As I walked to the Salt Palace Saturday morning for the last day of the FGS-RootsTech conference, I realized I had accomplished a lot during the week — attended several informative talks, networked with a lot of genealogy colleagues, even scanned more than 400 photographs.  I could have gone home then and still have had a very successful trip.  Lucky me, I was able to add even a little bit more on Saturday.

First, at the E-Z Photo Scan booth I managed to finish scanning the rest of the photos I had brought with me to Utah (thanks again, Arnold!).  I think my total over the three days was around 500.  I know that's a small drop in the bucket of the 100,000 the company was trying to preserve during the conference, but I was happy to be part of the total.  The photos I brought with me were all unidentified.  I decided to focus on those because now that they're scanned, it will be a lot easier to share them with cousins who are likely to recognize a good number of the faces.

Second, while I admit I did not find the Saturday sessions to be as good as the ones earlier in the week, I still learned something from each one I attended.  The best was Deena Coutant's talk about the U.S. nonpopulation census schedules.  The high points were that she gave a good overview of the six different types of nonpopulation schedules (farming, manufacturing/industry, defective/dependent/delinquent, mortality, supplemental, and social statistics), some ways in which they are helpful in learning more about your family, and which ones are online (not all of them are, something I did not know previously).  Unfortunately, most of the images on her slides were too small to be effective, and she zipped far too quickly through the slides that showed where one could find several of the series offline (and didn't include that information on her handout, having taken valuable real estate there to show partial images of schedule pages).  Coincidentally, she wrote a guide to the nonpopulation census schedules that's available for sale, and it was the only resource listed on the handout that she talked about during the class.  Hmmm . . . .

The other two presentations I went to were not as good as the census one.  A talk about online resources for black genealogy research was rambling and disjointed.  The speaker gave incorrect information several times, such as saying that all books digitized on Google can be read online (many, many books are available in snippet view only or can't be read online at all); if it has to do with genealogy and is online, Mocavo will "grab it" for you (Mocavo searches specific databases only); and you can log in at HeritageQuest.com with your library card to look at their databases (you need to go through your library's Web site for authentication).  Almost all the useful information was in the handout (where she spelled "Afrigeneas" incorrectly).

The last talk I heard, on the Digital Library on American Slavery hosted at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, was a little better but still frustrating.  Way too much time was spent on "jokingly" whining about how research was done prior to the advent of the Internet and how it cost lots of time and money to do so.  One short example would have been sufficient; four long ones was overkill.  The slides didn't really show how to do searches or how to link results together (not that it looked particularly difficult to figure out), and no real explanation was given of how to determine where to obtain copies of original documents after you decide that an abstracted record is relevant to your research.  One positive thing, especially in relationship to the "tech" part of RootsTech, was that the speaker announced at the beginning that there would be a hands-on practical learning part for the final quarter of the time block — but that was unfortunately not included in the handout, so not everyone was prepared for the opportunity.

Unfortunately, the talk I told Randy Seaver I was looking forward to the most, "School Daze:  Finding the School Records of Our Ancestors", was in the very last time slot of the conference, from 4:00-5:00 p.m.  My flight back to Oakland was scheduled for 6:10 p.m., so I had to miss the entire class.

My overall experience at the FGS-RootsTech joint conference was pretty good.  I learned about new resources, and more information about resources that I already use.  More than three quarters of the sessions I attended were offered by FGS.  I saw many of my genealogy friends in person, some for the first time, and did lots of networking.  And I think I made effective use of several of the special deals offered by vendors in the exhibit hall.  I'm thrilled I won a free registration.

My impression of RootsTech specifically — not quite as good.  I remember when RootsTech started as the great technology conference, with apps, developers, and programming as the focus.  Even though this was the first time I have attended, I noticed an extreme lack of tech overall and even in many of the sessions officially labeled "RootsTech" (as in no mention of technology of any sort in session descriptions).  I heard several attendees, particularly programmers and developers, comment negatively on the lack of technology orientation.  One woman I spoke to was aghast that the winner of the Innovator Challenge was something that essentially allowed you to record a phone call; she had been rooting for the application that could do OCR on handwriting.  (I tend to agree with her.)  A man next to me in a session said this year would be the last he attended due to the lack of programmer and developer focus.  It appears that FamilySearch's desire to have a conference to attract entry-level genealogists has had a negative impact on the appeal of the conference to those outside that category.  It's a shame they didn't just create a new genealogy conference with that focus and leave RootsTech independent.  It was probably an economic decision.

Ironic comments about the technological aspects of RootsTech:
• Tuesday, the day registration opened, the system crashed and wiped out records of people's paid add-ons.
• The Web site crashed during the conference.
• Nowhere online (or at the conference) could I find a version of the schedule that listed all events happening at the same time together.  Clear separation of every aspect of the conference (FGS, Innovators Summit, Getting Started, Getting Started, RootsTech, keynote sessions, computer labs, and events) was maintained throughout.  Maybe sorting a database by times is too much to ask of technology?

As a final note about my time in Salt Lake City, while I was waiting for the light rail to take me to the airport, I met a woman who told me she was from Murphys, California.  I asked her if she was a member of the Calaveras Genealogical Society.  When she said yes, I told her I would be seeing her in April, because I was going to be the speaker at the spring seminar.  She told me she was the new director of the FamilySearch Center in the church, where the seminar will be held.  Considering the fact that the population of Murphys was counted as only 2,213 in the 2010 census, that's a pretty amazing coincidence.

===

My previous comments on the conference are here for Tuesday and Wednesday, and here for Thursday and Friday.

FGS and RootsTech: Thursday and Friday

On Thursday, the RootsTech part of the joint conference with FGS began.  This meant that the exhibitor hall opened!  I was ready and waiting at the entrance for the 10:00 a.m. opening because I wanted to go straight to the E-Z Photo Scan booth.  There had been lots of announcements prior to the conference about their free scanning opportunity, with the company having a goal of 100,000 photographs preserved the course of the conference.  The purpose of the promotion was to show off the capabilities of the Kodak Picture Saver Scanning System (I think I was using the PS50).  I have to say, I was extremely impressed.  Arnold Hutagalung, one of the company reps at the booth, was very helpful.  He showed me how to get started, and it was pretty smooth sailing.  I scanned almost 350 photos in half an hour!  That's all it took!  It took a little while longer to copy the files to my flash drive, and I was done.  I can't afford one of these, but I was told that a big focus of the company's marketing is FamilySearch Centers and Libraries.  I'm hoping we'll get one in Oakland.

After I retrieved my flash drive, I ran off to the far reaches of the Salt Palace for more FGS learnin'.  The outstanding session of the day was Craig Scott's talk on Civil War medical records.  When I wrote about my great-great-grandfather Cornelius Godshalk Sellers, I mentioned that he had been in the hospital twice, and I'm very interested in finding more records related to those incidents.  Craig started off his talk by warning everyone that if they would be uncomfortable seeing information about STD's, they shouldn't go anywhere near Civil War medical records.  Apparently STD's were the leading cause of men needing to go to the hospital during the war.  Craig mentioned that even George Armstrong Custer (then only a lieutenant) was treated for gonorrhea!  Craig explained things such as the levels of care men might have received, which records might mention medical information, the top two medical reasons for which men received pensions (diarrhea and dysentery), and several of the National Archives Record Groups in which records might be found.  I felt inspired, but now I need to go to Washington to do research!

The other great talk of the day was by Judy Russell, the Legal Genealogist, who spoke about federal court records and how they can be useful in family history research.  (This was scheduled as a RootsTech session, though the only discernible "tech" connection I could find was the seven URL's she listed in her resource list.)  This was the first time I have heard Judy in person, and it was fun.  She discussed which types of cases could be heard in federal courts (and which couldn't), where records are held (almost nothing is online), and who might appear in records.  Beyond the expected plaintiffs, defendants, and judges, maybe you have a relative who was a court officer, investigator, attorney, witness, juror, bondsman, or someone in Customs, the Treasury, or the FBI?  Judy also talked about how you could follow people or an issue through a case and showed some interesting examples.  One man was prosecuted for running a still, and the file had lovely photographs of the still, from several different angles no less.  An inheritance dispute between some family members (which went through the federal court because it involved people in one state and land in a second state) included photographs from childhood to old age of the deceased man who had bequeathed the land, and fantastic family information about who was related to whom and questions of the paternity of a putative grandchild.  The cases she chose to showcase issues were on polygamy in the Utah Territory, and the famous Dred Scott case.  The decisions in those cases had lasting effects and are obviously relevant to families affected by them.

The best talk I attended on Friday was also by Judy, this one on justices of the peace.  After pointing out that, while originally the position was held almost exclusively by men of high social standing, not-so-prominent men could be JP's, Judy gave several examples of historical JP's, such as George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Benjamin Franklin.  A couple of unexpected justices were Henry Fielding, author of Tom Jones (no, not about the genealogist), and the famed Judge Roy Bean.  We heard about the first known black American JP, Macon Bolling Allen, who was appointed in 1848 in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, and the first female American justice, Esther Hobart Morris, appointed in 1870 in Sweetwater County, Wyoming.  Judy covered the varying responsibilities of JP's, what kinds of records might exist, and tips on finding the records.  Again, most of these are not online.

The other session I found particularly useful on Friday was a computer lab on finding and using online newspapers.  Yes, I know, I am the genealogy newspaper queen of the Bay Area :), but there is always more to learn.  The focus of the class was on telling attendees about large free online newspaper collections.  (They included the Wikipedia newspaper archive page I contribute to regularly.)  A short slide presentation showed the basic process of how newspapers are digitized.  Then everyone was instructed to go to the Indiana Digital Historic Newspaper Program site, create an account, and sign in.  After that we were told to do a basic search. None of that is too exciting, right?  The useful part was when the presenters explained in detail how the system to correct mistakes in the OCR worked.  This correction system is valid in almost all Veridian newspaper databases, so I tried it with the California Digital Newspaper Collection, which I use as an example in several of my newspaper talks, so I know of some specific mistakes there.  It was interesting to see the search results change after making a correction.  The search engine no longer finds the incorrect word, but when you search for the corrected text, the results still display the incorrect OCR reading.  I'm going to be adding this to my talks.

Other cool things on Friday were scanning another batch of photos at E-Z Photo Scan (thanks again, Arnold!), meeting Eric and Karen Stroschein of the Northwest Genealogy Conference (where I am scheduled to be a speaker), doing a group photo of California Genealogical Society members here at the conference, helping at the Association of Professional Genealogists booth during lunch, getting my photo taken with Randy Seaver (because I won my RootsTech registration through his contest), and talking with Schelly Talalay Dardashti, Thomas MacEntee, and Dear Myrtle.  The only real downer was the people at the GenealogyWallCharts.com booth.  They paid to have a promotional card inserted in the registration packets, saying that there would be free blank charts and free black and white charts available.  It seems that they didn't plan adequately for the number of attendees, whether ones asking for the promised charts or printing out color charts at the booth, and the booth people got grumpy and snappish and told me there weren't going to be any more free charts.  Sorry, guys, not a good impression to make on a (former) potential customer.

The other negative was that FGS' position as red-headed stepchild meant that less attention was given to that end of the conference hall.  Not only did the containers of ice water run out and were not refilled, even the attention to maintaining the women's room was minimal, and trash overflows were common.

==

My other comments about the conference are here for Tuesday and Wednesday, and here for Saturday and my overall impressions.

FGS Conference: Society Day and Librarians' Day

Here I am in lovely Salt Lake City.  It's February, but those of us here for the joint Federation of Genealogical Societies and RootsTech conferences have been enjoying relatively mild temperatures of 50's and even low 60's, rather than the snow we had been anticipating.  No complaints!

The FGS conference began on Wednesday, one day earlier than RootsTech, with Society Day.  It became clear very quickly that FGS is the red-headed stepchild in this joint-conference relationship.  Its sessions are tucked away in a far corner of the Salt Palace, much closer to JB's Restaurant than to where the RootsTech sessions will be.  If attendees actually have the audacity to want to attend sessions from both FGS and RootsTech on the same day, they're going to have quite a walk to travel between the two.  The exhibitor hall doesn't even open until Thursday — when RootsTech starts.

Getting back to Society Day, however, I figured I should attend as many sessions as possible, since I'm a board member of three genealogical groups.  I had hoped I would find helpful nuggets in at least one of the sessions, and indeed I did.  Two talks were particularly useful.

One of my boards, the San Francisco Bay Area Jewish Genealogical Society, is working on a new policies and procedures manual, and Ann Staley of the Jacksonville Genealogical Society taught an informative class on that subject to start the day. She clearly defined the purpose of a P&P manual and outlined a good process for putting together or updating one.  Though she unfortunately didn't include the URL's in her handout, she showed three good examples of other societies' manuals which are available online.  I'll be tracking those down and downloading them to use as inspiration for the SFBAJGS project.

Later in the day, genealogy tech guru Thomas MacEntee's topic was "Technology Initiatives for Genealogical Societies."  Thomas always has great information, but I had seen that his handout dealt with several topics that had come up in discussion in recent board meetings, so I was really looking forward to hearing the specifics.  One of the best pieces of advice he mentioned was that if you create a free Web site using Weebly.com and already have your own domain name (such as http://www.sfbajgs.org/), you can transfer your newly created site to your domain, again for free.  That could be helpful not only for the society, but maybe even my own Web site!  He also mentioned that a society that sponsors a FamilySearch Wiki page no longer is required to maintain that page (though assistance is always appreciated), so it is an excellent publicity opportunity to do so, and kind of missing the boat not to.  He even described ways to use Pinterest (which I truly have never understood the point of) that may have convinced me to start using it as part of the SFBAJGS publicity efforts.  I definitely got a lot of bang for my buck from his session.  Overall, I was pretty happy with Society Day.

I actually arrived in Salt Lake on Sunday night and spent all day Monday doing research at the Family History Library.  I came fairly well prepared and retrieved/scanned about forty documents for my own family, plus about another fifty for other people.  It was a great beginning for my trip!

Even before Wednesday, though, I had begun my conference educational opportunities.  On Tuesday, I attended the Librarians' Day sponsored by ProQuest.  We enjoyed five speakers (and a great buffet lunch).  Curt Witcher from the Allen County Public Library spoke about how librarians need to change their established methods to work better with the new types of patrons who come in.  He particularly picked on what he considers to be the obsolete, old-fashioned reference desk — or, as he termed it, the "fort" — and how it divides the librarians from the patrons.  An archivist from The National Archives (of the United Kingdom, and yes, that's with a capital "T") discussed how TNA's online holdings help bring people into the archives in person to do more research.  Librarians from the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center in Ohio and the Tulsa (Oklahoma) City-County Library talked about genealogy tourism and how repositories can help bring tourist traffic to their areas.  Though these talks aren't directly applicable to my volunteer work in the Oakland FamilySearch Library, there were some points I'll be bringing up when I get home (such as the reference desk as a fort to hide behind).

The big news that came out of Tuesday was during the talk by Bill Forsyth from ProQuest.  He revealed that HeritageQuest Online (HQO), long a staple offering from libraries and often accessible at home by library card holders, is undergoing a major overhaul.  HQO has partnered with Ancestry.com and is scheduled to roll out a new interface and new collections next month, in March.  The search pages on HQO will now be in the Ancestry style and will have more flexibility, such as Soundex and sounds like, instead of only exact spelling.  Several U.S. census databases will be added, such as the nonpopulation schedules.  I freely admit I have never liked the HeritageQuest interface, and I was very happy to hear that HQO hadn't gone the FindMyPast route and hired programmers to create a new, subpar interface when a good one was already available.  HQO will continue to be available through libraries, so if you have been able to use it through your local library Web site with your library card, that shouldn't change.  My only concern is that we have yet another company in bed with Ancestry.com.  "Incestuous" is becoming an understatement when describing the interrelationships in the genealogy marketplace.

===

Additional comments about the conference are here for Thursday and Friday and here for Saturday and my overall impressions.

I'm Going to RootsTech and the FGS Conference!

Right now I feel like an incredibly lucky person.

Randy Seaver, who publishes the Genea-Musings blog, is a blogging ambassador for RootsTech.  He ran a contest for a free full-conference pass to RootsTech, taking place February 12–14, 2015 in Salt Lake City.  Randy asked entrants to list a session they wanted to attend and a vendor they wanted to visit.  I said:

1.  I want to attend the "School Daze—Finding the School Records of Our Ancestors" session because I know several schools associated with my family members and I would love to be able to find school records for them.

2.  I hope NIGS is one of the vendors, so I can stop by and visit with the always pleasant Louise St. Denis.

Randy had stated that the choice would be made by a random draw.  For some reason, only seven (!) people entered his contest.  And I was the winner!!  So I started doing the genealogy happy dance.  And Louise even wrote to me to say thanks for the mention.  (She really is a very nice person.)

But it gets better.

Dee Dee King of Forensic Genealogy Services very generously has provided scholarships to a small number of genealogists every year since 2010.  Through her assistance, I was able to attend Jamboree in 2011 and the Forensic Genealogy Institute in 2013.  This year I applied for a scholarship to attend the Federation of Genealogical Societies (FGS) conference, which is being held in conjunction with RootsTech next year and starts a day earlier.  And yesterday Dee Dee let me know that I had won a scholarship for FGS.  So I was able to add an FGS pass onto my RootsTech registration, and I'll be attending the ProQuest library event the day before the FGS conference begins.  More genealogy happy dance around the house!

And of course I'll post from the conference about all the great stuff I'll be learning.

Hmm, maybe I should go out and buy a lottery ticket or something . . . .