November Genealogy Club

Mark your calendars: workshops begin Tuesday, November 1. Stop in to get reacquainted and share any interesting information discovered over the summer. We will meet each Tuesday in November and the first two weeks of December.


November Craft Fair: we will have a genealogy table at the craft fair on November 8. If anyone who has returned has an hour to spare that morning, please let me know. It's an easy job--just explain how our club works and encourage new folks to join.


Nancy Archibald expects to start the writer's group on November 15. She will give us a brief explanation of how she plans to help anyone who is interested get a start on writing either an autobiographical piece or a story about an ancestor.

Legacy's Weekly Webinar

Maureen Taylor, the recognized expert on photo identification, is presenting Legacy's October 26 webinar. "Flip for Flickr: Share, Store and Save Your Family Photos" will show how Flickr offers free storage and a way to protect your digital images.

www.familytreewebinars.com for more information and/or to register for the free presentation.

National Archives Virtual Genealogy Fair

Maureen Edwards contributed the following information today. Visit the website for topics and times. All the webcasts and handouts are free and you don't even have to sign up ahead of time. Each webcast is National Archives related.

Here's part of the blurb from the website:

On October 26 & 27, 2016 (Wednesday & Thursday), the National Archives is hosting a two-day, virtual Genealogy Fair via webcast. Viewers have the opportunity to participate with the presenters and other family historians during the live event on YouTube. All of the session videos and handouts will be available from this web page free of charge. You can watch the sessions and download the materials at your convenience. Registration is not required.

http://www.archives.gov/calendar/genealogy-fair

Legacy Webinar

Gena-Philibert-Ortega will be the speaker for this week's Legacy webinar. Scheduled for Wednesday, October 19, Gena will discuss "Social History Websites That Bring Your Ancestor's Story to Life."

Those interested in writing about their ancestors will find this presentation of particular interest. She will talk about social history as an important part of genealogical research and will go over 25 websites that will help to better understand your ancestor's life.

Remember, you can register to watch in real time or plan to see the webinar at your leisure for about a week following the presentation. www.familytreewebinars.com.

Bits and Pieces

Yesterday was German-American Day, chosen because it was on that date in 1683 that English Quaker William Penn brought the first group of German settlers to America.


Tomorrow our local family history center is holding an open house at 4PM to celebrate its 15-year anniversary. I hadn't realized that it had been open such a short time when we started using it after we began spending winter months at Palm Creek.


Have you noticed? The Palm Creek website now includes our genealogy club on its home page listing of clubs.


An email reminder from the Mesa Family History: Don’t miss the 2016 Family History Conference sponsored by the Mesa AZ FamilySearch Library on Saturday, October 29, 2016.  Register NOW by going to www.mesafsl.org.  The conference is FREE and will be held at the Tempe Institute of Religion on the ASU Campus, 1000 South McAllister Avenue in Tempe, from 9:00 a.m. to 4:10 p.m.  Attendees can register for as many as five classes and may also purchase lunch provided by Jason’s Deli.   The keynote speaker is James Tanner, a friend to our Conference and a well respected family history guru. Come join us as we learn about “Putting It All Together.”
  

Webinars for the Week

Legacy is presenting two webinars this week. Visit www.familytreewebinars.com for more information.


Wednesday, October 12: James Beidler will be instructing beginners on how to be more successful in locating their ancestor's records in "Time and Place--Using Genealogy's Cross-Hairs." He suggests that learning more about the history of your ancestor's location will help in your research.


Friday, October 14: Ursula Krause's topic is called "Finding Your Ancestors' German Hometown." She will discuss methods for research in immigration records and also how their name and church affiliation can be used successfully.

Family History Month

We are fortunate to be observing the first week of Family History Month at the Family History Library in Salt Lake City. They are remodeling the first floor of the library, so there is no access to that area at present. One advantage: we can use the third floor lunch room (usually reserved for their volunteers) which is much larger than the snack area for visitors on the first floor. We usually take a lunch with us to save research time...

We spent our first day in B-2 working with British records. It is interesting that many more films have now been digitized. It is always worth a look in the catalog to see if the information you need can be accessed that way.

It is time to begin organizing your "file piles" for the coming season--another way to celebrate Family History Month!

October 5 Legacy Webinar

Ron Arons calls his presentation "AHA! Analysis of Handwriting for Genealogical Research." He will be talking about the two main uses of handwriting analysis: 1) comparing signatures and handwriting in general to determine whether documents were written by the same person and 2) trying to understand the personality and behavior of a person by looking at the various traits of that person's handwriting.

Visit www.familytreewebinars.com for more information or to register to watch in real time.