Saturday Night Genealogy Fun :: My Genealogical Threes

Randy Seaver's challenge for this Saturday Night comes from Facebook. He says, "some people have been posting their '3s of Me' with information about themselves providing three responses in different categories like 'Three names I go by,' 'Three jobs I've had,' 'Three favorite drinks,' etc. You get the idea."

So our assignment is to give three responses to these questions:

* Three genealogical libraries I frequent

• Allen County Public Library, Fort Wayne, Indiana
• Peabody Public Library, Columbia City, Indiana
• Elkhart Public Library, Elkhart, Indiana

* Three places I've visited on genealogy trips

• Vevay, Switzerland County, Indiana (Wiseman and Bray)
• Nelson County, Kentucky (Bray)
• Pitkin, Gunnison County, Colorado (Lydia Fisher Conroy)

* Three genealogy societies I belong to (or want to)

• New England Historic Genealogical Society
• Indiana Genealogical Society
• Genealogical Society of Whitley County (Indiana)

* Three websites that help my research

• Family Search Record Search
• Ancestry.com
• US GenWeb

* Three ancestral graves that I've visited

• Peter and Christina Wise and family in Gilead Cemetery, Miami County, Indiana
• Lysander and Lydia (Robison) Joslin in Lyndon Cemetery, Valley Brook Township, Osage County, Kansas
• Charles and Naomi (Bray) Wiseman in McKay Cemetery, Craig Township, Switzerland County, Indiana

* Three ancestral places I want to visit (there's a theme here…)

• St. Armand, Quebec, Canada (Joslin)
• Franklin County, Vermont (Joslin)
• Leominster, Massachusetts (Joslin)

* Three brickwall ancestors I want to research more (I prefer to call them Roadblocks rather than Brickwalls.)

• Ruth Dyer 1771-1830 (married Jonas Joslin)
• Sally Church 1780-1831 (married Bela Goodrich)
• Abigail Price 1754-1827 (married John Goodrich)

The Ultimate "American History" Reading List

The recent Carnival of Genealogy :: 56th edition focused on the indespensible genealogy books in the libraries of the contributing genea-bloggers. It was a very good exercise and Lori produced a valuable list of essential resources we all can use for future reference.

The following article could be considered "old news" since it was published nearly four years ago, but I thought it appropriate in light of the recent COG.

American Heritage Magazine published the article America Unabridged in December 2004 drawing "on the knowledge and enthusiasm of leading historians, writers, and critics to offer a compendium of the very best books about the American experience."

The list is divided into chronological and subject categories with each section presenting "the writer’s choice of the 10 best books in a particular field, along with lucid, lively explanations of what makes them great."

The chronological periods covered are The Colonial Era to 1776, The Revolution 1776 to 1787, The Young Republic 1787 to 1860, The Civil War 1861 to 1865, The Industrial Age 1865 to 1917, Modern America 1917 to 1941, World War II 1941 to 1945, The Postwar Years 1945 to 1974, and Modern Times from 1974.

Subject categories are Biographies, Historical Novels, African-American History, The West, The Immigrant Experience, Popular Culture, Business, Technology, Indispensable Photographs, Sports, Women’s History, and Historical Movies.

There is something for everyone on this list. I know I'll be adding some of them to my reading list, particularly those covering the Colonial Era, as I prepare to research my New England ancestors!

A tip of the hat to footnoteMaven. Her article this morning on Shades of the Departed included a link to American Heritage. Be forewarned, don't go there if you don't have a lot of time to spare!

a date which will live in infamy

photo - remember December 7th poster
http://www.umkc.edu/lib/spec-col/ww2/aboutimages.htm#phposter

photo - USS Bennington
http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/images/u030000/u036055.jpg
The USS Bennington (CVA-20) passes the wreck of USS Arizona (BB-39) in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on Memorial Day, 31 May 1958. Bennington's crew is in formation on the flight deck, spelling out a tribute to the Arizona's crewmen who were lost in the 7 December 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Note the outline of Arizona's hull and the flow of oil from her fuel tanks. Official U.S. Navy Photograph.

• University of Missouri - Kansas City Voices of World War II
  
• USS Arizona (BB-39) Memorial at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii
  
• National Park Service USS Arizona Memorial
  
• USS Arizona Preservation Project
  
• National Park Service Photo Gallery
  
• The University of Arizona Library
  
• USS Arizona and Pearl Harbor Remembered

Are You Prepared? I'm Not.

The fires in California and the tornado that swept through Nappanee, Indiana last Thursday night (October 18th) have set me to thinking again about my preparations for a disaster. Nappanee is only 30 miles or so due west of where I live, and the area where some of my ancestors lived between 1860-1910. Luckily there were no deaths reported with the tornado in Nappanee, but there was extensive damage with at least 100 homes and businesses completely destroyed. That really doesn't compare with the extensive property loss in California, but to anyone who has had their home destroyed, it is devastating. Imagine losing everything you own, in a matter of minutes. It was heart-breaking watching the television during and after hurricane Katrina and it is the same now with the fires and tornados and floods.

Living in northern Indiana and knowing the area is prone to tornados, and having had several friends lose their homes to fire, you would think that I would already be prepared. I should be, but I'm not. You always think "It won't happen to me" but as we all know, natural and man-made disasters happen all too frequently. The thing is, if you live as though disaster is waiting around the corner, you won't have time to enjoy life, you'll be too busy worrying about what might happen next. You have to find balance. Think about what is truly valuable to you, what can not be replaced. Make plans to save those things, then follow through with the plan! Easier said than done.

With a forest fire, a hurricane, possibly even a flood, you might have advance warning of the pending or potential disaster. But with a tornado, as with the one in Nappanee last Thursday, there is no advance warning. For those people who had their homes demolished, very little is left. So, what can you do? Not much, in that situation, but with those disasters where some time is available for evacuation you can be prepared.

Put together a Family Disaster Kit. Written in 2005, this webpage is a goldmine of information for creating a plan and building a disaster kit as well as providing guidelines for the important documents and other necessary things. You don't have to do everything it suggests, and you don't have to do it all at once (the cost would be prohibitive, I think) but if nothing else, it will give you something to think about.

Prepare a Home Inventory. The Insurance Information Institute has software for recording your stuff. The software is easy to use. I downloaded it yesterday and have started adding some items. It allows you to attach pictures and scanned images. Best of all, it is free.

Create a Bug Out Box. The box should be small and light enough to be carried by one person. The contents should include copies of important papers, household inventory, prescriptions and other documents needed to reestablish who you are and what you had. Important phone numbers such as doctors and relatives, emergency contacts, credit card and other business numbers should also be added.

Important Papers includes suggestions on the critical documents necessary to rebuild your life.

There are a few things that I am already doing to prepare for a disaster, but I definitely plan on creating a disaster kit. If I had to rely on my pantry for survival, it wouldn't last more than a few days - I just don't keep much food on hand.

Bug Out Box.
I sort of have one but I'm sure it doesn't include all the important papers that would be needed, so I'm going to go through the box and add the things that are missing. I created a document listing critical addresses and accounts and printed a copy for my brother for safekeeping, primarily in case anything happened to me but also as a backup. I'll be getting a safe-deposit box to store some of the more important items. I'll also make copies and scan them before putting them away. It's important to have paper copies available immediately because if power is out, computer files won't be readily accessible.

Data Backup.
I have several external hard drives for backing up all my computer data. One of the drives is stored at my mother's apartment, 30 miles away. The drives are rotated weekly. I backup my data nearly every night on one of the two drives I keep at home. So at most, I'd only lose one day's worth of work.

Scanning documents and photographs.
This is an on-going and seemingly never-ending project. Also very time-consuming. But, to me, it is critical. I just started scanning stuff this summer and haven't gotten much done. I really need to get back to it. Not just family photographs but important documents also.

First Aid Kit.
A very basic first aid kit is kept in the car, along with a few blankets, but after reading the above articles I think more needs to be included.

That's a lot to think about. Not much fun either. But what would you do if your home was destroyed in the blink of an eye?

Follow-up post (11/14/2007): My Plan to Prepare for Disaster

Lucy, the First Human, Is on Tour

From Gadling:

Her bones made a debut on Friday at the Houston Museum of Natural Science in an exhibit called "Lucy's Legacy: The Treasures of Ethiopia." The exhibit, slated to appear in 9 other venues in the United States over the next few years, is not just about Lucy, but about the wealth of human existence that has come from Ethiopia.

In addition to the fossil of Lucy, over 100 artifacts such as ancient manuscripts and royal artifacts from a dynasty Ethiopians believe stretches back to the son of the biblical King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba will be on display.

I found the online exhibit Lucy's Legacy: The Treasures of Ethiopia, to be fascinating. She deserves more than the 15 minutes that I spent there... I didn't see any indication of where the other 9 venues were located.

There is also some concern about having Lucy's 3.18 million year old skeleton on display.

WeRelate and the Allen County Public Library

Promise? Yes, I promise! This will be my last post on the 2007 FGS Conference ;-) . . . in one of my previous posts I mentioned that one of the sessions I attended at the FGS Conference was "Working on Tomorrow's Virtual Community Today" with Curt Witcher in which he talked a bit about the relationship that the Allen County Public Library has established with the Foundation for On-Line Genealogy and WeRelate. Curt didn't really say much about the specific role that the ACPL is playing in the partnership but we did learn a little about the philosophy behind the relationship and the goals they want to achieve.

As Curt said "these are challengingly interesting times for researchers. The available electronic data is immense and growing exponentially. Along with this, the challenge of finding relevant data is also growing exponentially." Nothing new there, right? He continued "there is a growing need for collaboration - to avoid duplication of effort, to have the ability to have your data online on a site that has no affiliations and at no cost to the users."

Curt continued to emphasize that use of the site and data would be free to users. Call me a skeptic, but as Dear Myrtle (and Jasia) brought up just this week, there is no such thing as a free lunch. Someone, somewhere has to pay for the costs for this "free" online data including server space, bandwidth, obtaining the data, etc. So, how are they going to finance this free resource? Curt didn't get into that aspect but currently WeRelate is being funded by tax-deductible donations. In the "Watercooler" I found a comment regarding the recent design change of having the data being on the left side of the screen with notes in a larger "open" space on the right: "It's in preparation for putting genealogy ads on the right, which we need to do to pay for hosting costs." I'm wondering if maybe for an annual fee you could have the ads removed like they do for some other sites? I don't have a problem with ads, the expenses have to be covered somehow.

Why is the ACPL associated with WeRelate? Well, the way that Curt put it is that he wants "to let everyone play in the sandbox" by making genealogy accessible to more people. Essentially, the more players there are the better it will be for everyone. He also wants it to be a site that has no affiliations so that people will feel more "comfortable" with contributing their family data and to make it easier to collaborate with other researchers. The use of the wiki platform should encourage that collaboration by making it easier for information to be updated while maintaining a record of changes that were made and by whom. In order to edit any page on the site the user must be registered and logged in to WeRelate.

The bottom line is that WeRelate is all about collaboration, getting more people involved in genealogy, and free access to information and records.

Now, I've played around a bit with WeRelate but haven't yet uploaded a GedCom or created any people pages or anything else. I am working on a small file for testing purposes. I do want to see how it will handle the data as it is entered into my database and what kind of adjustments I may need to make in my data entry to conform to the site and how it displays information. I do think the site has great potential and I especially like the idea of collaboration with other researchers. So why haven't I contributed to it yet? Mostly inertia, but also a bit of skepticism, and the fact that I really haven't found the site to be all that intuitive to use. In my opinion, navigation of the site and the search feature both leave a lot to be desired. I got frustrated when doing a search on one of my surnames that is also a place name: a search for the "Berlin" in the Surname field and with "Person (and Family)" selected as the Namespace to search returned 578 items. On the 15th page of results it finally displayed a couple of entries for people. That's as far as I went. It wasn't giving me what I thought it should.

One thing to keep in mind is that WeRelate is a Beta site, it is under development, they are still learning what it is the users want and need. They are open to suggestions and want to improve the site. I encourage you to investigate WeRelate, take the 10-minute video tour and check out the other help features they have.

I highly recommend the series of posts that Denise Olson at Family Matters has on using WeRelate. She has tips and screen shots as well as some step-by-step instructions. She'll also be writing additional posts on using the site:

• Building Community
• Genealogy 2.0 - The Wiki
• WeRelate Update
• WeRelate: Registration and Profile

Also, Randy Seaver had an interesting and informative post on Testing the WeRelate.org Wiki/Genea-Networking site wherein he describes uploading a GedCom and using some of the features. He also lists what he likes and what he dislikes about WeRelate.

Additional Links:

• Allen County Public Library
• Foundation for On-Line Genealogy
• WeRelate
• Dear Myrtle: Genealogy sites at no cost to users?
• Jasia: Money is a Dirty Word

ACPL Videos Available

Thanks to Dick Eastman's post for this information.

The Allen County Public Library has recently released two videos on YouTube on using the Genealogy Center and some of their resources.

Part One: http://youtube.com/watch?v=tcqDqc0SXgo covers how to use their digital collection and online catalog. It runs for 9 minutes 17 seconds.

Part Two: http://youtube.com/watch?v=mlYhUwu8waQ runs for 7 minutes 30 seconds and covers the local history reading room, the microtext reading room, the family history room, as well as the movable stacks which house the city/county directories and oversize books. Other information helpful for planning a research trip to the center is also included.

Check out both videos, especially if you are planning a visit or even if you are simply curious about their collection.

FGS Conference - Some Thoughts

Overall I think the FGS Conference in Fort Wayne was one of the best organized that I have attended. The speakers were top notch and the selection of lectures was almost overwhelming. There are really only a couple of complaints I have, and I heard most of them from several other attendees as well.

1. The 2-hour break between the opening and the first lecture session on Thursday really was not necessary. In my opinion it was a waste of time. And I know of several people who did not attend Thursday morning because of that reason.
2. The 30 minute break between each session was the longest I've ever seen at any conference. Perhaps at another venue it would have been necessary but the rooms where the lectures were held were within a few minutes walk of each other. There were some lectures held at the library but it was still only about a 2-3 minute walk from the Grand Wayne Center. Fifteen minutes would have been more reasonable, twenty minutes at most.
3. The 2-hour lunch break was a bit much but I understand it was necessary because of the luncheons offered each day (each at $20 a pop, none of which I attended). It did give me a chance to browse some periodicals at the ACPL and I took a nap in my car on Friday ;-) so the time wasn't really wasted.
4. I've already mentioned the syllabus, which was 650 pages or so, and is a good resource. But something really needs to be done to offer it optionally in a different format. There are a number of ways it could be done to please those who still want a hard copy. A suggestion made by several people was to provide separate booklets for each day. Perhaps they could reduce the price of the conference for those that are willing to download it or even send a CD to early registrants before the conference. After the second day there were still a lot of people carrying the syllabus around and almost all that I saw had loose pages.

A video of a portion of the opening session of the Conference on Thursday morning is on Dick Eastman's blog. I'm in it ;-) That's my blond head you see in the center of the picture at the bottom of the frame. . . I was sitting in the fourth or fifth row, in front of the podium.

Dick Eastman attended the same session of the FootNote meeting that I did and took a couple of pictures. I'm in two of them though I don't know if he'll post them when he gets around to posting pictures of the conference on his blog. . .

Also attending the same FootNote meeting was Ceil Wendt Jensen. Now, I'm usually not one to go up and introduce myself but got up the nerve to do so this time and am glad I did. Ceil is very pleasant, congenial and easy to talk to. I mentioned that I'd heard of her through a recent post by Jasia (about the podcast Ceil did with Dear Myrtle). In the process I found out that I didn't know how to pronounce "Jasia" as I said it with a "J" which is actually pronounced as a "Y" and the "a" is more like "ah" so it's something like Yah-c-ah. I also discovered what Jasia's real first name is, but I'm not going to tell. . . I made the comment that I rather envy Ceil, Jasia and Steve since I consider myself an ethnically challenged researcher - one with no historical family traditions based on where my ancestors came from. The last of them came over so long ago (1832) that trace of any traditions that might have been have completely disappeared. Ceil suggested that I could become an honorary Pole...

While exploring the exhibit hall one day I had the opportunity to 'help' one of the vendors, who shall remain anonymous, with a slight technical problem he was having. I had stopped at the booth to introduce myself and he mentioned that his laptop had powered itself down after not being used for a while and it was not restarting as it should have. My suggestion was to see if it still had power. . . turns out the power cord had come unplugged from the power strip. He was a bit embarrassed that he hadn't already checked on that but we had a chuckle over it and I went on my way. I'm sure he would have figured it out eventually, but I was amused by the incident, but then I am easily amused.

For information on the lectures I attended, check out my previous posts on the conference:

• Genealogy Conferences (my contribution to the Carnival of Genealogy)
• FGS Conference - Day One (Wednesday)
• FGS Conference - Day Two (Thursday)
• FGS Conference - Day Three (Friday)
• FGS Conference - Day Four (Saturday)

Links outside this blog:

• opening session video on Dick Eastman's blog
• recent post by Jasia about the podcast Ceil Jensen did with Dear Myrtle
• Michigan Polonia which is Ceil Jensen's website, not to be missed if you are doing Polish research

FGS Conference - Day Four

Yesterday was the final day of the FGS Conference in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Out of the ten options that were available for each of the six hour-long sessions for Saturday, these are the lectures that I chose to attend.

For me, the morning started out the same as the previous day ended - with Curt Witcher. His presentation of "Exploring the Crossroads of America: Indiana Records and Repositories" was a whirlwind tour of the Hoosier State. Curt outlined a six-step strategy for Indiana Research: (1) Identify all the local record repositories. This is especially important since many of the records are still located in the counties and communities where they were created. (2) Explore the county sites at Indiana GenWeb. All Indiana counties have a presence at Indiana GenWeb, some have an amazing amount of online data. (3) Visit the three state facilities in Indianapolis, either virtually or in person: The Indiana State Library, The Indiana State Archives, and The Indiana Historical Society. (4) Explore the offerings of the Indiana Genealogical Society (5) Explore the Indiana resources available at FamilySearch (6) Visit the Genealogy Center at the Allen County Public Library! Each of these facilities has their own unique collection of materials.

At 9:30 I decided to forgo the regularly scheduled programming and attended a FootNote Users Meeting. About a dozen people attended this session in the small Boardroom of the Grand Wayne Center. I think I was the only one who was not a vendor or a speaker. Beau Sharbrough, Vice President of Content for FootNote, was the moderator of the meeting. The site was launched on January 10, 2007 and, in addition to the National Archives of the United States, has recently announced partnership agreements with the Family History Library and the Allen County Public Library. The site is not specifically geared toward genealogists in particular. One of their goals is to create and build a community related to History. Individuals can contribute to FootNote by creating story pages with their own personal records, documents, and stories. Individuals can also contribute by creating an annotation to any record - these are added to the online index and appear in search results. Individuals can also leave comments on any page to add to, correct, or enhance information contributed by someone else. You have full control over any information you contribute. There is a process in place for reporting inappropriate content that will then be reviewed by a member of the FootNote team. FootNote has been given exclusive distribution rights to the digital version of "Evidence Explained" by Elizabeth Shown Mills. When someone prints out a document from the FootNote site, the printed copy will contain a source citation that conforms to her criteria. The digital version, fully text searchable in pdf format, is available for about half the cost of the hard copy book.

My morning ended with "Lights, Camera, Action" presented by Tony Burroughs, which was a beginner's crash course on creating a digital video documentary. He emphasized that the software you select will define what you are able to do and how you will be able to do it. If your computer was purchased more than a year ago it probably will not have the processing speed or memory needed for the software to run properly. It probably also won't have a hard drive large enough to store the files that will be created. Tony briefly touched on the other equipment that would be useful, such as lights, cam corder, tripod, basic computer skills, shooting and editing techniques. You don't need video content to create a family documentary as it can be done with still photos and documents in the same manner used by Ken Burns for many of his documentaries. He also showed several examples that he has been working on that are still in the 'draft' stage. The process is labor and time intensive but the results are rewarding and well worth the time and effort.

After meeting up with some friends for lunch, I sat in on "Using Artifacts in Family History Narrative" with John Philip Colletta (again). John pointed out that there are basically three sources of information available about the past: Oral History/Family Lore, Private and Public Records both original and derivative, and Material Culture or Family Artifacts. A portrait of a person (physical traits, character, personality, social standing) can be created by carefully looking at and reviewing the information, photographs, documents, and records that have been collected on a person or family. John used examples from his own family to illustrate what can be gleaned from even the smallest artifact or bit of information. You can't say something was definite but by using terms such as "actions indicate", "it appears that", or "probably" you can infer that it was so and make an interesting narrative in the process.

The lecture with Mr. Colletta was the last one of the day for me. Perhaps, if the offerings had really, really interested me I might have stuck around for the next three hours, but I was very tired and having a very hard time staying awake! For me, the conference was a success. There was a lot to absorb. New ways of looking at age-old techniques. Refresher courses on the basics. Even some brand new stuff. Though tired and weary, I thoroughly enjoyed myself and am looking forward to using some of this new-found knowledge!

Links:

• Curt Witcher
• Indiana GenWeb
• Indiana State Library
• Indiana State Archives
• Indiana Historical Society
• Indiana Genealogical Society
• Indiana Research Guidance at FamilySearch
• Genealogy Center at the Allen County Public Library
• FootNote
• Tony Burroughs
• The Ken Burns Effect
• John Philip Colletta

DNA and Genealogy Research

Yesterday, Leland Meitzler posted Americans Are Individually a Mix of Many Races at The Genealogy Blog which is really about this article at The Observer: The genes that build America. It's a bit long but well worth reading.

It starts out talking about the discovery of the relationship between ancestors of Al Sharpton and Strom Thurmond, which is 'old news' but once you get past that, it gets interesting.

"America has embarked on an amazing journey to explore its own past. Millions of Americans of every creed and colour are exploring their family histories in a genealogy boom that is redefining who they are and what it means to be American. The internet has allowed people to find obscure information at the click of a mouse that was previously locked away on dusty library shelves. They are also using modern DNA techniques to research their racial history, creating a multi-million dollar industry of consumer genetics. Like Sharpton, many are making shocking discoveries. They are finding slaves and slave-owners. Far from being a nation of different races, many are finding they have mixed pasts. Blacks are discovering they have white blood, whites are finding black relatives. Native Americans are growing in numbers, not because of a high birth rate, but because many Americans are discovering unknown native ancestors written in their DNA."

"Last year, Professor Peter Fine at Florida Atlantic University had an idea for an art class. He would gather a group of students to produce work around their idea of their racial identity. But as part of the class he asked them to take a DNA test that would break down their racial background. His bet was that most of the class - of whom the majority saw themselves as whites of European descent - had no real idea who they were.

"He was right. Of 13 students, only one turned out to be completely European. The rest displayed a mixture of European, Native American, African and Asian genes. The one black student turned out to be 21 per cent white. Fine himself - who admits to looking like a corn-fed stereotype of a white Midwesterner - discovered he was a quarter Native American. 'I honestly think these tests could have a large effect on American consciousness of who we are. If Americans recognise themselves as a mixed group of people, that could really change things,' he said.

"Fine has a point. For centuries, America has been less a racial melting pot and more a stew, where different communities bump up against each other, but keep mostly to themselves. Yet, as millions of Americans take DNA tests, they are discovering a surprising truth: America's strict racial lines are, in fact, blurred. One-third of white Americans, according to some tests, will possess between two and 20 per cent African genes. The majority of black Americans have some European ancestors."

Trash or Treasure? How do you decide?

For some time I've been struggling with how to deal with all of the pictures, documents, letters, etc. that my mother and I have accumulated over the years. We have both downsized into apartments so space is at a premium. Trying to determine what should be scanned is an issue I've put off for a number of years, thus almost nothing has been scanned, but nothing has been tossed yet either. My mother hesitates to throw away a single picture, even the out-of-focus ones! Me, I don't have a problem with that but some of the other "not so good" pictures are more difficult to toss.

Last Sunday, I posted A Blast from the Past about the letters that my mother saved that my brothers and I wrote to her while we were in the Navy. I appreciate the comments that were posted and the fact that several people found the first two letters interesting. One of the people who left a comment was Sally Jacobs, The Practical Archivist. If you haven't visited her blog, you really should as it is loaded with great tips on storing your documents, photos, and other memorabilia.

Then yesterday, Randy Seaver posted What to Keep, What to Pitch with a link to an article by Cindy Larson in the Fort Wayne, Indiana News-Sentinel. The article "What to keep, what to throw away?" quotes Curt Witcher, director of the Allen County Public Library genealogy collection, as well as Harriet Schechter, an author, organizer and time-management expert. To give credit where credit is due, the link to the article in Randy's post came from Megan Smolenyak at Megan's Roots World. Thanks go out to both of you!

There were several links in the News-Sentinel article:

• The Frugal Life has a number of articles on Clutter and Organizing. One I especially liked was Treasured Keepsakes or Clutter? A Look at Memorabilia by Christine Sutton.


• I didn't check out much at Soulful Living, which is an "online magazine, devoted to personal and spiritual growth" but the News-Sentinel article linked to Shedding Sentimental Clutter by Harriet Schechter and it is worth reading the full article.

It's going to take some time, but this project is near the top of my list of things to do this year.

Paul Allen and World Vital Records

Off and on over the past year I've been reading Paul Allen's blog. In case you aren't aware of it, he was one of the founders of Ancestry.com, which he left five years ago, and he is the driving force behind World Vital Records.

It's kind of interesting to get a 'behind the scenes' view of starting a company, though I'll admit it can be a bit dry reading at times! Still, the insights provided are enlightening. His announcement of the World Vital Records Partnerships shows his enthusiasm for what he is doing and how he hopes to help improve the world of genealogy research. These partnerships should help increase traffic to the Family History Centers and will make more records accessible to more people than ever before.

His blog deals for the most part with the business aspect of genealogy and with business in general, so it's not a "genealogy" blog (posts that are categorized as "genealogy" can be found here).

As stated in a previous post, these are indeed exciting times for genealogists and family researchers! However, I feel that the news of this "explosion" in genealogy resources to come must be tempered somewhat with caution. It's going to take time and not all records will be available (at least, not in my lifetime). It's just not feasible when you consider how many records there are and the various kinds of records that are kept. We also need to keep in mind that that is a business and though the motives and intent may be good, the bottom line will be profit. That is probably what is driving 'The Generations Network' to make the decisions they have in the recent past. We need to be optimistic and hope that these new companies and partnerships will keep the needs and desires of their customers in mind - accessible records at a relatively low cost. Collaboration is good, competition is better. I applaud Paul Allen and World Vital Records for their partnership with FamilySearch and all of the other companies that have announced partnerships in the last few days and am very much looking forward to using all these resources.

Partnerships and Collaboration - ain't it great!

Dick Eastman at Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter has posted several very exciting notices of partnerships that have been announced this morning at the NGS Conference in Richmond. These partnerships are going to open up a whole new world of opportunities for researchers!

Quintin Publications Partners With WorldVitalRecords.com To Make Thousands of Genealogical Databases Accessible

Historic Ellis Island Passenger Records Receive Expanded Online Access This is a partnership between The Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation, Inc., World Vital Records, Inc. and FamilySearch.

More Than 4,500 Family History Centers Worldwide to have Free Access to WorldVitalRecords.com

Other recent announcements, posted by Dick and many other genea-bloggers, regarding partnerships and expanded availability of content include:

ProQuest CSA Teams Up with LexisNexis to Add Selected Serial Set Content to HeritageQuest Online "The addition of the Private Relief Actions and Memorials and Petitions from the LexisNexis Serial Set collection serves the growing genealogy and local history segment of the public library market. " Note that HeritageQuest is available only to libraries, not to individuals.

Footnote.com Teams With FamilySearch to Release Revolutionary War Pension Files "This new partnership brings together two organizations that will utilize their combined resources to digitize and make available many large historical collections. The first project will be the three million U.S. Revolutionary War Pension files, which will be published for the first time online in their entirety."

This past Tuesday, following the Footnote and FamilySearch announcement, Randy Seaver of Genea-Musings gave us his thought on what this means to the future of genealogy and research. You'll have to scroll down past the announcement to find his comments...

But, perhaps the most important recent announcement is that FamilySearch will Provide Access to the World's Genealogical Records. FamilySearch announced "its Records Access program to increase public access to massive genealogy collections worldwide. For the first time ever, FamilySearch will provide free services to archives and other records custodians who wish to digitize, index, publish, and preserve their collections. The program expands FamiliySearch's previously announced decision to digitize and provide online access to over 2 million rolls of copyrighted microfilm preserved in the Granite Mountain Records Vault. A key component of the program allows FamilySearch and archives to team with genealogy websites to provide unprecedented access to microfilm in the vault. The combined results ensure a flood of new record indexes and images online at www.FamilySearch.org and affiliated websites."

Godfrey Memorial Library and FamilySearch Centers Announce Partnership "The Godfrey Library has been digitizing much of their information and is now accelerating that effort. Even better, visitors to LDS FamilySearch Centers around the world will now have free access to the digitized material."

These are indeed exciting times for genealogists as well as researchers in general! I'm sure there will be more announcements in the near future. Don't you just love competition and collaboration, I sure do!

The San Francisco Earthquake of 1906

The terrifying rumble of an earthquake shattered the early morning silence of April 18 at 5:15 AM. The quake lasted only a minute but caused the worst natural disaster in the nation's history. Modern analysis estimates it registered 8.25 on the Richter scale (By comparison, the quake that hit San Francisco on October 17, 1989 registered 6.7). The earthquake was felt from southern Oregon to south of Los Angeles and inland as far as central Nevada.

However, the greatest destruction came from the fires the quake ignited. These ravaged the city for three days before burning themselves out. The maelstrom destroyed 490 city blocks, a total of 25,000 buildings, made over 250,000 homeless and killed between 450 and 700 people. Damage estimates topped $350,000,000.

Two Whitley County men, Ancil Brown and Joe Archer, were in the San Francisco area at the time of the earthquake. Their letters published in the Columbia City Post can be found at Whitley County Kinexxions.

The Virtual Museum of the City of San Francisco has a timeline, scans of some newspaper clippings and transcriptions of others, eyewitness accounts which are incredible - including one from Jack London. They have a list of "names compiled from newspapers of those persons who died as a direct result of injuries received either at the time of the earthquake and fire, or during the latter half of April 1906" and of course, lots of photographs.

These are some of the other sites that I found interesting (a Google search turned up 956,000 hits for “San Francisco Earthquake”).

Eyewitness to History
http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/sfeq.htm

The Library of Congress American Memory
http://memory.loc.gov/learn/features/timeline/progress/cities/earthqak.html

SFGate
http://www.sfgate.com/greatquake/

Berkeley Seismological Laboratory
http://seismo.berkeley.edu/seismo/hayward/seismicity.hist_1906.html

DoHistory and Martha Ballard's Diary

DoHistory is a fascinating website that I came across several years ago, forgot about, but recently rediscovered.

From their About this Site page: "DoHistory invites you to explore the process of piecing together the lives of ordinary people in the past. It is an experimental, interactive case study based on the research that went into the book and film A Midwife's Tale, which were both based upon the remarkable 200 year old diary of midwife/healer Martha Ballard. Although DoHistory is centered on the life of Martha Ballard, you can learn basic skills and techniques for interpreting fragments that survive from any period in history. We hope that many people will be inspired by Martha Ballard's story to do original research on other "ordinary" people from the past."

Starting when she was 50 years old, Martha Ballard wrote in her diary nearly every day from January 1, 1785 to May 12, 1812 (27 years) for a total of almost 10,000 entries.

Who was Martha Ballard? - - "Martha Moore was born in 1735 in the small central Massachusetts town of Oxford, but the real story of her life begins in Maine with the diary she kept from age fifty. Without the diary her biography would be little more than a succession of dates. Her birth in 1735. Her marriage to Ephraim Ballard in 1754. The births of their nine children in 1756, 1758, 1761, 1763, 1765, 1767, 1769, 1772, 1779, and the deaths of three of them in 1769. Her own death in 1812.
"The notice of Martha's death in a local paper summed up her life in just one sentence: "Died in Augusta, Mrs. Martha, consort of Mr. Ephraim Ballard, aged 77 years." Without the diary we would know nothing of her life after the last of her children was born, nothing of the 816 deliveries she performed between 1785 and 1812. We would not even be certain she had been a midwife."
--from Laurel Thatcher Ulrich's A Midwife's Tale

Be sure to read the Project History page that tells how Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, a middle-aged University of New Hampshire history professor looking for her next project, met Martha Ballard in the two-hundred-year-old pages of the midwife's diary on a summer day in 1982.

The About the Online Diary page tells how the husband-and-wife team of Robert and Cynthia MacAlman McCausland spent their evenings for nearly ten years in transcribing verbatim Martha Ballard's 1,400+ handwritten pages to create the text version. It also tells how the image version was created.

The How to Use Primary Sources page includes a History Toolkit with "short essays designed to help the beginning historian conduct and organize his or her own historical research."

Other information available on the site includes:

• What to do with a Diary you have found
• Bibliographies
• Links to Other Websites

And of course, there is Martha Ballard's Diary!

April 14th

Today, April 14th, is the anniversary of the assassination of President Lincoln in 1865, the sinking of the Titanic in 1912 and the Great Dust Storm of 1935.

Lincoln's Assassination

• Abraham Lincoln's Assassination
• Ford's Theatre National Historic Park
• Assassination of Abraham Lincoln

The Sinking of The Titanic

• Nova Scotia's Marine Heritage - Titanic
• Eyewitness to History - Titanic
• The Unsinkable RMS Titanic

The "Black Sunday" Dust Storm:

• From Writer's Almanac

Today is the anniversary of Black Sunday, the day in 1935 when a windstorm hit a part of the Great Plains known as the Dust Bowl. When the day started, the weather was sunny and calm. People were on their way home from church, or out visiting friends for lunch, when they saw huge flocks of birds flying south, away from a dark black cloud on the northern horizon. As the cloud approached, people realized that it wasn't a storm cloud, but a cloud of dirt, blown up by the wind. Witnesses said it was like a black tidal wave came down from the sky. It became as dark as night as soon as the cloud descended. Static electricity stalled cars and shorted out telephone lines. People standing a few yards away from their homes got lost in the darkness, and grabbed onto fence posts to keep from being blown to the ground. It was later estimated that the storm carried 300 million tons of
soil through the air.

Coincidentally, it was four years later on this day in 1939 that John Steinbeck (books by this author) published his novel about the farmers displaced by the Dust Bowl drought: The Grapes of Wrath. The novel tells the story of three generations of the Joad family, who lose their farm in Oklahoma and set off across the country for the paradise of California, only to encounter extreme poverty and corrupt corporations trying to make a profit off of them. Steinbeck interspersed the story of the Joads with chapters describing the migration as a whole, to give the
impression of a social history as well as a personal story.

Excerpts from "The Dust Bowl, Men, Dirt and Depression" by Paul Bonnifield can be found at the Cimarron Heritage Center (Boise City, Oklahoma).

A very interesting interview with Melt White is on the PBS website.

GSWC Workshop

The Genealogical Society of Whitley County (GSWC) held a Beginning Genealogy Workshop in conjunction with the Peabody Public Library on Saturday, March 17th. Attendance was limited to 20 people and the spaces quickly filled up. We were told there were enough people who wanted to attend that we should have another workshop - so, we will, on Sunday, May 20th. We are also planning a workshop for the kids who sign up for the 4-H Genealogy program, probably sometime in April.

My portion of the workshop covered "Internet Genealogy" and was only supposed to be 45 minutes. It ran a bit long, like an hour and 15 minutes total. Thank goodness there weren't any problems connecting to the internet! Randy Seaver mentioned that he'd had some connection problems with his presentation on blogging - I hadn't even considered that scenario. Guess I'd better make alternate plans, just in case.

As promised to the attendees, the Web Site Links have been posted at Kinexxions to make it easier for them to visit the sites listed on the handout (and so they don't have to try to type in the URLs for those sites). Have Fun!

In honor of Women’s History Month…some links

It's a bit of an understatement, but there are a lot of excellent websites 'out there' that celebrate women, whether famous or not. These are just a few of the sites I've bookmarked over the years, all of them are very good. Enjoy!

History’s Women
http://www.historyswomen.com/
Highlighting the extraordinary achievements of women throughout history and recognizing the obstacles they have had to overcome in order to reach their goals.

Notable Women
http://www.rootsweb.com/~nwa/
The lives of ALL women are "notable" - at least in the eyes of the genealogists who research them, and that is the ONLY criteria necessary for a woman to be included at this web site. Some are famous, others are not. Those who are famous have, until recently, often been overlooked by mainstream historians. The extent to which our schoolbooks and popular folk collections have largely ignored the most vivid, powerful women is simply astounding.

They Gave Their Lives
http://userpages.aug.com/captbarb/lives.html
Honors the American women who gave their lives in service to their country. Whether from illness, injury, disease, enemy fire, plane crashes, or the unknown, they deserve to be remembered as having made the ultimate sacrifice. Let us all remember that women have served proudly since our nation began.

Women's History at About.com
http://womenshistory.about.com
As Women's History Month in the US opens on March 1, you may be wondering why this event is celebrated in March (it's in October in Canada). This article explains the history of Women's History Month. And you'll find more resources on Women's History Month here on this site -- including a wealth of women's history articles and information, from ancient times to the dawn of the 21st century, from the US and around the world.

Women in History
http://lkwdpl.org/wihohio/figures.htm

300 Women who Changed the World
http://www.britannica.com/women
For millennia women have left their mark on the world, at times changing the course of history and at other times influencing small but significant spheres of life. Only in the past century, however, have concerted efforts been made to mention women's contributions in history books. Moreover, changes in status for many women in modern times - the right to own property, to vote, and to choose their own careers may obscure the accomplishments made by women of earlier eras. In profiling 300 women who changed the world, Encyclopædia Britannica has chosen those whose contributions have endured through the ages.

Women’s History Month at History.com
http://www.history.com/minisites/womenhist
The History of Women's Suffrage, a Hall of Fame, Firsts in Women's Achievements and more.

In the early nineteenth century, women were considered second-class citizens whose existence was limited to the interior life of the home and care of the children. Women were considered sub-sets of their husbands, and after marriage they did not have the right to own property, maintain their wages, or sign a contract, much less vote. It was expected that women be obedient wives, never to hold a thought or opinion independent of their husbands. It was considered improper for women to travel alone or to speak in public....

Women’s International Center
http://www.wic.org/
The mission of WIC is to Acknowledge, Honor and Encourage Women. To celebrate women and their positive, enduring contributions to humanity through the Living Legacy Awards. Includes biographies, Words of Wisdom, and an interesting feature where you can find out which famous women were born on your birthdate.

One of my interests is Women of the Civil War era. . .

Civil War Women
http://civilwarwomen.blogspot.com/index.html
An excellent blog by "MaggieMac" that celebrates the lives of women of the Civil War era. Her sidebar includes links to blogs covering various aspects of the civil war as well as links to general Civil War websites.

Civil War Women: Primary Sources on the Internet
http://library.duke.edu/specialcollections/bingham/guides/cwdocs.html

Civil War Women – Duke University Online Archive
http://scriptorium.lib.duke.edu/collections/civil-war-women.html

eThemes Civil War Women
http://www.emints.org/ethemes/resources/S00001299.shtml

Sallie Bingham Center for Women’s History and Culture
http://library.duke.edu/specialcollections/bingham/guides/

Women in the Civil War
http://americancivilwar.com/women/women.html

Women in the Civil War at About.com
http://womenshistory.about.com/od/civilwar/Women_and_the_American_Civil_War.htm

Women were There
http://userpages.aug.com/captbarb/femvets2.html
The War Between the States was also a war between brothers, cousins, friends and neighbors - and some of them were women.

Saving Photographic Memories

To help us understand how to protect and preserve our photographic memories, the International Imaging Industry Association (I3A) has created a website called Save My Memories. In addition to hardware and software issues they cover other factors (such as aging of storage materials and technology obsolescence) that can impact the longevity of a photo collection, whether they are digital or traditional photographs. For convenience, there is a link in the lower right-hand corner of the home page to download a printable version of the website. Overall, it's an excellent site with lots of information and tips.

Five Research Sites in Northeast Indiana

Without a doubt, the premier resource for genealogy research in Indiana, the Midwest, and the eastern United States is the Genealogy Center of the Allen County Public Library in Fort Wayne. I wrote about the opening of the new facility here and here. However, believe it or not, they don't have 'everything' for the local researcher (sorry Curt). So, if you're doing research on folks in Indiana you still need to go to the local libraries, court houses, and museums.

The Huntington City-Township Public Library in Huntington, Indiana has an excellent Indiana Room. Unlike most of the other libraries in the area, they have a librarian assigned to the Indiana Room so there is someone onsite to help with questions. The hours for the Indiana Room vary so you need to call to make sure it is open. In addition to resources specific to Huntington County, such as microfilm of county newspapers, files on local businesses and industries, school yearbooks, City and County Directories dating from 1892 to the present, they also have a collection of books from states east of Indiana.

The Kosciusko County Historical Society has a very good Genealogy Room. In addition to the "normal" books that you'll find on local history and families are some original record books. The Genealogy Room is located at the Historical Museum but does not have the same hours. The Kosciusko County Indiana GenWeb is an awesome site put together by Gene Andert.

In Whitley County, the Genealogical Society has a small research room at the Historical Museum, which was the home of Vice President Thomas R. Marshall. The Museum always has nice exhibits. The staff and volunteers are very helpful. The Whitley County Archives house the older original records such as estate packets, marriage records, etc. The Peabody Public Library has microfilm of the Columbia City Newspapers and a complete set of census records on microfilm. The South Whitley-Cleveland Township Library has the South Whitley newspapers on microfilm as well as an extensive obituary file and lots of other local resources.

And then there is the Indiana Historical Society and the Indiana State Archives and the Indiana State Library Genealogy Division, all located in Indianapolis. I attended a one-day workshop at the Historical Society and took a tour but have not actually done any research there. I've heard that all three are very nice and hope to find out for myself someday!