The DAILY genealogy technology newsletter for genealogy
consumers, packed with straight talk - hold the sugar coating - whether
the vendors like it or not!
The following was written by Jean Nudd, Archivist at the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration Northeast Region in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. Because it was written by a government employee in conjunction with her employment, you may freely copy this and republish as you wish. However, I strongly suggest that you credit Jean Nudd as the author.
Background
On May 18, 1917, Congress passed the Selective Service Act authorizing the President to draft men into military service. The Selective Service System (SSS), under the office of the Provost Marshal General (PMGO), was responsible for the process of selecting men for induction into the military service, from the initial registration to the actual delivery of men to military training camps.
MacFamily Tree is a genealogy program that has three things going for it: it was created for the Mac platform, it is relatively inexpensive, and it is fairly easy for a beginner to use. It is also available in nine different languages (English, German, French, Spanish, Norwegian, Dutch Swedish, Dansk, and Italian). It is a native OS X application (actually, OS X 10.2.8 and later).
The following is an announcement from the New England Regional Genealogical Conference:
As every New Englander knows, you go "down" to get to Maine. Genealogists looking for new directions in their research will be going "down to Maine" to attend the 8th New England Regional Genealogical Conference which will be held from March 31-April 3, 2005 at the Holiday Inn By The Bay in Portland Maine.
I'd hate to say how many PowerPoint demonstrations I have sat through. And, yes, I've certainly delivered my share of them, too. In fact, in many places it is now difficult to give a speech without PowerPoint, and I am not sure that is a good thing. Now Peter Norvig offers a tongue-in-cheek look at "What if Abraham Lincoln used PowerPoint?"
I received the following question in e-mail. I must admit that I cannot think of such a product so I thought I would ask if any newsletter readers can help. Please answer by posting a comment at the bottom of this page.
I do not yet have a genealogy software program. I want one that will allow me to enter in a route to be traveled in my RV and will give back to me the names of those relatives (with addresses) that I could visit along the way to my destination. Is there such a program with such a feature?
If you are looking for a mid-winter getaway to a warm and sunny location, the U.S. National Genealogical Society may have the answer. A three-day genealogy conference will be held in downtown Phoenix on January 20 through 22. The event includes three in-depth workshops plus 54 presentations by many of the leading genealogy lecturers of today.
Interment.net is an online publisher of cemetery records and materials relating to cemeteries. The largest group of users of this web site is genealogists who are looking for records to help trace their family history, and learn something about cemeteries in general.
The owners of Interment.net have been sending frequent e-mail newsletters listing new records added to the database and other news items. However, the owners have now announced that they will no longer send e-mail newsletters and instead are switching to an RSS news feed.
Google recently announced that the company will partner with several libraries in an effort to digitize millions of books and to place them online at no charge for all to use. See the earlier article for details. The ink was barely on the announcement when another group announced a somewhat similar effort.
For more than eight years I
have been writing newsletter articles about genealogy software, web sites,
conventions, current events, and other topics that I found interesting. Thanks
to the new blog format for this newsletter, I can now offer double or triple
the amount of genealogy news every week.
DistantCousin.com has scanned the original city directory for New Haven, Connecticut for 1894 and indexed it for your quick search. The site is super easy to use: click on the letter which corresponds to the first letter of the last name for the person you are seeking. You will be taken to a list of page numbers which correspond to specific surnames. Clicking on the page number should take you to the appropriate page.
When John F. Kerry was running for president this year, many news writers noted that he had the same initials as another famous Democrat: JFK. However, the official records of the Electoral College have now been placed in the hands of the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, complete with an error.
This has nothing to do with genealogy but does affect most computer owners (except for those who use Macintosh systems).
I have written several times about Linux - how much more secure it is than Windows, as well as being much cheaper. Now system administrator Chris Spencer has written An Open Letter to a Digital World about his experiences.
I have written a couple of times about Second Site, an excellent program that builds web sites from The Master Genealogist databases. You can read my most recent review here. Second Site is written and supported by John Cardinal, an expert programmer, genealogist and also a major contributor to the data that is within the Encyclopedia of Genealogy.
The Pocket Genealogist is a great program for the handheld PocketPC series of computers available from a variety of manufacturers. I use it on my iPAQ system and it also works on Dell, Casio, Acer, Hitachi, NEC, Sharp and others PocketPC handhelds. It does not work on Palm computers, however. Now Kevin Phillips of Northern Hills Software has just announced version 2.92 of the Pocket Genealogist.
Fire on Monday night destroyed the historic Piermont Inn in Piermont, New Hampshire. Temperatures of 18 below zero hampered fire fighters efforts.
The inn, built in 1812 and long a landmark in the town, was being renovated and a neighbor said the work was nearly done. Two people were living in the inn escaped safely. Fire fighters believe the fire started in a chimney near a wood stove connection
I just wrote a review of GenSmarts two days ago which you can read here.
Today's announcement of The Master Genealogist (TMG) mentions tight
integration of the two programs. Even better, you can also purchase
GenSmarts at half price when you purchase TMG.
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