Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter

Rhinebeck, New York Couple Honored for Genealogy Research

The Dutchess County (New York) Historical Society has bestowed its highest research award on Arthur and Nancy Kelly of Rhinebeck for their "meticulous search for historical truth." The Helen Wilkinson Reynolds award has been granted to only six previous recipients. In addition to the award, the Kellys each received a Certificate of Special Congressional Recognition for "outstanding and invaluable service to the community."

National Burial Index for England and Wales Online

The National Burial Index (NBI) for England and Wales is is an index to help family historians find burial records. It is an ongoing project devised and orchestrated by the Federation of Family History Societies (FFHS). The burial records date back to 1538, the year that Henry VIII was excommunicated from the Catholic Church, up to 1837, the date when civil registration began.

Old British Phone Books Now Online

BT is putting its entire archive of old phone books online for genealogists, or anyone else, to browse. The phone books date back to 1880 and contain 280 million names. They can be used to track down relatives, but you can also use the service to find out if your house has ever had any famous, or infamous, residents.

Lafayette's Ancestor to Auction his Famous Medal from George Washington

The International Herald Tribune is a famous and usually prestigious newspaper that published an article yesterday by Glenn Collins under the headline of "Lafayette's Ancestor to Auction his Famous Medal from George Washington." Excuse me? His ancestor? I'd like to meet this "ancestor" who obviously is more than 250 years old!

That has to be embarrassing for the newspaper. Don't they have editors who know the difference between an ancestor and a descendant?

(+) Traveling with Wireless Internet Access

With today's technology, you do not have to give up your e-mail and various web sites when traveling. You can easily access your favorite genealogy sites as well as your preferred online bank account, stockbroker, news sites, sports scores, airline sites, and even the weather reports from many locations. Do you want to change your reservation for tomorrow's return flight home? Pull out your laptop and check all the possible alternatives from wherever you are. You can also communicate easily via e-mail with family and friends. You can make free long distance voice calls to friends and family back home if you have Skype installed. You can do all this from your laptop Windows or Macintosh computer or even from a handheld computer.

I recently spent seven weeks traveling during a ten-week period. I never missed a beat: I was online every day from hotels, cruise ships, coffee shops, and numerous airport waiting areas. Today's wireless networking technology makes such access easy, although not always cheap. I thought I would write about my experiences. I will also describe the methods I use to save money although my methods may not work for everyone.

Footnote.Com Digitizes Late 18th Century Newspaper, The Times (London)

The following announcement was written by Footnote.com:

The Times (London) Includes Details About King George, Napoleon, As Well As Trials, Advertisements and Everyday Life

Lindon, UT – November 27, 2007 – Footnote.com today announced the release of original images from The Times (London from 1785 – 1820). These documents include details about prominent figures of that time such as King George and Napoleon Bonaparte.

“Each page in this collection is full of intriguing details about European life during late 18th and early 19th centuries,” says Russell Wilding, CEO of Footnote.com “We are excited to see what people will discover and share from this fascinating collection.”

In addition to details regarding prominent people, the newspapers provide interesting insight into everyday life in England at that time, including; reports on crimes and trials, advertisements from local businesses, weather reports and announcements about local interests like the release of the newly published “Sense and Sensibility” by Jane Austen.

ProQuest and Allen County Public Library to Add Newest Periodical Source Index (PERSI)

The following announcement was written by ProQuest:

Exclusive Partnership Marks Another Milestone for Local History and Genealogy Research

ANN ARBOR, Mich., November 27, 2007 -- ProQuest and Allen County Public Library (Ft. Wayne, IN) add another milestone in their longstanding alliance with the release of the newest data in the Periodical Source Index (PERSI). With this update, PERSI now contains more than 2 million citations from over 6,600 periodicals published in the United States, Canada, and abroad. The new release includes indexing for over 132,000 articles from 2006 and 2007. No other index covers periodical research in local history and genealogy as extensively as PERSI.

French-Canadian Genealogy Society to Open a Cultural Center

The American-French Genealogical Society plans to open a Franco-American cultural center in a Woonsocket, Rhode Island church it recently purchased.

The former First Universalist Church could could eventually house the society's genealogical library, displays about French history and culture and perhaps even space for French language classes. Details may be found at http://www.afgs.org/Buildupdate.html.

The society has about 1,400 members in the United States and Canada.

ScottishHandwriting.com

A new web site offers online tutorials in paleography (the study of old handwriting) for historians, genealogists, and other researchers who have problems reading records written in Scotland in the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries. ScottishHandwriting.com provides online interactive tutorials and weekly posers to help you study the characteristics of Scottish handwriting. The emphasis of the web site is on practical help to improve the paleographic skills, rather than on the academic study of Scottish handwriting.

More Virtual Presentations

I wrote recently about Dick Cleaveland's recent virtual presentation: he spoke to a genealogy gathering that was many miles away. Dick was at home and used a computer to display PowerPoint slides, log onto web sites, and perform other tasks while the distant audience watched every move as displayed by a computer projector in their meeting room. Dick's voice also could clearly be heard as it was played on the speakers in the distant meeting room.

That article is still available at http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2007/11/virtual-present.html.

I have since received numerous e-mail messages from people reporting similar experiences. Apparently, virtual presentations are more common than I realized. Indeed, I have done the same thing myself in the business world although not to a genealogy gathering. Perhaps it is time for me (and perhaps you as well) to move into the twenty-first century's method of making presentations!

Nova Scotia History at the Click of a Mouse

Almost three centuries of records from one of Nova Scotia's oldest churches can now be researched, thanks to a massive multi-year effort by dedicated volunteers and the summer-long attention of a professional archivist.

"We’re thrilled out of our minds, but the whole process takes an awfully long time," said Fiona Day, a member of the archives committee of St. Paul’s Anglican Church on Halifax’s Grand Parade.

NGS Announces 2008 Annual Conference & Family History Fair in Kansas City

The following announcement was written by the National Genealogical Society:

Arlington, VA.
26 November 2007

May 14-17, 2008 will mark the 30th Annual Conference in the States and Family History Fair of the National Genealogical Society. The 2008 conference will be held in conjunction with local hosts – Missouri State Genealogical Association, Mid-Continent Public Library, Northland Genealogy Society, APG Heartland Chapter, and Johnson County, Kansas, Genealogical Society.

The 2008 conference will be held at the Hyatt Regency Crown Center hotel downtown Kansas City, Missouri.  The conference will feature 4 days of educational sessions for the beginner to the more experienced family history researcher. In addition the Family History Fair will feature over 150 exhibitors of genealogical goods and services, including genealogical software companies, book sellers, genealogical and historical societies, gifts, maps, and more. The exhibit hall is attached to the main conference center and is open to conference attendees and the general public at no charge. There is a major shopping complex attached to the hotel by a glass enclosed walkway. Hallmark Cards headquarters is also attached to the complex.

Maine, Other States, Set Out to Store Electronic Documents

In Maine and other states, official record-keepers are searching for ways to preserve e-mails and other electronically stored information that will be of interest to researchers, genealogists, historians, policy makers and the public in years to come.

Since 1970, governments have been developing ways to extract material from a variety of record-keeping systems, such as punch cards, said Victoria Irons Walch, executive director of the Council of State Archivists in Iowa City, Iowa.

Video: Megan Smolenyak Interview on the Wholly Genes Cruise

I recently had a chance to interview professional genealogist Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak when we were both on a cruise ship in the Caribbean, along with 350+ other genealogists. Megan is well known in the genealogy community for her many activities: she is the Chief Family Historian at Ancestry.com, runs a DNA search service, researches the ancestry of notable people and is the author or co-author of several books on the same topics. What many people do not know is that Megan is also one of the people who created Roots Television.

Megan and I discussed a number of the number of topics, even including what life is like on a genealogy cruise. A Roots Television cameraman was available (naturally!) and recorded our conversation. If you are interested in any of her many topics, you can watch the video right now at http://rootstelevision.com/players/player_conferences.php?bctid=1323280470.

(+) Genealogy Cruises Compared

The year 2007 has seen three major genealogy cruises departing from North American ports. I was fortunate enough to be a participant on all three and decided to write a bit about my experiences. If you are thinking about joining a future genealogy cruise, my experiences may help identify the best future cruise for you as well as for your traveling companions.

The recent shift in genealogy conferences and learning opportunities is fascinating. The traditional conferences held in various convention centers around the country seem to be dropping in attendance numbers in recent years. In contrast, the number of genealogists who take cruises is increasing rapidly. More than 550 genealogists participated in the three genealogy theme cruises this year, a larger number than the attendees of many state and regional conferences!

Video: Tracing Ancestry with Genealogists

This Thanksgiving, New England Cable News reporter Greg Wayland went to look for his ancestors. He had help from people who know how to read those dusty old record books. He went to the New England Historic Genealogical Society where he obtained assistance from Brenton Simons and Michael Leclerc.

You can view this great video on your computer right now at http://tinyurl.com/yvhh8r.

Virtual Presentations

We live in a great high-tech world! It is now possible for experts to give presentations to remote groups without traveling. Newsletter reader Dick Cleaveland recently did just that: he gave a presentation to a genealogy group that was located many miles away. He used a combination of Skype and LogMeIn.

He writes:

The readers of your newsletter might be interested to know that I recently gave a presentation to a meeting of the Roots Users Group of Arlington, VA. Given that I have been an active member for several years, that, in itself, is not particularly surprising. The punch line is that I gave it from my summer home on the shores of the Atlantic, many miles away from the meeting place.

A New Online Competitor to Microsoft Office is Free

Sabeer Bhatia is a co-founder of Hotmail. He and Jack Smith created the wildly popular web site that offers free e-mail to everyone. In fact, Hotmail was the first site to offer free e-mail and was one of the first to offer any free web-based services. It was also the first e-mail service to run in a standard web browser. Prior to Hotmail, everyone needed a separate e-mail program to read and write e-mail messages.

In the days before Hotmail, you had to pay for nearly everything you accessed online, including any e-mail service. At the time, everyone else wondered how a web site that gave away its primary product free of charge would ever succeed. The site certainly did succeed for Sabeer Bhatia and his partner: they sold the site to Microsoft for $400 million. Not bad for a free site! Now Mr. Bhatia wants to do it all over again.

Sabeer Bhatia has now released a free online rival to Microsoft Office 2007, the suite of applications that includes Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.

Guide to Historic Town of Oyster Bay Cemeteries

Town Historian John Hammond of Oyster Bay, New York has released a guide for genealogists called “Historic Cemeteries of Oyster Bay”. Cemeteries are an important resource for many people delving into genealogy, and John has done the leg work by documenting every known pre-1920 cemetery in the Town.

Australia's Electoral Rolls Online

Australia's electoral rolls between 1901 and 1936 which are now available online at www.ancestry.com.au. The rolls can be used to track the location of ancestors and find out interesting facts about their electoral histories. Nearly 42 million names appear on the rolls.