Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter

Become Your Own Wealthy Heir After Being Frozen

Here is a "get rich not so quickly" scheme that apparently is legal. It is possible to finance your cryogenic preservation by using life insurance and then leave a huge death benefit to your future thawed self. So by taking the right steps, you can look forward to waking up one bright future morning from cryopreservation the proud owner of a bank account brimming with money.

FairPoint Files for Bankruptcy

On February 6 of this year, I posted an article telling why you don't want to use the e-mail service from your Internet provider. Instead, you should be using an e-mail service provided by an independent e-mail provider (Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo, Fastmail, etc.). I followed that up with a second article that described the bad experiences of 234,000 former Verizon customers in Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont who suddenly found their Internet service was being changed to a smaller company, FairPoint Communications.

Fairpoint changed the e-mail addresses of their new customers with little or no notice. In fact, some customers were not told of the new email addresses until AFTER they had been changed! Can you imagine what that would do to your email communications with friends, family, business acquaintances, genealogy mailing lists, etc.?

Leader of Unkechaug Indians Challenged on "Blood Right"

It's interesting to see one's genealogy end up as a court case. However, such disputes are not uncommon in Indian affairs when gambling or tax-free sales of cigarettes are involved.

John Maynes is a member of the Unkechaug Indians in Mastic, New York. He has asked a Suffolk judge to stop the chief of the Unkechaug Indians from conducting business and is challenging the chief's genealogical right to be part of the tribe. He claims Unkechaug chief Harry Wallace does not have ancestry that can be traced to American Indian descendants of Shinnecock Indians.

UPDATE: Tom Joyner wins Posthumous Pardons for Uncles

This is an update to the "Tom Joyner Seeking Pardons for Executed Uncles" article I posted last week at http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2009/10/tom-joyner-seeking-pardons-for-executed-uncles.html.

Tom Joyner went before the South Carolina Parole and Pardon Board today to seek a posthumous pardon for his great-uncles, Thomas and Meeks Griffin, who were executed in 1915 for a crime they apparently didn’t commit.

His request was granted.

Identity Theft is Usually an Unsophisticated Crime

I have written before about the "threats" of identity theft. Know-nothing politicians and bureaucrats often try to restrict access to public domain records and online databases with an excuse that restricting such access will somehow reduce identity theft. Sadly, genealogists suffer as a result. The same public domain records are often critical resources required to research one's family tree. Misguided legislation and procedures do nothing to stop identity theft but certainly do hinder genealogists.

A recent research report by Heith Copes of the University of Alabama at Birmingham and Lynne Vieraitis of the University of Texas at Austin has proven the point. The two examined identity thieves and their methods. Copes and Vieraitis searched federal court records in the US for people convicted of identity theft and then interviewed the thieves. They were able to find 297 inmates, from which they sampled 59 inmates in 14 prisons across the country. The convicts agreed to do detailed interviews, in private, to talk about themselves and their crimes. I would suggest the results should be studied by every politician and bureaucrat.

NARA Proposed Regulation 36 CFR 1254

The following notice was received from Marilyn Redman of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA):

The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is proposing a revision to the current NARA regulations on Researcher Identification Cards.  The proposed rule will require researchers using original records, NARA microfilm, and public use computers at the National Archives Building in Washington, DC, to obtain a researcher identification card. Researchers at regional archives are also required to obtain a researcher identification card when there is no separate research room for the use of microfilm and public access computers. The proposed rule also updates our regulations to reflect changes in available technology and research room practices, such as abolishing the three-hour time limit for using microfilm readers.

Proposed Cemetery Oversight Act

U.S. Rep. Bobby Rush unveiled legislation Monday that would expand the powers of the federal government by creating a new level of oversight for cemeteries to prevent the kind of abuses seen at Burr Oak Cemetery and to others.

The Bereaved Consumers Protection Act would force cemetery directors to bolster their record keeping and make those records available to federal, state and local officials. It also creates a kind of consumer Bill of Rights for cemeteries, prohibiting directors from misleading customers about the prices of funeral goods and services, and clarifying contracts for burial plots, entombments and inurnments.

Ancestry.com and the Drouin Genealogical Institute Reach Agreement

On August 30, 2009, I published an article about a disagreement between Ancestry.com and the Drouin Genealogical Institute concerning indexation of the Drouin Collection previously placed on-line by Ancestry.com. That article is available at http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2009/08/ancestrycom-in-arbitration-over-the-drouin-collection.html. As a result, one of the more valuable French-Canadian genealogy databases was taken off-line.

Now the Drouin Genealogical Institute reports that the two sides have reached agreement.

Help Still Needed for the Library of Michigan

The following was written by Shirley Hodges:

The Michigan Library Association organized an excellent Rally on the Lansing Capitol steps yesterday. Thank you to Gale and Proquest for the red T-Shirts and the posters. Thanks to all those who came and supported the Rally.

Governor Granholm amended her Executive Order 9 September 2009.   We do need to thank her for that. HOWEVER, we also need to reminder her and ALL OF THE REPRESENTATIVES and SENATORS that there are still 3 things that we are very concerned about.

Michigan Governor's Latest Executive Order is Now Online

UPDATE: The full text of Governor Jennifer Granholm's latest Executive Order EO 2009-43 may be found at her website, http://michigan.gov/gov/0,1607,7-168-21975-221451--,00.html.  The portions of greatest interest to us as genealogists is the second half of this document, Parts III and Part IV. Some of the wording seems to be vague.

Still More About the Library of Michigan Effort

The support efforts to save the Library of Michigan are snowballing. The Michigan Genealogical Council has a great deal of information about the situation, along with suggestions for what YOU can do to help.

The Council strongly urges every Michigan resident to write to their representative and at least one person on the Juciciary Committee. Their names are listed on the Michigan Genealogical Council web site.

Library of Michigan Petition Update

The following article was written by Fred Moss of the NGS/FGS Records Preservation and Access Committee (RPAC). This is similar to the earlier announcement only this newly-updated version offers a lot more details:

Library of Michigan—RPAC launches petition drive
September 6th, 2009
Fred Moss

Within the genealogical community, the Library of Michigan has long been recognized as one of the premier state libraries in the country.

The cohesive Library of Michigan collection with over 180 years of Michigan history, literature and culture records and reflects the lives of not only those who remained to raise their families within the state but of millions more whose migration to other parts of the country left their footprints in the soil and records generated by their passage. Visitors come from all across the country to research at the Library of Michigan.

Your Help Is Needed: Save the Library of Michigan

If you have been reading the news in this newsletter and elsewhere, you probably already know of the threats to move, reduce, and/or close the Library of Michigan. Many genealogists have already protested and those protests are growing louder.

In meetings held during the Federation of Genealogical Societies/ Arkansas Genealogical Society Annual Conference in Little Rock this past week, the Records Preservation and Access Committee (a joint committee of the Federation of Genealogical Societies and the National Genealogical Society) has initiated a petition drive in support of the Library of Michigan.

Facebook Forced to Adapt Tougher Privacy Policy

I have written before (at http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2009/07/facebook-privacy-flaws-dangerous-says-report.html and at http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2009/08/facebook-hit-with-privacyviolation-lawsuit.html) about Facebook's privacy problems. This site is very popular with genealogists, many of whom do not realize how much personal information they are exposing. Now Facebook has been forced to change. The company has announced new guidelines that limit third party applications and the information they're allowed to access. You can thank the Canadians for this improvement.

Ancestry.com in Arbitration over the Drouin Collection

Two newsletter readers have written with news that the Institut généalogique Drouin took The Generation Network Inc. (recently re-named Ancestry.com) into arbitration over the lack of full and proper indexation of the Drouin Collection previously placed on-line by Ancestry.com.

On the 12th of August 2009, the judge named to arbitrate this case sided with Drouin, and declared that The Generations Network (Ancestry.com) has failed in its contractual obligation to properly and fully index the database prior to publication and since publication. The decision grants 60 days to The Generations Network to remedy the situation. Should they fail to do so, the license granted by the Institut Drouin will lapse.

Tech Giants Unite Against Google Books

I have written several times about Google Books, in my opinion, one of the greatest online resources available to genealogists. Now Amazon, Microsoft and Yahoo will sign up to the Open Book Alliance being spearheaded by the Internet Archive. They will attempt to defeat Google not by offering a better service, but by launching an army of lawyers.

Facebook Hit with Privacy-Violation Lawsuit

Facebook is very popular amongst genealogists with a very active genealogy section. However, the company's business methods have recently come under scrutiny and now five people have filed a suit against the company, charging the social-networking company with violating California privacy laws and false advertising.

Facebook users assume that personal information and photos that they post on the site are shared only with authorized friends. However, the latest lawsuit says, “Users may be unaware that data they submit ... may be extracted and then shared, stored, licensed or downloaded by other persons or third parties they have not expressly authorized,” the suit reads.

The suit describes at length a massive data mining operation at Facebook, which it says has transformed itself from a social-networking company to a data-mining company. It faults the company for collecting and analyzing site content without user knowledge or consent.

Facebook is involved with several other legal problems involving the company's cavalier attitude about its users' private information. Earlier this year it changed its terms of use to essentially claim perpetual ownership of all content loaded on the site. In response to a user uproar, it later omitted that portion of its terms of use.

Ex-Genealogical Society Treasurer Pleads Guilty to Embezzlement

The former treasurer of the Licking County (Ohio) Genealogical Society was given a community control sentence that won’t end until she makes full restitution of money she embezzled. Karen L. Ray, 68, pleaded guilty to fifth-degree felony theft in Common Pleas Judge Jon Spahr’s courtroom Monday.

She also made the first of potentially more than 40 $100 payments to the Licking County Genealogical Society to repay what she stole over 16 months beginning June 2007.

California Considers Restrictive Marriage Records Access

The following announcement was written by Liz Stookesberry Myers of the California Alliance of Genealogical Societies:

Assembly Bill 130 will be heard in the Senate Appropriations Committee very soon.  It was introduced by  Kevin Jeffries (Republican ) of the Temecula area.  The Bill was presented at the request of the Recorder Association of California.  They want to be able to handle Marriage Records the same as Birth and Death Records.  That means that they can black out the Mother's Maiden name, if the County Recorder chooses.  The Recorder also has the option of sending out an informational copy only.

The main concern is what the Recorder of each county may or may not choose to do.  At least that is the way it is written today.

US Tries to Stop Geronimo Lawsuit

According to the BBC, US officials have moved to block a legal bid by descendants of Apache leader Geronimo to have his remains reburied. Geronimo's relatives say some body parts were stolen almost 100 years ago by members of a society linked to Yale University to keep in their clubhouse.

The relatives want to rebury the warrior, who died in 1909, near his birthplace in New Mexico. But the justice department has asked a federal judge to dismiss their lawsuit.

The society, known as Skull and Bones, is alleged to have stolen some of Geronimo's remains from a burial plot in Oklahoma in 1918.

Government lawyers want to remove the U.S. goverment as a defendant in the case, saying that the government was not involved in the alleged theft of bones. The same lawyers have no objection to the lawsuit's claims against the other defendants: Yale University and the Order of the Skull and Bones.