3-day Course Introducing the Major Record Groups, How to Analyze Them and How to Use Them

Judy G. Russell – The Legal Genealogist

Back by popular demand, Judy is an internationally known genealogist with a law degree.  She helps folks understand the arcane legal concepts and terminology that are so very important to genealogists.

Scheduled Lectures:

Dowered or Bound Out: Records of Widows and Orphans; NARA Myth-Busters: Your Family IS in the Archives; Through the Golden Door: Immigration After the Civil War; After the Courthouse Burns: Rekindling Family History through DNA

Pre-Registration: $40 for Sonoma County Genealogical Society Members; $50 for Non-Members

Admission at the door: $60

When: March 28, 2020
Time: 9:00 am - 4:30 pm (Registration begins at 9:00 am)
Where: First Presbyterian Church, 189 Church Street, Marietta, Georgia 30060

Topics:

• Heat up Your Research with Five Insurance Maps: This lecture includes a hands-on mini-workshop demonstrating the interpretation of fire insurance maps. These maps became immensely popular between 1860 – 1940 when America was industrializing, and cities were growing. Both small towns and large cities throughout North America were mapped to assist in risk assessment and fire insurance underwriting.  These maps combined with census records and city directories assist in the location of building addresses and provide details about the neighborhoods where our ancestors lived, worked, worshipped, attended school, shopped and recreated.
• Combing Every Mountain for Clues: Topographic Maps: Introduced from Europe, topographic maps primarily illustrate physical features on the earth’s surface, but they are also accurate portrayals of man-made features such as churches, schools, post offices, and cemeteries. These maps also serve as repositories of past and present place-names. In the United States, topographic mapping extended from the time of governmental exploration before the Civil War to the present. This lecture will cover historical topographic map resources and collections explore several modern digital topographic maps websites.
• Finding Immigrant Places of Origin Through the Use of Gazateers & Foreign Map Collections: Unfamiliar foreign place-names found in documents can become a springboard to researching new locations. Genealogical research in a foreign country need not be daunting especially with the use of place-name dictionaries or gazetteers. This lecture will show you how to locate gazetteers and maps online and how to interpret foreign maps. Maps can detail ancestral locations, help you plan research trips, or assist you in the direction of others researching on your behalf.
• Using Civil War Maps to Tell Your Ancestor's Story: This lecture includes a hands-on mini-workshop examining Civil War era and post-Civil War era maps and resources. The Civil War was the first war to be documented in great detail. Maps for both the Confederacy and Union sides played an enormous role in planning, executing, and illustrating the war.  This workshop is designed to introduce you to the diversity and beauty of Civil War mapping and its usefulness in documenting not only battles and troop movements but also the location of families, buildings, transportation networks, agricultural fields, and the natural landscape

Brooke Schreier Ganz founder of Reclaim the Records, a not-for-profit activist group of more than 6,400 genealogists, researchers, historians, and journalists, will present how they use Freedom of Information laws – and sometimes even lawsuits – to obtain copies of previously inaccessible archival record sets, which they then put online for free public use. They have won the first-ever public and online access to more than twenty-eight million archival records, including the New York City marriage license index (1908-2017), the New York State death index (1880-1956), the New Jersey marriage index (1901-2016), and they have an ongoing lawsuit for the Missouri birth and death index (1910-present). This presentation will explain how they accomplished this, as well as the history and legal basics of FOI laws, and will teach researchers how to file requests for any records that may help their own family tree research. Saturday, March 21, 2020 Finley Center Cypress Room 2060 West College Ave.Santa Rosa, CA 95401 Noon-2pm.

The Sonoma County Genealogical Society Presents Claire E. Miller “Finding Your French-Canadian Ancestors FAST In Quebec and US Records on the Internet” When Claire Miller began her family history research in 1988, she knew only as far back as her French-Canadian great-grandfather. Using the internet in 2001 Claire was able to trace her lineage back to the immigrant ancestor who arrived in Montréal in 1699. This talk will demonstrate how you can build an impressive pedigree in very little time, while sitting in front of your computer. Saturday, February 15, 2020 Cypress Room 2060 West College Ave. Santa Rosa 95401 FREE Noon-2pm

Date and Time: Wednesday, February 5, 6:30 PM

Location: Center for Jewish History, 15 West 16th St., New York, NY 10011

At first, aspiring Jewish men from Galicia, Lithuania, and elsewhere ventured to Padua University to study medicine when other schools across Europe refused their admission. Then, from the end of the eighteenth century onward, Jews from Galicia attended Habsburg universities—from Lemberg/Lwów and Kraków, to Vienna, Pest and Prague. Many nineteenth-century Jewish medics influenced Galician life beyond their profession, advocating educational, religious and civic reforms. At the turn of the twentieth century, Jewish women were at the forefront of newly won access to university education, changing societal and family norms.

This presentation will take us across the countries and continents, with genealogical information illustrated by unique archival records, newspaper accounts, and maps. You don’t have to have medical practitioners among your ancestors to find this topic interesting and helpful in your family history research.

About the Speaker: Andrew Zalewski is a former professor of medicine at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia. He is the vice president of Gesher Galicia, a non-profit organization devoted to genealogical and historical research on Galicia. Andrew Zalewski has also authored two books on Austrian Galicia: Galician Trails: The Forgotten Story of One Family and Galician Portraits: In Search of Jewish Roots.

An ASL interpreter may be made available if requested in advance.

Tickets: $10 general admission; $5 Center for Jewish History/Partner members, seniors, and students. Note: Our programs frequently sell out. It is highly recommended that you purchase tickets in advance.

This program is sponsored by the Ackman & Ziff Family Genealogy Institute and Gesher Galicia. It is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

SOS For A Photo Mess with Micki JonesMs. Jones will present the Safeguard, Organize and Share method for organizing your photographs. After the wild fires that swept the North Bay, Ms. Jones knew that she had to learn to safeguard, organize and share her boxes of print photos that filled closets and the years of digital photos that were on a twelve-year-old hard drive. Ms. Jones realized she had a passion to help others curate their photo collections and started Journeys Photo Solutions. Saturday, January 18th Finley Center Cypress Room 2060 West College Ave.Santa Rosa 95401707-543-3737 Noon-2pm Noon-1pm group chat 1pm-2pm presentation

Location: Center for Jewish History, 15 West 16th Street
Date and Time: Wednesday, December 11, 6:30 PM
Tickets: archiving.bpt.me or 800-838-3006 ($10 general admission; $5 Center for Jewish History/Partner members, seniors, and students)
VHS? Floppy disks? Vacation photographs? Everyone has digital materials that hold personal meaning and tell stories about their lives. Join archivist Maggie Schreiner for a personal digital archiving workshop and learn how to care for and preserve your digital memories! Master the basics of digitizing and caring for your collections of documents, photos, and audiovisual materials. Learn about file formats and storage, straightforward tools and techniques, and common risks and dangers (and how to avoid them!).
About the Speaker: Maggie Schreiner is the Manager of Archives and Special Collections at the Brooklyn Historical Society. She has previously held positions at New York University and the Queens Memory program at Queens Library, where she first began teaching about personal digital archiving. Maggie holds an MA in Archives and Public History from New York University.An ASL interpreter may be made available if requested in advance. This program is presented by the Ackman & Ziff Family Genealogy Institute and is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

Forensic Genetic Genealogy with DNA Doe Project co-founder Dr. Margaret PressThe DNA Doe Project has one mission: “To identify John and Jane Does using genetic genealogy.” The project’s first successful identification was the first announcement of how DNA could identify cold case victims. Since then forensic genetic genealogy has also been used to identify cold case perpetrators such as the Golden State killer. Dr. Press will share a behind the scene look at the DNA Doe Project’s first solved case. Saturday, November 16th, Finley Center Cypress Room 2060, West College Ave. Santa Rosa 95401. Noon-2pm Noon-1pm group chat “What are your DNA mysteries?” 1pm-2pm Dr. Press’ presentation. Arrive early – seating is limited.

THE VENTURA COUNTY GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY presents a Free Family History Presentation Saturday, November 16, 2019, at the Camarillo Library Community Room 4101 Las Posas Road, Camarillo, CA 93010 1:00 P.M.“The War of 1812” Presented by Linda Serna Did you have an ancestor who served in the War of 1812, between the United States and Great Britain? About 60,000 U.S. Army forces and 470,000 American militia and volunteer troops fought from 1812 to 1815. Linda Serna will tell the story of the War of 1812, one of America’s forgotten wars, and broaden our understanding of this time in history. Her coverage includes people, places, and events, and is rounded out with interesting trivia to make the story come alive. Linda Serna has been involved with genealogy in researching and writing family stories for over 30 years. In addition, she was privileged to work as a genealogist for the first season of the PBS Genealogy Roadshow program. Currently, she is a member of the Southern California Chapter of the P.M. Association of Professional Genealogists (SCCAPG), the Genealogical Speakers Guild (GSG), and several other genealogical organizations. She especially likes seeing how individual family stories fit in and make up the fabric of history. 2:30 WORKSHOP: “Snagit Updates” Presented by John Callahan Following the general presentation, John Callahan will review what is new in Snagit – a genealogist’s wonderful computer resource. 10:30 A.M. – 11:30 A.M.: VCGS DNA SPECIAL INTEREST GROUP MEETING The VCGS DNA Special Interest Group meeting will precede the general meeting from 10:30 A.M. to 11:30 A.M. at the Camarillo Library. Don and Carly Worth will lead a presentation about “Introduction to DNA for Genetic Genealogy.”