TCGS Helps Index 1940 Census

The figures are in: TCGS did an amazing job of contributing to the 1940 US Census Community Indexing Project.

At the last TCGS Board Meeting, John Covey, TCGS President, announced that we had indexed 83,754 names and arbitrated 154,116. This makes a grand total of 237,870 names.

Surprisingly, of all the societies indexing, our society came in 16th in the Large Society Group (16 or more members)! That is very impressive considering the size of our society and the number of people doing indexing.

There are some who outdid themselves with indexing, but no matter how many or few you may have indexed, your contribution has been counted and allows us to post the 1940 Community Indexing Project logo.

Many thanks to all!

 

16th in the Large Society Group (16 or more members)

WSGS 2012 Recognition Awards

It is with great pleasure that we introduce the TCGS recipients of the WSGS 2012 Recognition Awards. Janet McKinnon and Susan Faulkner were both recognized for their “exceptional and consistent support of the goals and operation of”¹ the Tri-City Genealogical Society; Gary Miller has been recognized “for outstanding efforts in the identification, preservation, dissemination or publication of information of genealogical importance and value to researchers interested in the families of Washington state.”²

Janet, as most of you know, has served as TCGS’ Vice-President and Program Chair since 2010. In addition, she was instrumental in organizing the annual Washington State Genealogical Society State Conference held in Richland in September 2011. Janet also serves regularly in the Richland Family History Center helping others learn more about doing genealogical research. And, at the end of 2011, when no one came forward to run for TCGS Vice-President, Janet agreed to continue for a second term.

Susan received recognition for serving as TCGS President from 2010-2011. It was she who enthusiastically accepted the opportunity for TCGS to host the 2011 WSGS State Conference and worked hard to see its successful fruition. In addition to serving in these capacities, she also made several presentations both to our society members and other members of the community and still found time to contribute articles to our TCGS Bulletin.

Gary Miller was nominated for his efforts in record preservation for TCGS. He helped with the photo indexing project for CREHST Museum in Richland, Washington.  After retirement, he contributed time indexing the Benton and Franklin County school censuses covering 1910 to 1933. In an effort to resolve some issues with the school census indexing project, Gary drove to Ellensburg to obtain better images of the census pages. At the end of that project, he created a document explaining what was done and where there might be some problems with the index. With the school census project finished, Gary turned his efforts to helping with the 1940 US Census indexing 20,000 names since April 2012.

We congratulate all three WSGS Recognition Award recipients and thank them for their efforts to sustain TCGS. These recognitions will be formally awarded at the 2012 WSGS Annual State Conference September 8th in Port Angeles, Washington.

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1 Washington State Genealogical Society. Annual Outstanding Volunteer Awards Program: Introduction to Outstanding Volunteer Awards. Union Gap: WSGS, date unknown. Web. http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~wasgs/volawardintro.pdf.

2 Ibid.

TCGS Member Marilyn Swanda Earns Washington State Pioneer Certificate

Marilyn Swanda was recently awarded the Washington State Pioneer Certificate for her research on her grandfather, Adam Scroggie. Her grandfather was born in Aberdeen, Scotland, in 1862 and emigrated to Washington in 1889. Adam Scroggie homesteaded in 1891 in Spokane County and worked for the Northern Pacific Railroad in Sprague in 1895. Family tradition holds that Adam was a stow away on a ship carrying cattle to the U.S.

Marilyn proves that attending TCGS monthly meetings is worthwhile. She learned about the Washington State Pioneer Certificates at one of our monthly meetings. She says she believes she may have other ancestors who emigrated to Washington before 1900 and plans to pursue certificates for those ancestors as well.

Southern California GS (SCGS) Jamboree

“Join the participants of the Southern California Genealogical Society's (SCGS) Streamed Video Sessions.  A total of 10 sessions will be streamed during the coming weekend, June 9 and 10.” is the message I received this morning in my email box.

Did you miss RootsTech streamed videos? Want to attend a really BIG genealogy conference but haven’t the time, money, or confidence to go? Here is your chance to listen to ten of the countries foremost genealogists teach you how to improve your research techniques.

The speakers who have agreed to live-streaming their presentations are Warren Bittner, Lisa Louise Cooke, Josh Taylor, Curt Witcher and Laura Prescott to name just a few.

I, for one, would do anything to listen to Curt Witcher or Josh Taylor speak about genealogy. I always come away with at least one new idea and am always inspired by their presentations. All these speakers will have something important and useful to share or they otherwise would not have been invited to speak at the SCGS Jamboree, one of the biggest genealogical conferences in the nation.

To access the schedule and plan your weekend, go to the SCGS Jamboree blog site at http://genealogyjamboree.blogspot.com/2012/06/jamboree-streamed-sessions-announced.html.

I’ll be in front of my monitor watching, will you?

June 13th Meeting Features Guest Speaker, Donna Potter Phillips

For TCGS Members, having Donna come speak to our society has become a yearly treat, this year no exception.

Donna always brings an interesting and inspiring presentation but this year she has chosen to bring us an eclectic look at genealogy “… or at least a new way to teach something old. Our upcoming seminar will prove that once again. Donna is coming with her netbook and six pages of questions, news, notes and answers and we will all talk at once and learn together. She advises that you do bring a notebook for taking notes; she offers no handout as she expects you will jot down the points that YOU need. Come learn with us!”

Donna’s upbeat personality and interesting lectures always bring fun to learning genealogy. No one can ever walk away without having learned something.

Please mark your calendars for this special presentation sure to inspire all of us in pursuit of our family’s history.

12 Days Until the 1940 Census Opens

Earlier this month, Legacy Family Tree Webinars hosted Thomas MacEntee’s Navigating the 1940 Census. It was so good, I suggested it be bought for our society library and Ray Baalman, our illustrious librarian, did just that! So in a week or so, you can view the CD at the Richland Family History Center and learn all you need to about accessing your family members in the 1940 census even without having an index.

Speaking of which, have you signed up to index the 1940 census with TCGS? Just contact John Covey, our TCGS President, to get your name on our list. It is possible there are incentives for our society if we can help with the indexing. If you are already indexing, it is just a matter of adding your work to the society totals, at least that is the understanding.

And, for those of you who want to go one step further and really understand why censuses were created (and surprise, surprise, they were not created so genealogists could find their ancestors), the attitude of the people about censuses and why some of our ancestors resisted being counted in the census, you may want to listen to the podcast Beyond Numbers: A History of the US Census from the website Backstory with the American History Guys, http://tinyurl.com/4ae9da4.

Bibles and Genealogy

Last night brought us another excellent presentation from Susan Davis Faulkner, past president of TCGS. Susan’s witty and thorough coverage of why and how to use Bibles for our genealogical research was outstanding.

TCGS’ monthly general meeting was held at the Mid-Columbia Library to celebrate the exhibit Manifold Greatness: The Creation and Afterlife of the King James Bible. How wonderful to learn we were only one of two cities in the whole state of Washington to be a part of  this special exhibition. Thanks to Susan and Michael, MCL staff member, for arranging for this wonderful and unique opportunity, the exhibit of several locally-owned Bibles and Susan’s informative presentation.

Susan gave us some good background on the existence of Bibles in our world. Did you know that it took 350 years after the King James Bible was first written for another Bible to take its place along side it? Wow! That’s staying power if there ever was any. And, to be sure, the KJV has not been replaced. Many people today still use it in spite of a handful of other versions.

Because the “family Bible” was a precious commodity, many people chose not to write their family data in it. In spite of this, the Bible owned by your family may still holds pieces of gold. People often kept such important documents as deeds, wills, bonds and land records in their Bible. In addition, one might also find funeral cards, pictures, letters, locks of hair and pressed flowers. Most of these can be used to enhance your genealogical research.

Bibles are especially useful for research because vital records are more rare than one would think. In essence, they are, except for a few instances, a 20th century invention, while the Bible has been around since 1611. Of course, many of the other written records or pictures that wind up in Bibles are also pretty modern concepts, so hopefully your ancestors took the time to record your family’s heritage in the family Bible.

The Manifold Greatness Exhibition will be at the Mid-Columbia Library until the end of March. At 7pm, Thursday, March 22nd, there will be another presentation entitled, “A Visual History of the King James Bible” with author and scholar Donald Brake, Ph.D. In addition, the movie Fires of Faith: The Coming Forth of the King James Bible will be showing at Fairchild Cinemas in Pasco, 7pm Thursday, March 29. Both the presentation and movie are free.