TCGS November General Meeting–Our Social Event of the Year!

The November meeting is one of the most fun meetings because not only do we get to meet, we get to eat! We are also kicking off our 2014 Membership campaign, so bring a friend, your appetite and join us at:

6pm, Wednesday, November 13th
Isla Bonita Mexican Dining
1524 Jadwin Avenue
Richland

Click for website to download a $2 off Coupon!

Our TCGS President, John Covey, has some great things planned for the meeting: a surprise involving “Family History Treasures” recently found at the Richland FamilySearch Center; introduction to our New Members’ Welcome activities; presentation of a series of “Hand's-on Computer” classes especially for TCGS members; and more—too much to publish here.

Come enjoy an evening with your genealogy friends and learn what the TCGS Board has planned for 2014!

"Become a Better Genealogist" Part 2

On May 8th the members of the TriCity Genealogical Society finally got to enjoy the sequel to January’s topic “Become a Better Genealogist”. Margie Beldin, as the TriCity Genealogical Society Education Chairperson, didn’t disappoint those that waited for the conclusion of her first presentation.

I personally appreciated Margie’s idea of a Genealogy Toolbox. Margie opened her toolbox and showed us some fascinating tools that will help us be better genealogists. Her toolbox was full of Internet links, library book call numbers, and electronic documents organized in an easy to find fashion that could be used to research family history. She encouraged everyone to create their own toolbox and fill it with the tools that she shared. She also taught us how to pack our toolbox for easy transportation by introducing the idea of online cloud storage.

Another juicy tidbit that I’ve munched on since Margie’s presentation was a principle I had never heard of before, but could immediately accept. This was the principle of Occam’s Razor. The Skeptic’s Dictionary at skepdic.com defines Occam’s Razor as “plurality should not be posited without necessity”. Margie broke this down for us and explained it simply. Our ancestors typically took the easiest path to go from one point of their life to the next.

The FAN Principle as introduced to the genealogical arena by Elizabeth Shown Mills is another principle that Margie shared. The FAN Principle encourages family history researchers to investigate the lives of Friends/Family, Acquaintances, and Neighbors to enhance our research on our ancestors. No one, not even our ancestors, lived in a glass bubble.

Margie wrapped these ideas, and more, into the Genealogical Proof Standard. By using this standard we can analyze data that we collect.

1. Reasonably exhaustive search

2. Complete and accurate citation of sources

3. Analysis and correlation of the collected information

4. Resolution of conflicting evidence

5. Soundly reasoned, coherently written conclusion

After giving us these important theories, principles, and standards to consider, Margie encouraged everyone to evaluate, record, and write our findings.

Does that sound like a “packed full of information” presentation? It was. Not a person in the room was able to leave without tucking something away in their pocket for further investigation later. We had so much to ponder. Margie delivered all of this with class and poise that has been developed over years of providing information packed presentations. When I left the presentation I felt that I had truly experienced a treat and was encouraged to become a better genealogist.

Become a Better Genealogist

Last evening, at the monthly meeting of the Tri-City Genealogical Society, the members learned about the Genealogical Proof Standard as well as how to improve their research methods through education. Here are some of the websites that can be accessed to enhance what was presented last evening.

Examples of Case studies and proof arguments which model the Genealogical Proof Standard
http://www.bcgcertification.org/skillbuilders/worksamples.html
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Choosing the Best Continuing Education Opportunities
http://broadcast.lds.org/elearning/FHD/Community/en/APG/Choosing_the_Best_Continuing_Education_Opportunities/Player.html

The presentation was actually a prelude to one coming in May that will explain how to implement the Genealogical Proof Standard by creating a work plan based on the Research Process, write Research Notes and complete the project by writing a Research Report.

Part 2 of last night’s presentation will be given on May 8th.

Scanning Tip

I just read my Internet Genealogy/Family Chronicle Newsletter Vol 2 #1 (29 Nov 2012: Moorshead Magazines Ltd.) online and found this wonderful scanning tip:

Scanning Tip

Scanning lots of documents for your family history project? If so, scan them in gray scale, not color, and use a low-resolution of 72 dots per inch. This will save space and make your scans go faster.

However, if you are scanning images for the purpose of creating a report, or publishing a family history, then scanning in color or gray scale at 300 dots per inch resolution, will give you the best quality.

Scanning has become so popular for saving documents that we find in books and online. We save them to our genealogy programs but, the question is always, what scale should I use? For reprints, as suggested above, we need to use a higher resolution, but that also takes up hard drive space. Copies of censuses, city directories, maps, pension records, etc. can be rescanned later if needed for publication, so save that space on your hard drive and start scanning smaller.

History of Vital Records

Ever wonder why we have birth, marriage and death records? Last night we found out when Susan Faulkner gave her presentation for the monthly TCGS meeting. It has been said, that to truly understand the information we learn from records, we need to know why they were created. The answer to that was loud and clear last night when Susan explained why and how vital records were started.

While I have always understood why church records were recorded, I had never thought about the origin of vital records – Statistics! Surprising? for me it was. It was purely because things were happening to the population that could not be explained. By statistically studying the effects on the whole population, patterns emerged which allowed the government to help solve or at least be aware of problems, such as health trends. Death records especially provided excellent information on why people were dying when the causes of the death were compared to others nearby as well as nationwide.

Sadly, vital record collection, in spite of knowing the reasons for collecting the information, was not begun throughout the United States successfully until 1933. Today both genealogists, statisticians, and many others know the value of recording vital events in our society, but this is definitely a 20th century accomplishment.

Susan quoted, “National statistics of death and birth were achieved only within the present generation, after two centuries [200 years!] of intermittent struggle and building. [emphasis added]”¹

So the next time you find a vital record for your ancestor, thank those who championed the collecting of this information, such as John of Gaunt, Edmund Halley (of Halley’s Comet fame), Oliver Cromwell and the English, Lemuel Shattuck of Massachusetts and many others who brought modern record keeping to the United States.

If you missed Susan’s excellent presentation, some of her information can be found in Val D. Greenwood’s book, A Researcher's Guide to American Genealogy, (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Company, 2000), 203-232.

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¹ Oveta Culp Hobby and Leonard A Scheele in their report titled “Vital Statistics of the United States, Volume 1” dated 1950.

Getting the BEST from Ancestry.com

Thank you LostCousins!

Tonight I attended the TriCity Genealogical Society presentation with a rather ho-hum attitude about the promised topic, “Getting the BEST from Ancestry.com”. I have been an Ancestry.com user for years. I know my way around that website like no one’s business, or so I thought. I was just sure that this was going to be one of those topics geared for beginners, but I’ve always been able to walk away with some new treat or tool from a beginner’s lecture, so what the heck. More than anything I was looking forward to supporting Margie Beldin by my attendance. I won’t list all of the hats Margie has worn for TCGS because I just know I’ll miss one or two. For me Margie has always been a part of the glue that keeps the Society going.

If I was disappointed in anything tonight it was in my initial attitude toward the topic.  Margie Beldin gave a wonderful presentation with poise and grace that captivated her audience. She spoke well, displaying that she had an expert level understanding of Ancestry.com.

Margie dissected Ancestry.com to show so many hidden treasures that I was never aware were available. While she did this she explained that it was not necessary to have a subscription in order to take advantage of what Ancestry.com has to offer. Not only did she walk her audience through how to get the most out of the Search Tab, but she also helped us explore the Learning Center of Ancestry.com.

I have read some of Ancestry.com’s wiki postings from time to time, but I was not aware of the many webinars, blogs and other professionally written articles that were just sitting there waiting for me to be educationally entertained. I was amused, yet my curiosity was spiked, to discover Ancestry.com has a YouTube channel. Imagine that! With my smartphone by my side, I will never again have to ponder what to do with that unplanned 10 minutes of waiting.

Throughout her presentation, Margie was sensitive to the cost of an Ancestry.com subscription. She shared ways to enjoy all aspects of what Ancestry.com has to offer by mixing registering (not subscribing) with Ancestry.com from home and taking freely given hints to the Family History Center to explore the actual digitized documents.

At the end of the evening I spoke with many of the genealogists that have been researching their family history for years. The tone in the room was a mixture of “That Margie. She sure is a class act. She gave another awesome presentation” with “Shoot. I’ve been a member of Ancestry.com and I never knew half the stuff that was revealed tonight.”

Curious about the picture and caption above? Margie's finale was information on how to get a great discount on an Ancestry.com subscription. Go to http:\\goo.gl/tBgkt to learn what she shared. Sign up for LostCousin's newsletters to stay on top of breaking news and various discounts.

~Susan

New Indexing Project

The TCGS meeting for the Washington State Archives Cemetery project will take place at 7pm  Thursday, 23 August 2012, at the Richland Family History Center.

Now that the 1940 U.S. Census indexing project has finished, John Covey, TCGS President, has found another wonderful indexing project for us. This one closer to home, we are indexing local cemeteries. Washington State Digital Archives, at the request of the Washington Secretary of State Sam Reed, is asking societies to index their local cemeteries for preservation in the digital archives.

Over the years, members of the society have been indexing the cemeteries but there is still plenty of indexing to do. If you are interested, please attend this meeting tomorrow evening.  If we all pitch in, we can get our cemeteries online and hope that others are indexing the cemeteries in the areas we are interested in researching. Let’s not let the enthusiasm from indexing the 1940 census die.