Starting today, 19 November, MyHeritage DNA is available at a great price at https://www.myheritage.com/dna/. As MyHeritage says “With detailed ethnicity results covering 2,114 regions, users can explore where their ancestors came from and connect with relatives around the world through advanced DNA matching. And with the most comprehensive set of genetic genealogy tools available, there’s even more to discover.”
Time to get those calendars out to mark some dates for great education in 2025. This is for those interested in genealogy/familyhistory/history/community history/DNA/AI. I think that covers most of the course contents. It’s time to add the National Genealogical Society’s GRIP Genealogy Institute to those calendars.
• 22-27 June 2025, Virtual Courses
• 13-18 July 2025, In-person Courses (Pittsburgh, PA)
• End of November 2024, the GRIP Genealogy Institute website plans to have full course details.
• 4 February GRIP 2025 REGISTRATION OPENS
Many questions can be answered by delving into the various tabs at the top of the GRIP Genealogy Website https://grip.ngsgenealogy.org/. The titles of courses for 2025 can be viewed at https://grip.ngsgenealogy.org/#schedule. Many NEW courses!
I am coordinating a new course “Beyond Digging Deeper: Sources, Methods, and Practices.”
We have listened to requests from previous students in the longtime GRIP course “Digging Deeper: Records, Tools, and Skills” and have added another course related to it. This new course “Beyond Digging Deeper: Sources, Methods, and Practices” delves into additional essential record types and provides sessions showing the research process and effective use of tools. This course features hands-on creation of research questions, research plans, and research reports. Application of learned methods will be put into practice throughout the week.
Prior participation in the longtime course, “Digging Deeper: Records, Tools, and Skills,” is not essential. The courses work in tandem and complement each other and are designed to be taken in no particular order.
In a future post, I will share more about this course, the wonderful lineup of instructors, and Cari Taplin’s “The Spirit of the Inland Seas: Research in the Great Lakes Region” in which I am an instructor.
“WORTHINGTON, Minn. (AP) — Immigration from around the world has transformed Worthington, bringing new businesses to emptying downtown storefronts as well as new worship and recreational spaces to this town of 14,000 residents in the southwestern Minnesota farmland.” In my beautiful home state of Minnesota where I still reside.
An article by GIOVANNA DELL’ORTO and JESSIE WARDARSKI is making the rounds of online news. Immigrants helping to revive a town. Immigrants starting new businesses, working in established businesses, attending church, shopping, children in school. Worthington is in Nobles County, in Southwestern Minnesota along Interstate 90 and is thriving because of a mix of recent immigrants with descendants of much earlier immigrants and probably some descendants of Native Americans.
Read the article for free on The Associated Press (AP) website https://apnews.com/article/immigration-policy-integration-minnesota-history-churches-business-soccer-5385d18481c901ee1faeec19c16ebf6d
It’s the early holiday season! Ancestry has a big sale on DNA tests ($39) and on various levels of Gift Memberships. Be sure to read the terms. The sale runs through November 27th at 6:00 p.m. EST.
Geoff Rasmussen says “We’ve tallied the numbers and made a list of the Top 10 most-watched webinars for October 2024! Are your favorite topics or instructors among the list? Need something new to learn? Use the list to get inspired! You’ll see my name and my September presentation among the runner-ups. Guess it’s still drawing viewers. Thank you.
Now Legacy has 2,300 genealogy classes in the members-only library and its blog lists the most watched during the month of October 2024. Members get access to the 9001 syllabus pages! Join today if you aren’t already a member. My affiliate link to join is http://legacy.familytreewebinars.com/?aid=1739. Get ready for November webinars!
MyHeritage has announced that from “October 29 to November 1, 2024, it is offering free access to their “vast collection of death, burial, cemetery, and obituary records. With nearly 1.2 billion records in 435 collections, it’s the perfect chance to dive into the stories that connect us to generations before us.”
Search Death, Burial, Cemetery & Obituaries now
Do you know who was on the land where you now live about 200 or more years ago? I’m betting that then or way before, it was Indigenous people who lived on “your” land in what became the United States. You may be a descendant of that group of Indigenous people whose land was taken away by force and by treaty by immigrants to the U.S., aka the federal government. Finally, more and more states, counties, and cities are paying some attention to the original inhabitants. This second Monday in October is being officially recognized as Indigenous Peoples Day. Unfortunately, the federal government has not made it an official “holiday.” My home state of Minnesota definitely has. https://mn.gov/indian-affairs/indian-affairs/indigenous-peoples-day-2024.jsp. The educational aspect noted in the graphic below is important, but only an hour? There needs to be more education and not just on one day.
Part of my work schedule for today is working on updating handouts and PowerPoint slides for a bunch of presentations I am doing in October and November. It’s always enjoyable to share my knowledge with groups around the world, but I am staying in the U.S. for the next several months. While I’m working on these, I hope you’ll allow me a bit of bragging. My Webtember presentation for Legacy Family Tree Webnars, “The Neighbors Knew: Strategies for Finding YOUR Ancestral Details in THEIR Records” made the month’s top ten!
Legacy Webinars is filled with almost 2,300 webinars that you can view from home. Most are free the first time presented. A one-year subscription allows you to watch them at any time and see the almost 9,000 pages of syllabus material. I’d appreciate it if you would use my affiliate link to join the thousands of us who have a membership as we keep learning. http://legacy.familytreewebinars.com/?aid=1739
A recent newsletter from the University of Minnesota reminded me to look at other parts of the Minnesota Digital Library. The MDL is best described directly from its website. MDL “supports discovery and education through access to unique digital collections shared by cultural heritage organizations from across the state of Minnesota. Our contributors include libraries, historical societies, museums, and archives.”
Sounds good, right. “Begun in 2003, the Minnesota Digital Library includes digital content from over 200 participating organizations from across the state. Together we have digitized more than 60,000 photographs, postcards, maps, documents, letters, and oral histories. These materials are available online in a free searchable database.” Sounds more like excellence, right?
I was reminded about oral histories that are becoming accessible online via MDL. In a September 24, 2024, post about Minnesota Digital Library News, Stephanie Hess wrote about 135 historical oral histories made in 1950-1955 about Beltrami County that are now available. https://minitex.umn.edu/news/minnesota-digital-library/2024-09/beltrami-county-historical-society-audio-recordings-now . Bemidji is the county seat. Many of the audio recordings include references to area Native American reservations, area businesses, occupations, and many other states are mentioned. Just one collections example:
Every day and every month I learn about some other event, designation, or awareness label in states, provinces, countries, and I can’t keep track of them all. The three in the title of this post are examples of some that apply to me and my fellow history/genealogy researchers. These and others apply to people all over the world. Where would we be without an understanding of history in general and specifically of our own families? Most of my friends are descendants of immigrants, as am I. I have friends who are descendants of the Native Americans who were here before my own ancestors.
What archives will you visit this month? What archives websites have you thoroughly investigated? What archives have you advocated for at state and federal levels? We need to interact with elected officials to be sure our archives and historical societies are fully funded so history can be preserved carefully. Think about one aspect of Hurricane Helene this past week. What historical materials have we lost along with people, homes, and government buildings?
For Family History Month, be sure to watch an online webinar and attend a presentation by a local genealogical society. Then take the handout or other material from that presentation and be sure to check the books and websites mentioned in it. Oh, the education we are able to get from that alone. Hundreds of webinars are available for free or low cost from all around the U.S. Hint: check Conference Keeper for links to tons of webinars and seminars. https://conferencekeeper.org/
I highly recommend Legacy Family Tree Webinars and my affiliate link for a membership is http://legacy.familytreewebinars.com/?aid=1739. For a year’s membership, we get access to 2,281 webinars and 8,947 pages of syllabus material. Most webinars are free when first presented and then for a week afterward, even without a membership. The syllabus material is only available to members. Well worth it as several new ones are offered each week.
German Heritage fits into the other two categories as far as my tips. It’s all a continuing education sequence. We never give up, never say we are finished, nor do we negate any clues we get unless thorough research proves the clues as wrong.