What a great combination of designations for this month. In many places, the temperatures are cooling down. We aren’t going on as many picnics, to the beach, or using the swimming pool. Children are back in school. The genealogist’s minds turns to FAMILY HISTORY. October seems fitting to be both Family History Month and American […]
I am at the Family History Library in Salt Lake City for several days. There are still some open seats here for you. The microfilm readers and computers are busy. I see many people pouring through books that are not yet digitized. It feels good to be back here. When is the last time you […]
The Great Falls Tribune [Montana] has a wonderful article about the Butte-Silver Bow Public Archives, the holdings, and the mission of the repository. This is the way I wish all localities felt about historical researchers. That’s what a genealogist does. We are searching for the history of our ancestors, collateral family, and the place in […]
Learning that a family member may have been divorced 50, 75, or 150 years ago might yield a temporary shock to your system. It might also yield a plethora of family history details. Divorce in the past is different from divorce today in some ways. Societal and family pressures may have caused a family or […]
The opening two sentences of a 17 July article in the Minnesota Daily, the newspaper of the University of Minnesota’s main campus, tells the story of why we still need to visit such places in our family history research. “In the last five years, the University of Minnesota Archives has digitized about 1 million pages […]
Have you checked the newsletters produced by the state archives in your ancestral states? The content varies, but may include: list of recent acquisitions bios of staff members (may tell you which person is familiar with specific collections) descriptions of collections notes on state history indexing projects digitization projects Both the current and past issue […]
My news feed had that headline to an article this morning. The article states “Recent data compiled by the Council of State Archivists, a national organization of state records executives, indicates that Iowa ranks near the bottom of the nation’s 50 states in its commitment to state records preservation. In fact, Iowa is the only […]
The Society of American Archivists has a helpful online guide Using Archives: A Guide to Effective Research. It has many great tips for potential users. I have read most of it and felt like I was reading my own advice when I teach about the gems found in archives and special collections departments. It’s worth […]
What a great idea. Tomorrow, Saturday October 1, 2011, the archival community in Sacramento, California is sponsoring the free Sacramento Archives Crawl. This is a neat opportunity that appeared in my news feed from the Sacramento Bee newspaper. “Four historical organizations are partnering in the crawl and include the California State Archives, California State Library, […]
According to a press release, the Pennsylvania State Archives will close from Oct. 18 through Feb. 3, 2011, for needed renovations. October 16th is the last day researchers can visit the facility in person, but the staff will continue to respond to telephone, e-mail, and postal inquiries during the renovations. “Barbara Franco, PHMC executive director, […]