FamilySearch.org closer to changing

Paula Stuart-Warren  FamilySearch  Leave a comment

Over at the Ancestry Insider, the AI reports that the time is drawing close. That is, “FamilySearch is readying to replace www.familysearch.org with beta.familysearch.org possibly before the end of the year. “[The] FamilySearch website will change to a new version by [the] end of 2010,” says a December newsletter sent to Salt Lake area family history consultants of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.”

To read the AI’s full comments click here. You might also want to read through some of the past posts there to learn more about the changes, procedures, and for tips that will help you use the new site.

I have mixed feelings about this change — but then again, we all get used to the status quo and may be just a bit reluctant to have things change. As with all other things, it will take time to get used to the new version. I do love all the records images and indexes on the beta site.

One week till the NEW U.S. National Archives website debut

Paula Stuart-Warren  National Archives  Leave a comment

Just received this press release from the National Archives. Note that you can click on the link to get a preview. I think that the overall look is less cluttered. I can’t wait to work on the full website next week!                                     
December 6, 2010
National Archives Web Site Gets New Look
Archives.gov Site Transformation to go live on December 13, 2010
Washington, DC… The National Archives and Records Administration will launch a redesigned Archives.gov web site on December 13, 2010, as part of its flagship Open Government Initiative.   
An interactive preview of the redesigned Archives.gov is online at:   archives.gov/open/redesign/preview/
“It’s essential for the National Archives to have a user-friendly online presence,” said Archivist of the United States David S. Ferriero, (the first Archivist to blog, tweet, and launch a Facebook page). “We hope to reach new audiences while still engaging our long-time users, researchers and visitors.  This redesign – part of the National Archives flagship Open Government Initiative – reflects the ongoing effort to engage the public and make records of the National Archives easier to find and use.”
The new Archives.gov web site will feature:
  • A brand new home page voted by the public in July 2010;
  • A new interactive “Our Locations” map of NARA’s facilities nationwide;
  • Historical documents and streamlined access to military service records (81 percent of Archives.gov visitors are looking for this information);
  • Single topically organized sections focused on the needs of both casual browsers and professional researchers; and
  • Easy links to National Archives’ social media sites, including Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, YouTube, and both the Archivist’s AOTUS blog and other National Archives blogs.
The public and National Archives staff participated in the redesign process. A multi-faceted participatory approach, including online card sorts, voting on home page designs, and usability testing was used to gather input to create content organization on Archives.gov.
The interactive preview explains what has and has not changed and gives you the opportunity to walk through the redesign.  A web site is never done and this is the first step in a number of ongoing changes.  We look forward to your input.  Please contact us at [email protected].
For more information on the Archives.gov web site redesign, see http://www.archives.gov/open/redesign/
For more information on Open Government at the National Archives, see: http://www.archives.gov/open
To submit suggestions and feedback to the National Archives Web Staff, e-mail [email protected]

Registration is open for the 2011 NGS Conference

Paula Stuart-Warren  Conferences, National Genealogical Society  Leave a comment

Registration for the 2011 National Genealogical Society Family History Conference opened yesterday. It will be held in the Charleston Area Convention Center, 5001 Coliseum Drive, North Charleston, South Carolina, 11–14 May. The convention center is conveniently located near the Charleston International Airport (CHS) and is surrounded by a number of hotels with restaurants and outlet stores nearby. Historic Charleston is twenty minutes away via taxi or shuttle service.

Click here for more details and to see the full program.

Advent Calendar: Christmas Food Memories

Paula Stuart-Warren  Christmas  2 Comments

Baking from scratch has always been one of my passions. Cut-out sugar Christmas cookies were always high on the list. I had a large collection of cookie cutters, the good ones that were metal and cut through the dough very nicely. I loved to make cookies when I still lived with my parents and continued that once I was married and had children.

It was Christmas tradition to make and decorate the sugar cookies with my children. Over the years we lived in two different houses but neither had a kitchen with much space. Thus, we had tv trays set up for cookies to cool and for decorating. When they were small, the cookies were, shall we say, interesting. But it was fun to see their grandparents ooh and ah over whatever the children presented to them. The mess was something else. Who knew sprinkles and icing could end up everywhere! My daughter has taken over the family baking in recent years. She always made what we called 6 layer bars for my mother.

An enjoyable outgrowth of the Christmas cookie experience came when my oldest son, Jim, asked for the sugar cookie recipe to use in making cookies with his family. I have posted it here in case you want to join in on the Warren Sugar Cookie Tradition

Sugar Cookies
6 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups butter (4 sticks at room temp)
4 eggs, lightly beaten
2 cups sugar

Mix dry ingredients together, add butter, then eggs. Much of the mixing of this thick dough will need to be done by hand.

Chill in 2-3 separate balls wrapped in plastic wrap. Remove one just when you are ready to roll it out.

Roll out on floured pastry cloth or board to 1/8 inch thickness and cut out the cookies.

Bake at 375 degrees for 6-8 minutes; bottoms can brown too fast but this can be helped by using only cooled down cookie sheets.

Let cool and have fun decorating.

Advent Calendar: Christmas Tree Memories

Paula Stuart-Warren  Advent Calendar, Chicago  1 Comment

My plan for this December is to be a better participant in the Geneabloggers Advent Calendar of Christmas Memories. This will be a way for me to tell my children and grandchildren about Christmas in my youth and to remind them about some wonderful Christmases in their past.

I grew up in a rambler on Bowdoin Street in St. Paul that had three huge side-by-side living room windows. This was the perfect place for a tree. And for my parents, especially my Mom, that had to be the perfect tree. I think Dad was pretty particular, too but she was more so. It was always the coldest day of December when we would venture to the tree lot. I remember going to one at the corner of Snelling and St. Clair at the edge of the Macalester College campus for many years. We looked and looked till we found the best tree (short needles of course) and if there were a few spots that needed a branch or two, we purchased extra branches. My Dad would then drill holes for these “additions.”

The tree would be positioned in front of the windows, Dad would do the lights, and then we three girls would get to hang the ornament. That was always so much fun to see these wonders we hadn’t seen in a year. Mom and Dad would make some adjustments if we didn’t have them spaced too well! Then came the tinsel. Tons of tinsel. BUT each piece had to be run through our fingers to make sure it was perfectly straight, not twisted or tangled. The result was a tree that was wondrous. We would turn off the room lights and sit on the couch and beam at our work. The background was all the snow in our large front yard.

Genealogists, who are you!

Paula Stuart-Warren  Uncategorized  3 Comments

It’s the time of year when genealogists salivate about all the relatives they see on the various holidays. I thought about something this morning and realized I am guilty of neglecting someone very important. That would be me. Will my descendants know about my first bike, the places I lived, my elementary and high schools that no longer exist, the various jobs I have held, my first boyfriend, my fear of water, Christmas in my youth, my wedding, the time I loved spending with my grandparents and great grandparents, the teachers I had, and so many other things?

Oh how I wish those grandparents and I had talked about family history. Would I have listened? Why don’t I talk more about the past with my own grandchildren?

I now have a file (on my computer that is labeled “Paula Stuart Warren Her Story.” The format is an expanded timeline. I list things by year (approximate year) in some cases and then have a few brief words about an event or other item. Eventually I will pull out the old photos and use them to expand on it. A few entries will be expanded to tell more of the story. I have worked on this timeline on and off today. It it addictive.

My challenge to you is to begin such a timeline as a Christmas gift to yourself and to future generations. Once you start, it will be difficult to stop adding to it.

Imagine this family group sheet in the future!

Paula Stuart-Warren  Research, Technology  1 Comment

100 years from now a family genealogist is looking at a family group sheet posted on whatever the technology of the day is. The first thing the budding genealogist notices is that somehow in the one ancestral family branch the father, mother, and child have all been given the same day of birth, November 24th. This genealogist has already taken some classes from the experts of the day and knows to question such a thing. Did the person doing the earlier research make some mistakes when doing the data entry? Was there an error made by the hospital clerk who did the data entry into the state’s master birth files? The genealogist realizes that the person who compiled the family group sheet did not cite the sources and wonders why those folks back in 2010 didn’t do that?

Then the future era genealogist notices that the mother’s surname is the same as the father’s surname. Didn’t those earlier genealogists realize that these are supposed to list the maiden name of the mother? 

So research begins to ascertain the correct days of birth for this family and the maiden name of the mother. The index to the Minnesota birth records and, of course, digitized information from all the 20th and 21st century births for the state are easily accessible on her home digimatic machine.

Whoa, Mom’s birth surname is the same as the Dad’s. And all three have the same date of birth. Could this be true? Well, next the digimatic is checked for the back files of everything that was on those old televisions. There is a story on November 26th, 2010 that tells the story of the baby being born on November 24th, the same birthday as both his parents. Maybe everything that is found on this newfangled technology isn’t too bad. It even says the Mom and Dad have the same surname.

True? Yes, the story appeared today on one of my local TV stations today, KARE 11. You may read the full story about Jamal White, Jr. and his parents here: www.kare11.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=884952.

States where I have lectured

Paula Stuart-Warren  Conferences, Seminars  Leave a comment

I have presented all-day seminars or lectured at genealogy conferences or institutes in 32 U.S. states plus the District of Columbia. South Carolina is included in that number but that won’t be factual until May for the NGS Conference in Charleston.

So far, I have not had the opportunity to do such presentations in 18 states and those are Alabama, Alaska, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Louisiana, Maine, Mississippi, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Dakota (yes, my next door state!), West Virginia, and Wyoming.

No matter where I have spoken, it has been a great experience. People involved in genealogy and history are always so much fun, interesting, and we never run out of things to talk about!

States I have visited

Paula Stuart-Warren  Research, Research trips  Leave a comment

In the summer of 2009 I was fortunate to be in two more states, Maine and New Hampshire. I have now visited all of the mainland 48 states. I have not been to Hawaii or Alaska and I hope to do so! I thought about this recently as one of my nephews asked me about one of the states where I recently lectured. He has only been in a few states.

That made me realize how lucky I am to have been in most of the states. I love this country and have never had a bad visit. Some of these states were visited when I was a senior in high school, on family vacations with our children, others researching family history for me or clients, and yet others where I presented all-day seminars or lectured at a genealogy conference. I have visited some states several times and lectured in others more than once.

Late this week I will list the states where I have and have not presented lectures. Then in another post I will talk about states where I have researched on site.

15 million new records indexed at FamilySearch Beta

Paula Stuart-Warren  FamilySearch  1 Comment

A nice press release just received from FamilySearch!

A Lot to Be Thankful For: 15 Million New Indexed Genealogical Records

November 17, 2010

Digital images and indexes include 34 collections from 13 countries
The collection of indexes and images available on FamilySearch’s beta website continues to grow by leaps and bounds, with the addition of 34 collections of genealogical records. These records include 15 million indexed records and 2.5 million images. The bounty of information covers 13 different countries around the world: Mexico, Chile, Colombia, Honduras, Guatemala, Brazil, France, Spain, Germany, Belgium, Jamaica, Canada, and the United States. Search these records now at Beta.FamilySearch.org.

You may read the full list at https://news.beta.familysearch.org/node/1001 but here are several from the full list to whet your research appetite!

Germany, Bremen Passenger Departure Lists, 1904-1914 44,465 44,315 New images and records
Guatemala, Guatemala City, Sagrario Parish Baptisms, 1898-1920 7,748 0 New images added to existing collection

 

U.S., New York State Census, 1905 0 3,601,920 New records for the following counties:  Albany, Bronx, Broome, Columbia, Essex, Franklin, Greene, Hamilton, Herkimer, Jefferson, Lewis, Madison, New York, Onondaga, Oswego, Seneca, Warren and Yates. This release completes this collection.
U.S., New York, Eastern District Naturalization Petitions, 1865-1957 0 675,035 Index only. Data courtesy of Footnote.com
U.S., New York, Western District, Naturalization Index, 1907-1966 0 89,554 Index only. Data courtesy of Footnote.com
U.S., Oklahoma, Applications for Enrollment of the Commission to the Five Civilized Tribes, 1898-1914 0 882,272 Index only. Data courtesy of Footnote.com

2022 Note: for that last entry in the chart above, the proper terminology today is Five Tribes. Though, if a record says otherwise, we need to use what it is titled or includes. FamilySearch has made catalog changes to show Indigenous categories instead of Native Races.