More access to digitized books! FamilySearch & Digital Public Library of America.

Paula Stuart-Warren  Books, FamilySearch  Leave a comment

In several of the presentations I have done in the last few months, I have discussed either the digitized books at FamilySearch.org or Digital Public Library of America. If not discusses, they have been in my handouts.

Now, those two efforts are collaborating. As the FamilySearch blog states, “In concert with the American Library Association national conference in Orlando, Florida, this week, the Digital Public Library of America (DPLA) and FamilySearch International, the largest genealogy organization in the world, have signed an agreement that will expand access to FamilySearch.org’s growing free digital historical book collection to DPLA’s broad audience of users including genealogists, researchers, family historians, students, and more.”

These are the libraries currently associated with the FamilySearch digital books. I have also viewed some periodicals.

FS booksBy golly, we may be catching up to some other countries that have extensive materials online at a national level.  Read the post here.

Stereoscopic photos from across the U.S. on New York Public Library website

Paula Stuart-Warren  Photographers  3 Comments

Did you have a View-Master as a child? I still have mine and a variety of slides. These were an outgrowth of the stereoscopic photography that was the rage in the late 19th into the early 20th centuries. Duplicate pictures were viewed through a stereoscope and the image appeared to be 3 dimensional.

These are found in museums, archives, libraries, and historical societies around the world. I have seen modern reproductions of these sold in gift shops.

The New York Public Library is one of the repositories that has a large collection of such photos and has digitized these images. A man named Richard M. Dennis collected such stereo images during his lifetime.  In 1939, his collection of 35,000 images was sold to the New York Public Library. By 1980 he donated another 35,o00 images to the NYPL.

The date range of these photos is about 1850-1930 and cover buildings, people, churches, homes, hotels, railroads, and landmarks all across the United States. I plan to look at the images again and again. I searched by places and names of buildings. I saw one listed as Montpelier, Vermont that had a cat wearing a hat and sitting on a chair at a table. Reading a book. No, I am not kidding. Look for yourself!

The NYPL’s website has an in-depth explanation of the collection and of course, the images.

Join me at upcoming genealogy events. Register soon!

Paula Stuart-Warren  Uncategorized  Leave a comment

It’s a busy genealogy summer for me. I just returned home from California and the Southern California Genealogical Society Jamboree. It was a fantastic four days. My upcoming travel brings me to many events in different parts of the U.S. and beyond. Please join me for my presentations at these along with the rest of the audiences!

  • 18 June 2016, Tacoma Washington: Washington State Genealogical Society Conference. For more details and registration click here. I will be doing four presentations complete with extensive handouts. Cyndi Ingle of Cyndi’s List will be the emcee for the day. I heard there were some fantastic door prizes and a raffle, too.
  • 17-22 July 2016, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: Genealogical Research Institute of Pittsburgh. Please join us for a week of education, collaboration, problem solving and some fun in my course, Intermediate Genealogy: Tools for Digging Deeper.
  • 5-6 August 2016, Minneapolis, Minnesota: Celtic Connections Conference. DEADLINE for registration is July 1.  Attendance is limited to 400, so register soon!
  • 31 August- 2 September 2016, Springfield, Illinois: Federation of Genealogical Societies Conference. It’s FGS’ 40th Anniversary! Four days of lectures with top notch speakers and a huge exhibit hall. for a significant savings.

Then, let’s do some relaxing, fun, networking, and education on a genealogy cruise in September!

  • 18-25 September 2016, The 3rd Heritage Books Cruise: Join a great group of instructors on the Royal Caribbean Liberty of the Seas. Some of my best friends will be along: Cyndi Ingle, J. Mark Lowe, Paul Milner; David Rencher, and Craig Scott. Sign up soon before it’s sold out.

Blogging anniversary: June 2, 2007

Paula Stuart-Warren  Uncategorized  2 Comments

Has it really been that long since I composed my first blog post? June 2, 2007! In one way, it’s been longer than that. I have had excellent advisors along the way.

I began the blogging part of my service for the Federation of Genealogical Societies before that. It was a blog that publicized FGS conferences. My friend, Debbie Mieszala from Illinois was my “instructor” on setting up that one using Blogger. She has her own blog, The Advancing Genealogist.

When I began my own blog, it was called Genealogical Eclectica and was on Blogger. Another friend, Avis Calkins, came up with that name. I met Avis back in 1982 at a Minnesota Genealogical Society meeting.

When I decided to transfer my blog to a WordPress format and also use it as my website to promote my genealogy business, Cyndi Ingle of Cyndi’s List fame helped me set it up.

Blogging is not done alone. We need inspiration, helpers, and readers. Than you to all of you!

 

 

Lyfmap: Share Saint Paul memories, history, and photos

Paula Stuart-Warren  Family, Google, Lyfmap, Uncategorized  2 Comments

Lyfmap is now LIVE and open to the public!

What is this Lyfmap? If you have a connection to Saint Paul, Minnesota take a look at Lyfmap.com. a fantastic new way to preserve memories, history, and photos. Register and add your own. Imagine being able to save all your memories at the actual locations where and when they happened! It uses Google Maps to let you save memories at all the addresses in your life and that of your parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and so on. Share memories and photos of schools, homes, businesses, and events. Pretty cool! Take a look and let me know what you think…

There is also a genealogy blog where you will learn about tracing family history and may ask your own questions about your family history, where to find records, and next steps you should take. I write that blog and appreciate that the Lyfmap founder, Larry Bieza, asked me to be a part of Lyfmap.

I already added a picture to Lyfmap from my mother’s 8th grade class as they graduated in 1940 from St. James School in St. Paul. You might find a relative in that photo. Then I added a photo of the house in which I grew up. It was a house that was just built in 1950 and at the time the photo was taken, the street in front was still dirt! There was just a field north of that house and now it has many houses. That address was 1080 Bowdoin. Do you know where that is located? Type that address in on Lyfmap and then you will know!

Did you notice that I didn’t mention the cost? That’s because there is no cost to you. Let’s preserve our memories, family history, and photographs.

www.lyfmap.com

Time for the SCGS Genealogy Jamboree

Paula Stuart-Warren  Conferences, Conferences/Institutes, Jamboree  Leave a comment

On June 1, I am off to Burbank, California for the Southern California Genealogical Society’s annual event known as Jamboree. Are you going? The great SCGS volunteers will still take your Jamboree registration “at the door.” For details: http://genealogyjamboree.com/.

If you aren’t able to attend, be sure to check out which sessions are live-streamed for free, courtesy of Ancestry.com.

From the Jamboree blog, this is information on the recordings of some presentations for those having trouble deciding which sessions to attend:

Jamboree 2016: Mastering the Art of Being in 2 Places at Once

What do you do when faced with the overwhelming possibility that at any one given hour at Jamboree, there is not just one, but rather two or more sessions and speakers you want to hear?

How do you decide?
The answer is really quite simple: Conference Resources will be on hand at Jamboree providing audio and video recording of many of the Jamboree sessions.
Take advantage of the wealth of opportunity! When planning your schedule, look at the Pink Sheets to find if the sessions you want are going to be audio or video recorded. The info will be in the lower right side of the session box.
You can actually pre-order and save 10% before the conference. That way, the recordings will be ready for pick up at Jamboree or shipped to your home after the conference.

(more…)

Native American remains returned to tribes

Paula Stuart-Warren  Native American  Leave a comment

That title above was painful to write. We are talking about the remains of a human being, someone’s ancestor or that ancestor’s sibling.

“Human remains excavated from Native American burial sites in Kansas soon will be returned to two tribes by the Kansas State Historical Society.”

That newspaper headline makes me smile because of the repatriation, but not a big smile because it involves human remains. It’s not the only historical society in possession of Native American remains. Many are being reclaimed by tribes; unfortunately in some cases it hasn’t been easy. Resistance still exists. Tribes, Archeologists, anthropologists, historians, and others are fully involved and aware of a variety of issues across the U.S. and in other places, too.

I know times have changed for the most part. Still some scavengers search for Native American remains and artifacts. It’s generally against the law to possess these. In my mind, it’s also unethical to even do the searching unless authorized by a tribe. Remains are sometimes discovered in an excavation or other building activity  but experts are usually called upon. The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) is a 1990 federal law.

In this Kansas case, the remains were donated to the KSHS. That’s another awful sentence to write and I am not placing any modern blame on anyone. An article in the Topeka Capital-Journal tells that “In 1881, the remains of at least two deceased people were donated to the KSHS by William Griffing, a private collector, after being dug out of the ground in Pottawatomie County.” It has been determined that the remains are probably from the Kaw Nation, of Oklahoma, and Kickapoo Tribe, of northern Kansas.

Check out the full article in the online Topeka Capital-Journal.

Additional reading (and this is only a small sample of articles.) (more…)

1853 San Francisco “official” marriage record survives for Dubois & Marfing

Paula Stuart-Warren  Civil War, fold3.com  7 Comments

Years ago my one and only niece (thus my favorite niece) asked me to work on her family genealogy. We both have had many real life interruptions that slowed the progress but I still dabble on it here and there.

One of the special discoveries is that two “official” transcripts of a 1853 marriage record exists for her great great great grandparents. Why are these special? On 18 April 1906 the historic earthquake struck the San Francisco area. People died and otherss were injured, homes and business were destroyed and damaged, and the courthouse  destroyed along with the bulk of the records. Yes, there are alternative resources for some items but my excitement at finding this marriage record was strong.

One of the record sets that Fold3 has digitized from the U.S. National Archives is the Civil War “Navy Widows’ Certificates.” I knew her Great Great Grandfather Theodore Bailey DuBois (1826-1874) was a ship captain in his civilian life and also served in the Navy during the Civil War. Both T. B. and his soon-to-be wife were Brooklyn, New York residents.

I had seen mentions of a 1850s San Francisco marriage for them but never with any documentation. I could imagine this captain sailing around to San Francisco, but what was the bride, Elizabeth Theresa Marfing (1833-1894), doing there? I am still working on that last question.

The Navy widows pensions on Fold3 included that for Elizabeth T. DuBois, widow of Theodore B. DuBois. I will tell more about their full story in a future post, but this pension tells much about them, his service, his injury and subsequent trauma, some about their children, and much about Elizabeth’s own Marfing and Post families. It’s a gem. 165 page filled with details.

For the widow to petition for a pension, she had to prove marriage to the service person. Her trail to get a pension is long and includes not one, but two handwritten documents complete with official seal, stating in part:

I, John Satterlee Judge of the Superior Court hereby certify that on the 8th day of October 1853 I did join in marriage Theodore B. DuBois and Elizabeth Theresa Marfing in the City of San Francisco California.”

Navy Widows' Certificates, #2994, page 34. https://www.fold3.com/image/27633933/?terms=theo*%20dubois
Navy Widows’ Certificates, #2994, page 34.
https://www.fold3.com/image/27633933/?terms=theo*%20dubois

Fold3.com is full of other gems and the series of widows’ pension for other service in the Civil War is ongoing.

One great place to learn more about what does and does not exist for pre-earthquake San Francisco is San Francisco Genealogy.

Celtic Roots? This is the summer conference for you!

Paula Stuart-Warren  Conferences, Conferences/Institutes, Ireland, Irish Genealogical Society, Irish Research, Scotland  Leave a comment

The clock is ticking! The Celtic Connections Conference ’16, August 5-6 in Minneapolis, is less than three months away, and you have less than a couple weeks to get the discounted registration fee of $150 for both conference days. This low rate is available only until May 31, so it’s time to get serious about attending this unique Midwest event! Minneapolis, the City of Lakes, lush green summertime, air conditioned meeting rooms, maybe a trip to the Mall of America or Como Park and Zoo in Saint Paul, and the company of hundreds of fellow family historians. Ready?

In 2014 IGSI (Irish Genealogical Society International) and TIARA (The Irish Ancestral Research Association) brought family historians the sold-out Celtic Connections Conference in Waltham, Massachusetts. This year’s Celtic Connections Conference “Celtic Roots across America,” comes to you by the same co-hosts and promises another successful offering combining genealogy, history, music, and literature.

The August 5-6 conference features internationally-known genealogists from Ireland and Scotland: Brian Donovan, Dr. Bruce Durie, John Grenham, Brian Mitchell, and William Roulston, along with nine other family history experts from around the U.S. Brian Mitchell, widely recognized for his genealogical expertise in North-West Ireland, leads off Friday’s sessions with a discussion of Irish place names. The Friday program continues with twelve hour-long sessions on topics aimed at beginning, intermediate, and advanced family history researchers, and concludes with an evening banquet featuring Irish-born entrepreneur Kieran Folliard. A bagpiper, a harpist and Celtic fiddlers will entertain at conference events. Saturday’s program continues with eleven hour-long sessions; an author luncheon featuring Erin Hart, well-known author of Irish mysteries; and a closing session on Irish records with distinguished genealogist and author, John Grenham.

Come a day early and experience a guided bus tour of scenic and historic areas of the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul.

“Celtic Roots across America,” takes place at the DoubleTree by Hilton, Minneapolis Park Place, St. Louis Park, Minnesota, just outside Minneapolis. Specially-priced lodging for conference-goers is available at the conference hotel. Complete conference details, including the program brochure, hotel reservation information, and online registration, are available at http://celtic-connections.org/.