MGC Annual Seminar

The Massachusetts Genealogy Council (MGC) held their Annual Seminar this past Saturday in Mansfield, Massachusetts.  As usual, there was a great crowd of genealogists from all over New England and a few "foreigners" from New York who I ran into.  As members of the New England Chapter of the Association of Professional Genealogists (NEAPG),  Kate Lowrie and I attended representing NEAPG as a Gold Sponsor.  I also moderated a discussion group at lunch.  My topic was learning interview techniques to build family history "right from the horse's mouth" so to speak!

The day consisted of a number of presentations from some highly respected genealogists.  It's too bad we all couldn't attend every session.  Although it was my responsibility to greet people and answer their questions about NEAPG, I snuck into 4 of the presentations right around the corner from our booth.  I listened to Walter Hickey twice.  He spoke about immigration and naturalization from a very informed view. He had a career at NARA, the National Archives and Records Administration, and could give us some interesting tips on getting to the right sources quickly.  Later in the day, his presentation concerned census records.  While I'm pretty knowledgeable myself in that area, he brought up some good ideas.  Julie Michutka instructed us with her expertise in my next favorite software application, Scrivener.  And finally, I always like to hear Morehead's DNA presentations.  She had a very interesting analogy on distinguishing the role of Y-DNA versus mtDNA by comparing it to a space shuttle! The rockets represent the energy of the mtDNA driving the rest of the cell towards its goal of fertilization while the shuttle itself represents the Y and all the other autosomal elements.  That's a really short version of her explanation!

Between Kate and myself, we talked with dozens of people who, we hope, will consider joining NEAPG! We were definitely a busy group!



Here's a shot up the lobby in between sessions.

It was a long day for me.  I left Chicopee at 5:15 in the morning, got to the hotel to set up around 7.  Non-stop until it was time to go home around 4:30.  

I always appreciate the opportunity to "blend in" with my fellow genealogists.  Always something to learn, to share, and to experience.  Other than local events and meeting, the next "big one" is the New England Regional Genealogical Consortium's conference in Providence, RI affectionately referred to as NERGC or "NERK".  That's in April of 2015.  And the big news for me is that I'll be one of the speakers!  

Speaking of speaking, I need to start getting ready!  It'll be April before you know it!  See you there!

Related articles

• NERGC Conference, 15-19 April 2015, Providence, RI
• Join! Genealogy Tip of the Day
• Man traces ancestry, uses genealogy tests
• "Family History and DNA: Genetic Genealogy in 2013" Conference to be Streamed on the Internet
• "...with special guest, Dave Robison"
• Genealogists hope to knock down brick walls at open research meeting

Create Your Health Pedigree Here!

Here's a link to a post by Polly FitzGerald Kimmit of the Massachusetts Genealogical Council, among many other professional genealogical organizations.  You'll have to click "Continue Reading" to get to the active link, but I believe it will be worthwhile.  The title/link is Create Your Health Pedigree Here!

Rather than me repeating everything you'll read in the document, please take a look.  You'll be able to download your own document to fill in for your own use.  I noticed, though, that the instructions say to click on the document to download the chart.  But I found that it was necessary to click the link that's in the document for that to happen.

Here's a little more about Polly:

Polly FitzGerald Kimmitt is a Board-certified genealogist specializing in Massachusetts research. She has been taking clients for sixteen years and researchers a variety of topics from Mayflower lineages to locating townlands of Irish immigrants. She is a case worker under contract to the US Army on repatriation cases, helping to locate family members of servicemen missing or killed in previous conflicts. She currently serves as a director at Federation of Genealogical Societies (FGS), and editor of the FGS Voice Newsletter, and is past president of MGC. You can visit her blog at "Polly Blog" or her website at Kimmit Genealogical Research.

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Entrance to Old Ship Church, Hingham, Massachusetts (Photo credit: Wikipedia) Hingham, MA is the colonial home of the first Lincoln Family in the US, progenitors of President Abraham Lincoln.[/caption]

Related articles

• Stemma (thing) (everything2.com)


• The First Episode of Genealogy Roadshow (eogn.com)


• Webfinder : Genealogy Resources (southplainfieldlibrary.wordpress.com)


• Renowned 'Genome Hacker' Constructs The World's Biggest Family Tree (traxarmstrong.com)


• Nature (nature.com)


• Maureen Taylor, Genealogist and Historic Photograph Expert (oldbonessearch.com)


• War of 1812 Pension Digitization Fund Receives Generous $250,000 Donation from FamilySearch (eogn.com)


• Did Stephen King's ancestor suffer 'death by canoe oar!'? (bangordailynews.com)

Massachusetts Genealogical Council

"The Massachusetts Genealogical Council (MGC) is an umbrella organization representing genealogists, historical researchers, and all those concerned about records preservation and open access to public records."

Karen and I participated in the annual meeting of the MGC yesterday, Saturday, July 20, 2013. We actually had a pretty good time with the help of VERY effective air conditioning at the Hogan Center on the campus of the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass. The featured speaker was a nationally known lawyer/genealogist, Judy G. Russell, CG, CGL owner of "The Legal Genealogist". You can find her at The Legal Genealogist

Judy presented 3 programs through the course of the day. She's far from boring! Intelligent and very knowledgeable in the field of genealogy, the first program was "Breaking Through the 20th Century Brick Wall---Building a Family Through Circumstantial Evidence." Great stuff! She pointed out a number of time saving strategies that could help just about anyone who has hit their genealogical "brick wall."

Second, she presented How Knowing the Law Makes Us Better Genealogists." She strongly advises checking the laws in the state in which you're researching. For example, based on her experience in one particular town clerk's office, she brought copies of the legislation that allowed public access. The town clerk stated emphatically, "You can't see that. It's the law." She immediately pulled out "the law" and asked to be shown which part of "the law" prevented her from doing her research. It took about a half hour of the clerk and her staff studying Judy's copies, but she ultimately prevailed.

Finally, she presented "No Person Shall...Gallop Horses in the Streets: Using Court Records to Tell the Story of Our Ancestor's Lives." Among all the information she provided, here's a bit of interesting data: So, you think that checking the voter's list in the early 1800's Virginia for a female ancestor is a waste of time? Believe it or not, sometime between 1805 and 1807, the Virginia legislature allowed it!! It wasn't long before they legislated against it, but it happened.

We also heard from Kimberly Toney representing the American Antiquarian Society in Worcester. They are the repository foor an amazing amount of early American history in the form of millions of documents, books, leaflets and loose paper from "first contact" to about 1876. Worth a look!

Great program, great venue (it was actually TOO cold!!) and great to see a number of people that I usually only communicate with in blogs, webinars and other internet venues.

We took the scenic drive home and stopped at the "Steaming Tender" in Palmer, Mass for dinner. All in all, a long but productive day.