Member of ISOGG
Archive for February, 2011
News from around the web.
Go to Source
—
RootsTech, a family history and technology conference organized by FamilySearch,
starts Thursday in Salt Lake City. If you can’t make it to RootsTech in person, you’re
in luck — eight of the sessions will be broadcast free online.
The digital sessions include some of the keynote speakers and a sampling of technology
and family history presentations. The available sessions are:
Thursday, Feb. 10:
-
8:30-9:00 a.m (MST): A world of Information, presented by Shane Robison, chief technology
officer of Hewlett Packard -
9:00-9:30 a.m. (MST): Turning Roots, Branches, Trees into Nodes, Links, Graphs, presented
Jay L. Verkler, chief executive officer of FamilySearch International -
3:00-4:00 p.m. (MST): Digitally Preserving Your Family Heritage, presented by Barry
Ewell, founder of MyGenShare.com
Friday, Feb. 11:
-
8:30-9:30 a.m. (MST): The Changing Face of Genealogy, presented by Curt Witcher, manager
of the Historical Genealogy Department of Allen County Public Library -
9:45-10:45 a.m. (MST): Cloud Computing: What is it and How it has Been Used to Create
the Next FamilySearch.org, presented by Brian Pugh, senior engineer at FamilySearch
International
Saturday, Feb. 12:
-
8:30-9:30 a.m. (MST): Personal Archiving and Primary Documents, presented by Brewster
Kahle, founder of the Internet Archives -
1:45-2:45 p.m. (MST): Virtual Presentations Round Table and Collaborative Panel Discussion,
presented by Thomas MacEntee, professional genealogist and technology specialist -
3:00-4:00 p.m. (MST): The Power of PDF: Tools for Every Genealogist, presented by
D. Josh Taylor, director of Education and Programs at New England Historical Genealogical
Society.
Interested viewers can watch the live presentations at RootsTech.org.
Our very own Lisa Louise Cook will be at RootsTech. Check back here for her updates
from the weekend.
News from around the web.
Go to Source
—
Family Tree University‘s next session
commences Feb. 14. That means there’s only a few days left to register for the Finding
Your African-American Ancestors in Newspapers course for $24.99—75 percent off the
regular price of $99.99.
This deep discount is made possible through a partnership with GenealogyBank, a subscription
website with one of the largest online collections of historical African-American
newspapers, for Black
History Month.
The Finding Your African-American Ancestors in Newspapers course will equip students
with key background information for newspaper research, expose myths pertaining to
the use of white newspapers, give students the skill and confidence to seek out and
utilize African-American newspapers, and provide invaluable tips and strategies designed
to optimize search success.
Sign
up for the class on Family Tree University’s website.
News from around the web.
Go to Source
—
The National Library of Finland has launched
Digitalkoot (digital volunteers), an online crowdsourcing project to digitize the
nation’s historical records.
“We have millions and millions of pages of historically and culturally valuable magazines,
newspapers and journals online. The challenge is that the optical character recognition
often contains errors and omissions, which hamper for example searches,” said Kai
Ekholm, director of the National Library of Finland. “Manual correction is needed
to weed out these mistakes so that the texts become machine readable, enabling scholars
and archivists to search the material for the information they need.”
The program currently consists of two online games developed by Microtask. In Mole
Hunt (Myyräjahti), the player is shown two different words, and he must determine
as quickly as possible if the words are the same. This uncovers erroneous words in
archived material. In Mole Bridge (Myyräsilta), players have to correctly spell the
words appearing on the screen. Correct answers help beavers build a bridge across
a river.
The online gaming experience enables anyone to contribute to the conversion portions
of Finnish cultural heritage into a lasting format. The aim is to crowdsource thousands
of volunteers to participate online utilizing modern technology developed in Finland.
“In the Digitalkoot program, participants can do as much, or as little, work they
want, where they want and when they want.” says Harri Holopainen, Microtask managing
director. “We help turn routine work into fun, almost a parlor game.”
News from around the web.
Go to Source
—
Exploring ancestry can be a difficult experience, especially if the researcher’s family history is riddled with hardships and pain. Actress and comedian Rosie O’Donnell’s genealogical journey on season two of NBC’s “Who Do You Think You Are?” is no exception.
Her mother died of breast cancer when O’Donnell was still a child. After her death,
the family never really spoke of her mother again, resulting in emotional pain and
disharmony between O’Donnell’s siblings. This led O’Donnell to focus on her mother’s
side of the family while filming “WDYTYA?” because she didn’t know much about them.
She enlisted her brother Ed, the one sibling with whom O’Donnell is in contact, to
help search for her family history. The experience of “WDYTYA?” was not only therapeutic
and healed their relationship, but also gave her insight into her own life. “It definitely
changed the view of my own history, my own childhood, and it also helped explain to
my children where their grandmother was from and what she was about,” O’Donnell said.
“They have never met her, because she died when I was 10, and they often ask questions
about her. It was nice to be able to fill in some of those blanks.”
The information found in records about her mother is somewhat limited. O’Donnell really
wants to know more about her adult life, so she is working with playwright Dick Scanlan
to produce a one woman show about her. To find out more about her, Scanlan tracked
down a few of O’Donnell’s mother’s friends and her classmates at Katharine Gibbs Secretarial
School. “I’ve been able to sit down and talk with some of them and that’s been really
interesting see my mother through adult eyes as opposed to a child’s eyes,” O’Donnell
said.
With the aid of professional genealogists, O’Donnell utilized photographs, work records,
censuses, baptismal certificates and newspaper articles in her research. “It was a
pretty intensive research project, and I was very impressed with the staff [at Ancestry.com]
and what they were able to find—things that I couldn’t believe that they found,” O’Donnell
said. “It was pretty intense and pretty surprising for me to know that many details
still exist.”
On the show, O’Donnell was also able to explore her Irish heritage. She compared her
Irish ancestors living conditions to that of Frank McCourt’s in his memoir Angela’s
Ashes. The extreme poverty and hardships endured by her family shocked O’Donnell,
changing the view of her own history and completely reframing her life.
“I didn’t know the history of my family and the struggles that brought them to the
United States and what they had to endure,” O’Donnell said. “You take your own reality
and put the frame around it as the most difficult thing that anyone can survive, when
you come to find out that your life is pretty blessed comparatively.”
O’Donnell’s episode of “WDYTYA” airs Feb. 18, at 8 p.m. EST on NBC. Check the Genealogy
Insider blog for a brief recap of each episode, and post a comment to be entered to
win in our Discover
Who You Are Sweepstakes!
News from around the web.
Go to Source
—
We’re celebrating the return of NBC’s “Who
Do You Think You Are?” with a giveaway. While celebrities explore their genealogy
on the show, we want to give you the opportunity to explore your own genealogical
history with our Discover
Who You Are Sweepstakes!
Each week in February we will announce a lucky winner on our Facebook
fan page and the Genealogy Insider blog. Our first winner:
So what’s the prize? Four lucky winners will get Discover
Your Roots Kits, which include a bookazine for genealogy beginners, a Family Tree
University course, a subscription to Family Tree Magazine, our State Research
Guides CD and the Family Tree Pocket Reference eBook—a $205 value!
You can enter each week in February, by doing one or both of the following things:
-
Comment here on the blog during “WDYTYA.” You could write about a technique or resource
you learned about from the show, or (if you missed the show) something you’re looking
forward to learning about your own genealogy. -
“Like” Family
Tree Magazine on Facebook, and comment on or “like” our statuses about “WDYTYA.”
We’ll pick a winner each Monday and post their name here and on Facebook.
This contest will run until Feb. 27, 2011. Official
rules can be found here.
Surname Forum Activity
———————-
Samuel MANLY/MANLEY born c1828 VA, married Vira, born North Carolina – lived in Rochester, Butler Co. Kentucky 1860/70 with children – Richard, Philip, William, Sarah, Jennie, Jesse, Samuel, Wesley, Olive & Allie.
Who were Samuel’s parents? Trying to determine if he was brother of Caroline (Manley) Bishop of Fluvanna Co. VA
Go to Source
Surname Forum Activity
———————-
I have found Flavel Manley in both the 1790 Federal Census
and the 1800 Federal Census. He was in Sandisfield,
Berkshire,MA in both Censuses, in case anyone is interested
in knowing.
Go to Source
Surname Forum Activity
———————-
mary aka sadie was my grandmother. what information on her
Go to Source
News from around the web.
Go to Source
—
Mark your calendar, pop your corn, grab a notebook and keep a box of tissues handy — Who Do You Think You Are? returns for its second season this Friday, February 4 on NBC (8/7c). And we couldn’t be more excited.
This season, eight of your favorite stars trace their family roots through the centuries. They’ll solve family mysteries, make discoveries, connect with family lines they’ve never known before. One finds a family of trailblazers who stood firm against social opposition to gain freedom for all; another uncovers his own family’s rags-to-riches real estate tale with ties to America’s founding fathers. And the list of discoveries goes on and on. Ancestry.com is a sponsor of the show — be sure to watch a preview to learn more about what’s in store at www.nbc.com/who-do-you-think-you-are.
Plus, to sweeten the deal, Ancestry.com is offering you a chance to win your own family history dream prize in The Ultimate Family History Journey Sweepstakes. Grand prize includes $20,000 in travel expenses plus assistance from researchers, Ancestry.com World Deluxe subscriptions for you and up to five of your relatives and more.
You’ll find all of the details on the sweepstakes at www.ancestry.com/sweeps. Bookmark the page: you can enter daily through April 8, 2011. And remember to follow us on Facebook, where you can connect with other family history researchers, talk about the show, share your own stories and get all sorts of other updates from Ancestry.com.
News from around the web.
Go to Source
—
Family history is a great way to connect with your past. And Family Tree Maker can help you illustrate your family story and share it with friends and family members. Join us on Wednesday, February 16th at 8:00 pm (Eastern Standard Time) for a free webinar that focuses on creating charts, reports, and slide shows. You’ll learn how to design and print charts, run effective reports, discover what print functions are on each workspace, create individual and family slide shows, and more. To attend the Family Tree Maker 2011 Charts and Reports webinar, click here to register.
If you have questions you’d like answered, please enter them in the Comments section below. We’ll try to respond to them during the webinar or on the blog. (Please limit your questions to functionality available in Family Tree Maker 2011.) We appreciate your questions and look forward to talking to you soon. Thanks!
Have you missed past webinars? You can view them any time at FamilyTreeMaker.com.