Thanks To My Big Genealogy Family!

Genealogy is about growing our families, which is something that I have always believed in. This is evidenced by the number of children I have collected over the years and by the number of siblings I now count, which is a staggering accomplishment considering that I am an only child. So today, I really have to thank my genealogy “brothers,” Thomas MacEntee and Randy Seaver, for helping me with what has quickly become my now, not-so-secret blog. To that, I have to thank my team of cheerleaders, for keeping me going when nobody could find my blog. I also want to thank my reader, John Sparrow, for suggesting that I provide a “Follow by Email” button to my page. It is now there, all shiny and new. 

Almost everything that I supposedly learned (or should have learned) in kindergarten is practiced my fellow genealogy bloggers. They play nice, help lunatics like me, and are far more likely to laugh with me than at me - which takes serious inner strength, let me tell you. Most of all, I like them back. So, do something nice for yourself and go to Geneabloggers at http://geneabloggers.com/ to check out all of the blogs written by these incredibly wonderful people. Can you believe that they even gave me a plug today? Really awesome people. You won’t be disappointed.

Now back to the World Cup and like all genealogists - reading player’s names on the backs of shirts and wondering about their genealogy.. Oh, and watching the matches, too, of course.

Friday’s Funnies: Surname Swear Words

Every family, every ethnic group, has some odd quirks, weird traditions, and strange names. Being Cornish, I am aware of how these things play out, but nothing tops the compilation of surnames that were once used in my beloved Cornwall. These words are today, what my kids grew up calling, “swear words.”

In fact, when my kids were young and I would mutter a Cornish surname of this ilk, they would look at me with that, “uh-oh, Mom’s swearing,” look, a mix between shock and glee, hoping to confirm that Mom had a potty mouth. Even though I would immediately sit them down and explain that, while in today’s society, it is indeed a swear word, it wasn’t always such and that words and phrases chance over time. They faked agreement by nodding and barely camouflaged their glee in hearing Mom swear!

Finally, as they got older, I would slip and swear, and even if it wasn’t a Cornish surname, they would just shake their heads and say, “Yeah, yeah, it’s a Cornish surname,” proving that we managed to put a new spin on ordinary family disfunction.

Disfunction does not seem to have played much of a part in the surnames originally, with the possibly exception of “Bastard” and “Clapp.” Those have origins that seem to quickly paint a picture of exactly how they came about. Crap is still around, Friggin, too and even Buglehole, sometimes written as “Beaglehole” shows up, although they are not as common as they once were. 

I remember reading a will from the 1700s where a Nicholas Cock had died and left many of his worldly goods to daughter, the wife of William Hoare. The will went on to mention her further as “Jennifer Cock Hoare.. For some reason, be it Ellis Island or a lack of a sense of humor, you just don’t see names like that anymore. But next time you’re at a library and you need a good laugh while doing genealogy, look into old Cornish records and you will find it there.

My Big Secret #2

I have another secret. This one is shared by many others in the field of genealogy, although no one openly mentions it. You see, behind the glitz and glamour of genealogy, there is one tawdry secret that we all share at one time or another. This comes as a part of the job and is purely in the pursuit of solving the mystery, finding the proof, and learning the real story. Really. But, in between, the truth is that many of us are.... (dum-de-dum)... Professional Couch Surfers. It is the real story behind the profession.

This shocking revelation has to be tempered by a few facts. We do this not for thrills or even by choice, but rather by necessity. Couch surfing is a means to an end - or at least we hope it is. Believe me, one has to be committed to be willing to surf where we do. At one time or another, one of us is likely sleeping on someone else’s well-worn sofa or, frankly, where Junior used to rest his behind when he played video games. If we’re lucky, Junior has moved out of the basement and thus, we don’t find ourselves sharing the couch with Junior and friends while they hold a World of Warcraft marathon while we try to catch some zzz’s. 

However, we will do what we have to do. We are, after all, committed to our profession and therefore we are willing to endure whatever it takes to get our proof. We also are pragmatic enough to know that obscure documents are not hiding on the internet or widely available in every archive on the planet. These documents are the ones that have yet to be located, and thus, are the ones hiding in small towns, in distant places, and are usually covered in decades of dust. These docs are in the Middle of Nowhere. We have to go to them.

Behind the glossy world of genealogy, the real pros know that many of places that are hiding these treasures are also shockingly lacking in Marriotts, Holiday Inns, and even without a WWII-era motel, but we must forge on anyway, for the sake of our profession. We realize that without couch surfing, we likely would be camping behind a library dumpster (for privacy) in a town of 800 people, piddling in the weeds because the the town is so small that the local convenience store closes up at 7 o’clock in the evening, and with its closing, there goes any hope of latrine privileges. Yet, we persevere because that library and that library alone, might be hiding what amounts to our only hope of locating some long-lost, moldy, old, key-to-the-answer-type of documents that we not only need, but that we dream of uncovering. Being seasoned pros, we also know that the chances of finding a motel that doesn’t double as a truck stop bunkhouse within an hour’s drive are pretty slim. So we look for a friend, or the sister of an ex-boyfriend from our sophomore year of high school, with whom we tolerably got along, or even a former classmate from first grade who by luck, it happens to live in the exact place where we really, really need to spend a couple of days, rooting around in the basement of their library. We all deeply believe in doing whatever we have to do to get our document... And sometimes, if we’re lucky, we have a ninth cousin living there or a Facebook friend who barely knows us but has the correct zip code. We endure beyond-lumpy, frat-house-rejected futons, suspicious-smelling recliners, mothball-filled, fold-away cots that were last used when Reagan was president, just for that chance to get a peek into the place where those documents might be hidden away. 

Road-weary and experienced, we mostly just pray that the indoor plumbing is working when we roll into town and that no one is chasing us with tar and feathers when we depart. It’s what we do to survive, and more importantly, it is what we do to find those illusive records, solve those brick-walled-in mysteries, and what we do to capture the long-lost stories. Yet, when it comes down to the truest truth, when the data is documented and the citations written, what we are always after, are the stories. The stories are what makes it all worthwhile, and in the end, it is always about the stories.

Happy surfing!

(P.S. - And, once in a while, if the planets are all lined up just right, we luck out and we do get to stay in plush quarters visiting some of our best friends...Thanks to M.,T., K., & B. for putting up with me! I love you guys!)

My Big Secret

Genealogy Bloggers Rock!
2014 Blogger's Summit at
Southern California Genealogy Jamboree

I have a big secret - and a mystery, too. Not that kind.... 

However, if you are reading this, you are in on my secret. The mystery is about this secret. You see, while this blog has been around for awhile it seems that very few people know about it and that search engines miss it entirely. Apparently, without a personal invitation, nobody can find it. Sort of depressing, when I think of the work that has gone into it. On the other hand if I ever become a super-celebrity (heaven forbid!) I will know how to hide out on the web. But, back to how I found out that I had this secret...

I learned all of this at the Blogger’s Summit at the Southern California Genealogy Jamboree in Burbank this past week. If I wasn’t so shocked, I would have had the sense to be embarrassed. Lacking sense, I just sputtered, which was not at all attractive, but fortunately, the blogging community  wasn’t alt all snarky about it and welcomed me with open arms. (Perhaps they noticed my very warped sense of humor?) I found my way to Blogger’s Island, a conference table situated in the midst of the action with comfy chairs and libations nearby. Bloggers there gave me all sorts of wonderful advice about blogging and the courage to figure out what is wrong with my blogging. So thanks to bloggers such as Thomas MacEntee, Judy Russell, Elise Doerflinger, J Paul Hawthorne, Kim Cotton, Randy Seaver, Blaine Bettinger, Cindy Ingle, and so many others who hung out with me at Blogger Island, I have been working hard at letting my - our - secret out of the bag. Let the mystery finally be solved! 

Blogger's Island

Since then, I have learned that either I am as obtuse as they come and the Forest Gump of the blogging world, or that any blogger - new or experienced - can be in a similar situation. This is what I learned: first, check your settings. Mine were fine, meaning that I was keeping my secret in far more techie ways that I had the brains to delve into, but that has never stopped me. Of course, this epiphany occurred well after midnight, but I was committed to doing something, so I did a big ol‘ swan dive into the techie part of the blog puddle and learned about getting the word out. It seems that I was lacking a feed, meaning a service to spread the blogging word. I didn’t have one, or at least it didn’t go beyond Google+ anyway, so I looked around to find feeds. At two in the morning, I started looking around  to get myself listed on “feeds” such as FeedBurner and others. The ‘Others” part is what I am still working on... and trying to figure out what I was doing plus what I did at o’dark o’clock in the morning. My memories of it are a bit sketch at this point, but I did do some things correctly. Despite the hour, I somehow figured out that I needed to optimize my blog’s visibility to search engines. This is called “Search Engine Optimization” and sounds intimidating. It is intimidating unless you are or you have a 14-year-old kid around. Unfortunately, I am not 14 and when I was trying to do this for my blog, it was 2:30 in the morning and no 14-year-olds were available to consult. What I did do was left a strong document trail. I copied and pasted every page into a document and bookmarked everything into a separate, new bookmark file that was hard to misunderstand (i.e., “Blog Site Stuff So I Won’t Screw It Up In The Morning”). Now, I am blogging, procrastinating before slogging my way through that batch of bookmarks and an equally confusing scrum of note, all the while hoping someone will come along and explain what I did and what it means and how to get it all fixed so I can do some real genealogy. This may be quite a long process without the aforementioned help, so if there is anyone out there in my currently secret society who can answer my questions, of which there are many, please feel free to make suggestions. In the meantime, if you are reading this secret blog, feel special.

Bennett Greenspan!

Quick update: I am in Bennett Greenspan's session on "The Future of Genetic Genealogy." This is one of the best ever. He has a logical, balanced view of the future, but also aware of the potential pitfalls that might limit our access. Moving to the next session....

Blogger Anxiety

Here I am at the So Cal Genealogy Jamboree Blogger Summit with just a few of the "stars" of genealogical blogging. My blog, this blog doesn't even show up, and granted, I have a lot to learn. Still, sometimes, especially around these pros, I wonder if I am dong something wrong, maybe nobody is out there? Any ideas?

They are also talking about "cousin bait" or using blogs to find cousins. This is a great idea, so let's count cousins reading this and then see what their brick walls happen to be. So, cousins speak up?

In the meantime, I am looking for cousins to connect with from England, Australia, Norway, and the US. More on that shortly, but back to to blogging summit.

Southern California Genealogy Jamboree Continues!

I started this morning in the very best way. Yesterday, hats were off to Blaine Bettinger's thorough but easily understood presentation on DNA, but today, thus far anyway, I am learning in spades from Judy Russell. What a great way to start my day.

Judy is advocating, as we all should be, for all of us to volunteer, join genealogical societies, and to lobby our congresspersons  (I just messaged my local candidate, Nancy Cronk) to support keeping information and records open as well as the "Genealogists'' Bill of Rights." If we do not advocate for our rights, we will lose them.

Currently, It's time for the blogger summit. Later!

DNA Day Live From Beautiful Burbank!

This is a quick post between sessions. I just came from Blaine Bettinger's fabulous session on " Using Autosomal DNA to Explore Your Ancestry." The man is a master. He is interesting, well-informed and quite helpful. Five stars from me! New session starting, got to go...

DNA Day is Tomorrow!

4 June 2014

I am back from my long-planned trip to the other side of the pond and after issues with my electronic devices, they are now all back in working order. This comes just in the nick of time because in less than 10 (ten!) hours I will be at DNA Day, or as it is officially called “Family History and DNA - Genetic Genealogy in 2014” Day, which kicks off the 2014 Southern California Genealogy Jamboree. This first, full day of genetic genealogy is co-sponsored by the Southern California Genealogical Society (SCGS) and the International Society for Genetic Genealogy (ISOGG) and is devoted to educational classes in the field of genetic genealogy. I am so excited that I am worried that I won’t sleep and since I am staying with my almost-should-be-closer-than-close-family in my old hometown of Valencia, I will be jumping on the freeway at the crack of early, joining a few thousand fellow commuters, so I must say good night now. However, check in frequently over the next four days to get updates from my experiences at the Jamboree and updates in the field of genetic genealogy. 

Learning From "The Legal Genealogist" and Update On My "Clock"

My mind is stuffed with ideas after a weekend of learning from the one and only, Legal Genealogist, Judy Russell. Her seminars were far better than I could have dreamed of and the turnout was a testament to Colorado Genealogical Society, their board, and their volunteers. It was seamless. 

Best of all, for me personally I learned so much, yet I also learned that I know so much, all thanks to Judy Russell’s seminars. You see, I’m still “on the clock” and I am entering those days of wondering if I can pull it all off. To wit, I have put “senioritis” into a whole knew dimension. I am just over halfway to my deadline and I know it. Technically, I could pull the whole portfolio together in a week or two at this point, even factoring in that I would lose something and have to stop and look and then find out that the cat was sitting on it the whole time (along with my phone - her favorite). I can do it, have done it, but keep going on, adding and subtracting and throwing this or that over for some thing better, shinier. Watching television for example, for me, has gone by the wayside. That is to say that I mean the kind that you actually sit down and just...watch. For me, what little “watching” I do is done surrounding by books and notes and electronic gadgetry and a minimum of three websites and six documents open on my computer at all times and they are in use through it all. 

That’s the life - or my life - of being on the clock, but it is a magnificent one. Why? What makes it so magnificent?  While working on my portfolio for certification by the Board for Certification of Genealogists (BCG), I have been attending institutes, seminars, tuning in to webinars, devouring journals, and even searching for and buying back issues of them, for particularly useful articles. I have put together a library of reference books that fills shelves and have been reading a stack of heavy, thick books that have to remain at home when I go to seminars, because if I put them in my suitcase, I’d need a second suitcase, and even then they would both still be overweight. If you haven’t figured it out, I have been on the road quite a bit and will be for the rest of the year.

Granted, my education is self-imposed to a certain extent and while the BCG does not mandate such a schedule per se, they encourage continuing education (seminars and institutes) and keeping up via books, journals, videos, online education, and webinars. I am just taking it to the over-achievers’ level of “I need to be absolutely, 100% sure that I am as good as I am supposed to be.” I got lucky last weekend, because the education came to me, here in Denver and it was one of the best seminars I have ever attended.

So thank you, Judy Russell, for helping to make me feel a little bit better about my skills and for teaching me so much more about the things that I needed to learn, or at least those that needed clarification. Please come back and see us in Denver again because I know I’ll need a tune-up and there are many others here who missed your seminar and who really would like to hear you speak. Until then, safe travels.

Confessions About the Clock

I have a confession to make. This blog was created to document my year of being “on the clock,” but somehow along the way, it has become a genealogical potpourri of my experiences, albeit with a genealogical twist. Yet, I have written this blog without discussing the real “work” that goes into my everyday life; the work I do toward my certification. It’s probably my personality showing through - I love to laugh and feel that it is often more important to focus on the joy found in my work than to focus on the work that results in wrinkles furrowed into my brow. However, as I said that I would document my year, it is part of my personal due diligence to chronicle the “work product” that I am involved in on a day-to-day basis. Me, being me, I would rather talk about what I’ve done right rather than whine about what has not gone so well. I try to be an optimist, so that’s what you get here. Maybe I should throw in a piece about the misery once a week and call it “Moaning Monday?” Meh.

When my packet first arrived from the Board for Certification of Genealogists (BCG), I tore through it and almost missed an appointment, just to work on the will that I was given to transcribe. Then, eying the clock (not the one that I am “on,” but the real one on the table) I gathered everything up, put in a labeled binder with page protectors to keep it all together, and dashed out the door, barely making my appointment. Later, I also took each required task (to complete my portfolio) and created a separate file for it. The requirements for each part of my portfolio were on a page of their own, bolded, underlined, and highlighted, to make sure that I went over it, read it extensively, and pulled out the most important parts visually, so that I could periodically re-check it. While doing so, this forced me to notice the most important parts of each requirement. It has worked well so far.

Next, I invested in a library. I researched and found every book on the BCG list. Some were easy to find, while others required real hunting, not unlike a genealogical search to find some old, obscure document. I found that many were available online, for a price that ranged radically from reasonable to “are you out of your mind?” I purchased several through used and rare book services. It wasn’t easy, but I found them and read them. I still read them. 

One of the many resources that I have stumbled over and found to be a real resource for clues (notice that I did not say, or infer, that this means “proof” of any kind) are old, period books, meaning non-fictional accounts, written by contemporaries of those being researched. I make sure that  they are specific to the period that I am researching and the location that I am researching. More than once, just one or two lines in one of these period books has opened up a whole new avenue of investigation for me. They are a wonderful resource for anyone researching in obscure locations or where traditional records are limited.

Finally for today, I have devoted so much time to learning: learning from books; learning from journal articles; and learning by attending seminars and institutes. I schedule time for webinars and to read other genealogist’s blogs. I am grateful for what I learn and still, I am oddly embarrassed, yet bolstered, when I learn how much I already  know. Still, knowledge is always mixed and when I learn what I already know, I always pick up something new, be it through new stories, by hearing about different techniques, or especially, from cautionary tales of mistakes made by others and learning how to avoid making them myself. Genealogists can never afford to be cocky. Excited? Yes. Thrilled over what they can accomplish? Of course; Relieved when they can learn something and can use it successfully? Absolutely. But, never think that you know it all. Always remember that genealogy keeps growing and changing. There are so many new things popping up, that we can never know it all. 

Therein lies genealogy’s beguilement: while there are always more mysteries that one can solve, there will always be many, many more mysteries to be solved.

Happy hunting!

The Legal Genealogist is Coming! The Legal Genealogist is Coming!

I am so excited! You see, just one week from today, on Saturday, the 26th of April 2014, this genealogy geek is going to be in heaven. No, this does not mean that I am returning to the Family History Library in Salt Lake City. That was heaven combined with long hours of hard work. This kind of heaven is about the pure pleasure of enjoying someone else’s hard work. What I am talking about is happening right here in my own backyard, at the Denver Public Library’s Lower Level Conference Center, all thanks to my good, hard-working friends at the Colorado Genealogy Society who are bringing, Judy Russell, a.k.a, the Legal Genealogist, to town! She will be giving not one, but four, presentations at the seminar and I promise that you will regret it, if you don’t attend (unless, of course, you are in need of life-saving medical help during the seminar, which might be a slightly higher priority...maybe). 

If you have not read her blog, you are truly missing one of the best writers and often, one of the funniest people on Earth. You can check out her blog and even subscribe to it at http://www.legalgenealogist.com/. From my genealogy-geek perspective, her citations are just fabulous, too.

It’s been a long time since I have seriously considered camping out for anything, but in this case, I may just do it, to be first in line on Saturday morning. 

You can register for the seminar online. Just go to: http://www.cogensoc.us/cgsseminar.html. You can also print and mail the registration form, but hurry! The clock is ticking!  Kim Rogers is the seminar chair, so contact her and not me. I’ll be getting my camping gear together. Just be nice to Kim as this seminar is a lot of work. Kim’s email is kimrogers@comcast.net and she has all the info.

If, heaven forbid, you cannot make it to the CGS seminar on Saturday (for reasons such as hospitalization in the ICU, being hit by a bus, or similar) on Friday night, Judy Russell is also giving a “free” program at the regular Colorado Genealogical Society meeting entitled, “No Person Shall .. Gallop Horses In the Streets -- Using Court Records to Tell the Story of our Ancestors' Lives.” This program is part of the CGS’ regular meeting, and will be held the evening before the seminar, at 7 pm on Friday, the 25th of April, at Christ the King Lutheran Church, 2300 South Patton Court in Denver. Even if you are not a member, you really should be consider joining if you have even the slightest interest in genealogy, because this is an awesome group. They are an awesome group even when Judy Russell isn’t speaking, but Judy will just put everything over the top next Friday evening. I can’t wait! I may be camping out in front of the church all day Friday, too...I hope the neighbors don’t call the cops on me...

Antique Baby Books, The So Cal Genealogy Jamboree, and Heirloom Roadshow

I have mentioned before that I am going to be attending, and blogging from, the 2014 Southern California Genealogy Jamboree. As part of the festivities, Heirloom Roadshow ( http://genealogyjamboree.blogspot.com/2014/03/jamboree-heirloom-roadshow-wants-you.html ) is coming to this year’s Jamboree and they are looking for heirlooms that need preservation.

So far, I have submitted something that I find both fascinating and unusual: my father’s baby book from 1918. Despite having spent years in the antique biz and even more years in genealogy, I have never seen ,or even heard of a baby book from that era. I had no idea that such things existed 95 years ago. In fact, I thought that baby books came about in the post-WWII era.


Thus, I wrote and told the nice people at Heirloom Roadshow a bit about the book and sent photos showing both the uniqueness of the book and the challenges that I face in preserving it. I was limited to a mere 3 photos maximum, but here I am posting several more to show you what an amazing little gem this is, and also so that you can see the condition that it is in at the moment.

It is a somewhat, mass-produced book with a brown suede cover, entitled, “The Baby’s Record of Mental and Physical Growth,” by Bonnibel Butler. Inside, on the title page, the title is expanded to read, “The Baby’s Record of Mental and Physical Growth, and His Horoscope.” It was published by M.A. Donohue & Company, Chicago.

Dad's Capricorn Horoscope

Horoscopes for babies in the WWI era? Who knew?

My father, and his parents, were given this book as a baby gift when he was born, as a baby gift from Dad’s mother’s sister, his Aunt Helga, who was a nurse. There is a picture of Aunt Helga in her nurse’s uniform, holding my 11-month-old father, outside a hospital in El Paso, Texas, in 1919. It is glued into the book, of course. The paper behind it is degrading. This is a challenge, but I digress.

Dad with his Aunt Helga, Nov. 1919

You see, my father was born on the 22nd of December, 1918, in Fertile Township, North Dakota. We (meaning my husband and I, plus our children) knew nothing about this book until shortly before my father died. Dad told us, before he died, that he had always had it with him, but I had known nothing of it. He told me little else and as an only child, there is really no one else to ask. No matter as this book gives an amazing view of his early life.  It gives glimpses, sometimes shocking, sometimes surprising, but always interesting, into his childhood, into the culture of those times, and into his family’s unusually well-traveled life. It is filled with photos, reflections, and perspectives on a time that has not been chronicled, especially from a baby’s daily perspective. It is filled with stories and quotes and many, many pictures, in varying states of decay.


There is also a silhouette that is lovely, but glued solidly into the book surrounded tightly by photos. The pages that were not used as heavily, such as baby’s horoscope, are in decent condition but the entire book needs to be stabilized and restored. Throughout the book are wonderful stories and hand-written notes. The ink has smeared in places, too.

Even though it is not quite 100 years old, it is quite a snapshot into who my father was as a child and how the people around him lived. There are many photos of the times that depict the culture and family relationships. There are photos of my father with his cousin, Gordon, playing”Indians” in matching outfits that their grandfather had bought for them. Other vignettes show that one of the most popular activities for children of the time was to throw “fake weddings” and there are several photos of these. There are also photos of my father’s young life on a massive cattle ranch in Cuba during the 1920s and early 1930s.

"Fake" Weddings

Dad and his cousin,
Gordan, playing "Indians"

Pics from Dad's life in Cuba

This baby book has traveled from North Dakota to Cuba, to Kansas City, and back to Cuba, where it spent many years, to Miami in the 1930s. In the 1940s, it moved to Montana, and various states in the Pacific Northwest before moving to Illinois where it settled in for a few decades. In 1988, the book returned to Florida again, where it remained until 2012, when it moved, again with my father, to Colorado. Since my father’s death in November 2013, it now resides with me. I hope to take it to the Jamboree in June to get this treasure the help that it needs. Keep your fingers crossed in hoping that Heirloom Roadshow will see that this book is special enough to warrant their attention.

So enjoy the pictures and I will keep you updated on the progress with Heirloom Roadshow.

Taking On Research at The Family History Library in SLC

Just a half a block from my hotel and part of my
daily walk to the Family History Library in Salt Lake City.

Blogs are wonderful, but they take time. Thus, my silence last week while I immersed myself in work at the Salt Lake City Family History Library. Truthfully, I was there every minute that they’d allow me to be there. That added up to between eight and thirteen hours a day. On four out of six days, I was there for thirteen straight hours. You can imagine what my meals looked like. Worse, you can imagine what I looked like. On second thought skip that last thought altogether and focus on making the trip yourself.

Despite my appearance, going there was so worth it, and yet, I really needed an extra week to gather what I needed. Or, so it seems on the morning after my return. There is so much available, but you can lose valuable hours, unless you know what you are looking for and how to find it.

The beginning of my daily walk back to my hotel.

So here are a few tips that I have learned:

1). Allow days, not hours, to research. I was there for six days, but I truly needed more time. There is so much material and, in my case, as it had been a few years since I had been there, I had to find my way, as things have been moved around. I spent every minute working, but as with everything, there are unforeseeable delays, and it is hard to predict how much time those delays will cost you.

2). The Family History Library is not a Walmart. It is not open 24-hours-a-day. Currently, it is open 8-5 on Mondays, from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. from Tuesday through Friday, and from 9 am to 5 pm on Saturdays. It is closed on Sundays, and also closed for certain church functions, so be sure to check ahead. 

3). Have a good, but flexible, research plan. You will need it to know what you want to get, which brings me to my second point, figuring out where to find it. Family Search has an online catalogue that will give you call numbers and film numbers. Find it here: https://familysearch.org/catalog-search. It will also tell you if the items desired are available at the SLC library or if they must be ordered from the Granite Mountain Vault, which is undergoing renovations, and thus, may  require extra time to deliver it to the main library. Knowing these things ahead of time  and preparing will save you many hours.      

An average LDS garden on my daily walk.

4). Go with a group whenever possible. You will save money on group rates at hotels and there is sanity in numbers. They bring up subjects like, “Have you eaten today?” which can be something easily forgotten when enthralled by all that lovely information.

5). Stay close to the Family History Library. This will save you time, allowing you to get there quickly and leave late. I can only vouch for the hotel where we stayed, “The Carlton Hotel,” but it was an easy, stunning walk from the library (see pics of my walk on this page). It was also reasonable, comfortable, and they had great breakfasts included. If you choose not to walk, Larry will drive you in the van, and was funny, kind, and very helpful. The walk from the Carlton Hotel to the library was historic and the gardens were stunning. The newly built City Creek Shopping area also provided entertainment, which was important for someone who, while there, learned the specific gender of an upcoming addition to the family. A quick trip to Nordstrom’s (less than a block from the Family History Library) was needed to celebrate the news.      

More gardens along South Temple
 (the street that I walked down).

6). Be prepared. Bring a laptop and a laptop lock for it, in case you have to leave it for any length of time. Dress comfortably and in layers. The weather can change quickly. 

I was fortunate as my group held lunch meetings to prepare us for the trip. It was so helpful. If you are going with a group, suggest that everyone meet and discuss the plan for the trip. It gave me ideas and saved me lots of confusion.

Some things that I used most:

• My 64-gigabyte flash drive. I filled 63.18 gigabytes. I wished that I had a second one and think it would have been a good idea. You can save documents directly from the copier or computer to a flash drive, cutting the need to haul a suitcase full of paper back home at the end of your trip.
• My flatbed scanner. I spent approximately $80 for a a small, lightweight, flatbed scanner that ran off power from my Macbook, and also sent scans directly to my laptop for storage. It fit in my roll-aboard case and weighed about 2 pounds. It’s very quiet and quickly scanned everything I needed. Best of all, whenever there was a long line for a copier, I could quickly pull out my scanner and be done long before iI would have reached the head of the line to photocopy. Just make sure that you have enough room on you computer’s hard drive to do this, by cleaning out extraneous files before you go to Salt Lake City. 
• Water Bottles. Salt Lake City is a dry climate and it is easy to become dehydrated. You cannot have food anywhere in the library except for a relatively small lunchroom, but water bottles with a screw-on cap are allowed on the library floor.
• My laptop. Despite the availability of church-owed computers, when you crawl back to your hotel, you need a laptop. 
• Personal WIFI. Originally, I got mine from Verizon (called a “MiFi” at Verizon) for entirely different reasons, but I have learned of its value ever since. With it, I can have secure, personal internet access anywhere, which is wonderful if you are away from home for any length of time and spending time in public places such as hotels, conferences, or libraries.
• Little binder clips. Scrap paper and pencils are available everywhere for quick notes, but it was the small binder clips that kept me from flinging them all over the place.
• A roll-aboard bag to keep everything together and organized. I used the freebie bags that come with make-up “specials” to hold cords in my bag for easy identification.
• Flexible hair ties. I use them for everything from wrapping up cords to keeping small items like protein bars from getting loose. Ditto for zippered plastic bags.
• A lightweight, flexible (not the rigid type) 1/2-inch to 1-inch binder with empty, plastic page protector sleeves to place photocopies in once you have made the copies. This will protect them until you can get back to the hotel and file them for taking home. 
• Small, reusable grocery bags that can be stuffed into a tiny bag or ball.wonderful for putting film boxes in to transport to the microfilms machines or to drop photocopies into before you place them in the binder.
• Labels with your cell phone number. Use these to label anything that you brought and might accidentally leave behind, from flash drives to your cell phone. 

After you return home, consider organizing your data right away. It will help remind you of what you have found and will also help you to keep track of it, before the memory fades. As always, make sure that you have good citations for all of it as you may want to use it in the distant future, as well as today.

The main homestead and its
amazing "Beehive Gardens."

Going Back to My Southern California Genealogical Society Jamboree Roots!

I am so excited and proud to announce that in June, I will be going back to where my genealogy journey began, nearly two decades ago, with the Southern California Genealogy Society (SCGS). Back then, their little Jamboree was in its infancy, but today it is a three-day long extravaganza with an additional day added on the front end dedicated solely to genetic genealogy. Yes, that sound is me, swooning.

I sometimes think that I am the luckiest girl in the genealogy world. You see, back in the mid-1990’s I had no idea that the place that I started my genealogy journey, the Southern California Genealogical Society’s Genealogy Library, in Burbank, California, was one of the best place in the world to begin. I was taught and nurtured by the most knowledgeable, caring, and insightful people that one could ever imagine. I can look back now and see that I was getting the equivalent of an Ivy-League, Genealogical Education. My teachers were the SCGS members and volunteers, who took me under their wings and taught me much of what I know today. I would not be the genealogist that I am now if I had not been “tutored” by everyone at SCGS for so many of my early years! 

So, today I am proud to announce that I am going “home” again.  Not only will I be going back to my genealogical “home,” at the SCGS Library, but that I will also be blogging to you from the 2014 Southern California Genealogy Society’s Genealogy Jamboree! Of course, between now and early June, I will be bringing you regular updates about the Jamboree in addition to my blog, just in case you might want head for Burbank, to join in the fun. And let me tell you, these people know how to have fun! After all, it is Southern California ( and Sheryl Crowe’s rendition of “All I Want To Do is Have Some Fun” is running through my mind as I write this...). The link is right here: www.genealogyjamboree.com

Forensic Genealogy and Posting a Blog with My Mind

It’s really too bad that I cannot blog directly from my mind, since this typing business takes up time. That’s just how busy I am and each day gets busier. I am learning so many new things, doing so many new things, and meeting so many interesting people that I couldn’t be happier...except for the fact that I still have to find time to do laundry, to sleep, and o do all those other time-consuming things that take away from my genealogy work. Thus, to me, just thinking mentally, “Post Blog” and it would be written and posted sounds awesome. Realistically, the typos alone would get me into oceans of trouble, so I am better off typing away on my computer.

So what have I been doing that’s kept me busy enough to dream of mental word-processing? Well, today, I updated the Birk & Bond Research website (www.birkandbond.com) and among the many other, boring tasks that websites require, I also created a link to this blog from the website. So if you can’t remember this blog’s address, just go to Birk & Bond’s website and you can find your way here.

I agree that’s not much, but going backward in time, I also attended a pair of institutes last week in Dallas, presented by the Council for the Advancement of Forensic Genealogy (CAFG) - and I finished both with certificates to prove it! I really wanted to blog from the institutes, but they kept us far too busy to let out thoughts stray from the material that we were learning.

The first institute, “Foundations in Forensic Genealogy” lasted three days where we were studying nearly everything that you could think of that has to do with genealogy and much, much more. As it turns out, Forensic Genealogy is not for the under-educated, nor it is for those without a bit of stamina, because the folks at the CAFG believe that you can never learn enough and they fed my brain non-stop. We learned about forensic genealogy’s part in real estate and right-of-way cases; in probate and guardianship cases; plus we learned about natural resources, land issues,  and aspects of legal rights involving things, both above and below ground. I’m glad that I was a geology rock hound from birth because that background paid off. 

Okay, you must be wondering how genealogy and rocks are related - right?  It is not about your grandmother’s crazy brother, Uncle Harry, even though Grandpa said that Harry had rocks in his head.  What we learned is about people and ownership of land, mineral rights,including almost anything that can legally be found above or below ground, and how the legal aspects . That’s what ties these areas together. Genealogy is always about people, such as the tracing of missing or unknown heirs (but not like one of those “Heir-tracing firms that want a contingency fee) to properties or estates and connecting the real people and discounting the “wanna-be’s” who come out of the walls trying to get a piece of the pie. The same people who appear claiming to be your long-lost cousin when you win the lottery...lucky for me, those people never show up because I never win anything!

We learned new, inventive ways to help adoptees find their families and of course about DNA’s role in it. ( I was so grateful that I have spent the last six months studying Genetics and all aspects of genetic inheritance as it is not an easy subject if you do not have the background to grasp it. Oh, and then every night we had homework. Real cases to solve, document and report. That was just the “Foundations” institute!

The first one finished and we were right back at it again. The second institute, “Advanced Forensic Evidence Analysis” was more interesting to me because I’ve been at this business for nearly two decades. Granted, everyone can brush up on the basics and I certainly need to be more organized, but the “Advanced” institute got me excited. After all, who else can say that they spent hours with the Deputy Director of the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory (AFDIL) from the Armed Forces Medical Examiner System at Dover (Delaware) AFB, James J. Canik? Me, that’s who!

Did you know the the United States is the most dedicated country in the world when it comes to finding, identifying, and repatriating service men (and women) who are missing and presumed dead reaching back to the Civil War? Their work is simply amazing and they continue to become more efficient and to develop new techniques all the time to locate and identify our missing veterans so that their families can finally find peace. Of course, locating families and tracing DNA is a daunting task, calling for - did you guess? Genealogical experts in forensic genealogy. Quite a fascinating area of work.

However, the folks running this little shindig, think nothing of hard work. So if you didn’t guess what I’m about to say next, you aren’t paying enough attention - and that would get you into trouble at either institute because the amount of information that I am sharing here is nothing compared to all the things that the CAFG taught us. And yes, what I meant was that there w-a-y more that we were taught.

My heart belongs to genetic genealogy and the Advanced session brought forth more dealing with genetic genealogy. I was so grateful that I spent so much time on it as it was fast-paced, in-depth, and fascinating. 

We also learned about document analysis, translations and certified translations and how to find a real, educated translator (some languages are not easy to get certified in, so you need to know how to evaluate and find someone who has a serious educational background with a degree in the language, but a degree that includes in-depth knowledge of the culture, regional dialects, the history,  the customs and sociology of the place, etc., plus a background in international affairs or business so that the legal aspects can handled properly when, for example, you are applying for dual citizenship. Why would anyone want this? Many reasons? Ease of visiting family, such as your children, if they live abroad. Ease of travel within a certain country or countries is popular as is connecting with ancestral family, a potential place for retirement, business opportunities, and many more things. The list is long. The simplest places to attain dual citizenship are currently in Ireland and in Italy. We at Birk & Bond are already up-to-date and involved in dual citizenship work in Italy, but now are looking forward to adding more countries. Overall, the 7+ billion citizens of earth are quickly becoming one, big, global family and we want to connect in person, not just by way of the internet.

But back to the institutes as I have not finished telling you the rest of the story. We also covered working for the court system as a Expert Witness, and how the legal system utilizes forensic genealogists. The possibilities are vast, from criminal cases, to finding heirs for many things, to oil / mineral / environmental cases, to locating the families of unclaimed persons or even finding the next-of-kin to deliver ashes, also known as “cremains”, left uncollected at funeral homes and crematoriums.

One of the things that I have done, but that we really did not cover in either institute is research to determine unknown medical genealogies and histories in families. Perhaps that is already in the plans for a future CAFG institute? Time will tell.

Since this was typed and not mentally written and magically posted, I have to move on to the next thing on my list. However, I hope to be bogging again soon from Salt Lake City as I dive into the world-renown Family History Library. I’ll be blogging at you soon! 

Same Sex Marriage, Genealogy, and How We Will Be Viewed a Century From Now

Life has a sense of humor. I know that there are people who live their lives to the music of a score that has played in their heads since childhood, with few, deviations or diversions. They set out to learn a certain area of study and they accomplish it happily, usually becoming the best in their chosen field. Even their hobbies follow a similar path. They finish their projects and then plan, and execute others.

Then, there are the rest of us; we wander through childhood and adolescence, examining things, dropping those when other things worthy catch our eyes, darting on to another things, turning it over, and considering it for a time. And, it repeats and repeats... Eventually, most of us are forced into a job or into a major in a subject matter that forces us to narrow what we do with our lives. 

A small number of us rebel in various ways. I studied everything and minored in what I couldn’t major in and eventually was bribed (with a raise, contingent on securing my degree) by an employer into taking my undergraduate degree, with a given deadline of five days. Do you know how hard it is to find department heads to sign off on a degree in the heat and humidity at the beginning of August? The joke was on me; my completed majors had to take a backseat and become minors, but I managed to locate just enough deans that I completed the graduation process and I got the raise, if not officially, all of my earned degrees. Does it matter? No, not really, because the knowledge is still (usually) there and now, after years have passed, nobody really cares. 

One hundred years from now, it will, perhaps, provide a confusing mystery to a genealogist, which becomes my point here: we are making history now, as we live our lives. Yet, I would be willing to bet that, even as genealogists, we are leaving a rather confusing trail of who we really were, for future genealogists to interpret, and genealogy, my friends, is more than facts, it is about interpreting what they mean and about extracting the true stories behind them. It is about using the best possible judgement available.

It’s a difficult concept for us now, to easily grasp. We are too close to the actual incidents to have the same perspective that those in the future, unborn generations will  use view us with, and most of all, to draw conclusions about us. For example, in my own life, I have a daughter who was born in the 1980’s in Chicago, Cook County, Illinois. Despite a a striking resemblance to Barbie and an affinity for the color, pink, her birth certificate says that she is, indeed, a boy. My husband and I have filled out and paid for this to be corrected numerous times, both together and individually. Yet, this error remains uncorrected, and despite having extracted promises from everyone from the clerks to the county recorder, every “corrected” birth certificate that has been sent to us, has remained exactly as it always was. She is still a male.

Our daughter is now an adult and fortunately, the Colorado DMV, the Federal Passport Agency, and her husband, have all agreed that, despite Cook County Illinois’ stubborn stance that our daughter is a male, they agree that she is a female. However, as my daughter, she inherited my attitude and has found a silver lining in it that has made her rather pleased. She proudly points out that as a male, her marriage to her husband, who is both a male on his birth certificate and in...er... actuality, is proof that the State of Colorado has approved at least one, legal, same-sex marriage, and it is hers,...wait, his...um,...theirs!

This is but one example of how we need to live and record our lives in a way that will help future generations to understand the past. I have other examples to beat you over the with and other thoughts to expound on, but for today, I will let this sink in. In the meantime, consider how hard it is to leave a real, honest legacy of truthful information through the eyes of those living their lives today.

Happy New Year and A Gift to the Future!

The holidays are over. It’s a new year, but that still means it is January. There are decorations to put away, tax documents to gather, a chill in the air at best, and snow, cold, and ice, for many. 

Among all of this, one of my yearly tasks is to put “the book” away. This book was innocently created long ago and contains a record, going back nearly twenty years, of our family’s (and often friends’) hopes, dreams, observations, wishes, memories, and histories. It has evolved to become a book of the highest value.

I could spend all of 2014 describing this book, and from time-to-time I may discuss it. However, the focus of this blog is my journey toward my Board Certification in Genealogy and “The Book” occupies another place in my world.

The place that it occupies is the writer in me. That said, I am creating a book proposal that contains the history of this book, some of the family stories, and a guide to creating something like it for others create and through it, they may be able to retain an aspect of their own lives that would otherwise be lost. As a guide book, per se, I intend to show how history can be recorded for future generation. The concept is not limited to large families or small ones, but can be designed to fit the needs of any situation. It can be simple, elaborate, or in between and it requires only the skills that each person possesses. 

However, there are some very important steps involved in the creation of this book. These are things that we have learned over the years and are necessary to get the best results. Using these guidelines, anyone can develop something as unique and as valuable as our book. Experience, as they say, is a wonderful teacher.

In the meantime, I am back to blogging about genealogy here and my experiences in certification, as well as my experiences with sources, brick walls, finding a way through the many twists and turns that lie out there in the genealogical world. I will leave you with a genealogical tip to start your new year off in the best possible way.

Today’s tip is this: Always remember that, while you are looking for records and clues to your ancestors’ lives, you yourself, are making history for your descendants. Even if you have no children, you are someone’s aunt, uncle, or cousin. You do matter to those who come after us and it is up to all of us living now to leave an honest, accurate record of our lives. What might seem embarrassing to you now will become a surprising quirk once time has past and we are noted in history, some one hundred years from now. Be authentic. Do not hide the facts, especially medical issues or procedures, if only from the future. If you cannot bear to speak the truth now, then leave a letter with instructions that it is not to be opened until decades after your demise, or even a century from now. Just be real and honest about who you are. The future will thank you for it.