The Journey Takers Blog

Our Not-So-Fun Adventure

2011-11-08T17:43:00.000-08:00

I wanted to share a few photos so I decided to write some commentary to go along with them. Our “adventure” began two Saturdays ago – October 29th. We had been hearing that a “big” snowstorm was coming to town. Now, when you live in Massachusetts, big snowstorms hardly strike fear into your heart. I mean, last winter we got about 7 BIG snowstorms. Of course none of them came in October though. A big snowstorm in October seemed so unlikely that I even said to my husband “I’ll believe it when I see it.” Famous last words, right? Even if it did snow, we could handle it. We do all the time.

My first clue that something was different should have been Saturday night when we drove home from our church Halloween party. We could hardly get down my son’s friend’s road because so many trees were heavy with snow and leaning over the road. When we got to our own home, we found that a little tree by our front door was so bent over that we had to climb over the flower bed and onto the porch to get in the front door. When we got inside, the power was out. Unpleasant, I thought, but no big deal. We piled blankets on everyone and went to bed. I even made sure all the lights in the house were off so that when the power went on in the middle of the night, it wouldn’t wake anyone up. During the night, I woke several times to hear loud cracking sounds. Once, I took a flashlight and shone it out the back window. I saw a huge tree laying across our back lawn.

When we woke up the next morning, it was about 52 degrees inside the house – and there was still no power. Yuck. There was also no cell phone service. We had never lost cell phone service before. Looking out the window, I saw that we had gotten about a foot of snow. I also saw that the tree I had seen last night was not the only one down in our yard. A huge branch had fallen from higher then our second story ceiling, smashed half of our front fence (that we had just finished repairing and repainting two weeks ago). The branches nearly reached the kitchen window. Another huge tree was blocking our cars from getting out the driveway, one had smashed the back fence, and several more lay across the lawn. Christian (age 2) kept telling me, “Trees in the sky fall down, mom.”

Our house is on a little road (Gulf Road) that connects to Route 9 - one of the most major roads in town (but I live in the country so it’s just a two-land road). We got dressed and headed out to look around. Gulf Road was completely blocked by several huge trees. Our neighbors had a giant tree hanging upside down in their power line. It wasn’t until we turned the corner to Route 9 that we finally really realized how severe this storm had been. The road looked like a tornado had gone through it. Every five feet, a tree was down in the road. Trees lay across power lines, dangled over roads tangled in power lines, and power lines were strewn across lawns and the road everywhere. In several places, cars had been abandoned when huge trees had fallen and smashed them. The fact that it was October and some of the trees still had leaves on them had caused the trees to hold more of the wet, heavy snow – and had caused many to fall.

“We’re not going to have power for a week,” my husband said.

Now, I know this was not hurricane Katrina or anything. But, it was a tiny bit alarming to realize that we were stranded – no phone, no internet, no power, no heat, no water (we have a well so no electricity means no water), and no ability to drive away. Soon individual people were out on the road with their chain saws cutting a few of the major trees – our neighbor cut the one blocking our driveway. By night, I could drive to a gas station down the road (very slowly by driving around trees and on top of electrical wires). I wanted to find cell phone service so I could call my sister-in-law, Cassy, in NYC and see if we could escape to her house. I had no idea how widespread the damage was or if it was even possible to get out of town on the roads. Another problem – the gas station had no gas and we only had a quarter of a tank. A stranger let me borrow his cell phone (that had service – mine still didn’t) and Cassy said we were welcome at their house. We heated up leftovers on our grill for dinner, walked around with flashlights bundled up in coats and hats, dumped our water storage down the toilet to flush it (we tried bringing in some snow in a bin, but by then the house was so cold that the snow wasn’t melting very quickly), and huddled under the blankets. When we woke up, it was 44 degrees in the house. We were all miserable.

The next morning, we drove down the road some more and located a gas station with gas. The few stations that had gas had lines sometimes stretching half a mile. We had to pay in cash because they couldn’t take credit cards. That afternoon, I packed our belongings and headed out of town with the kids (my husband stayed behind). I took these pictures as I drove – all along Route 9 within about three miles from my house. Cars were still smashed under trees two days after the storm and I hadn’t seen one “official-looking” person. The road was an absolute safety hazard and if the town hadn’t been in a crisis, I am sure it would have been closed.

In NYC, I had cell phone service and was able to learn a little more. 100% of my town had lost power, as had many other towns around us. Some were calling it the worst storm in the history of western Massachusetts. (Other states were also hit hard, particularly Connecticut.)

As the days continued, I got periodic updates from friends in Belchertown. Halloween was “canceled.” The high school had been turned into a shelter. School was canceled for the entire week. Some people began getting power back on Tuesday night. Finally on Thursday, I decided to come back home. In the day, we began the work of cleaning up the mess and at night we slept at friend’s house since we still didn’t have power. The first clean-up task was to throw away all the food in the fridge and freezer. Still, I felt relatively calm until Friday afternoon. My husband’s co-worked came over with a chain saw to help us cut some of the largest trees. The one that had smashed half of the front fence was still caught in a branch higher than our house. I watched as he cut it down and it crashed through the remaining fence – the one I had just spent several weekends painting. At that moment, for the first time I felt a lump in my throat.

Sunday at 2:30 p.m. our power came back on – after eight nights. I just got internet access today (but it's only semi-functional).It will take us weeks to clear the trees and repair the damage. I read a newspaper article today that said Belchertown (my town) was the hardest hit community in Massachusetts. Still I know it could have been worse. We are safe, our house or cars were not damaged, we have wonderful family and friends that let us impose on them so we didn’t have to sleep in our freezing house, and we are now back in our house – appreciating the heat, flushing toilet, and lights more than ever before!

A Trip to Canada for Genealogy - and Fun!

2011-10-19T11:20:00.000-07:00

I spent most of last week in Canada. It was one of those work/fun trips - my favorite kind. The original purpose was to speak about my book and about the immigration experience to the Ottawa branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society for the Ryan Taylor Memorial lecture. Soon after I got the invitation, I began to develop a second part to this trip though. Ever since we moved to Massachusetts over five years ago, I have wanted to visit Quebec City. Once, I even had a trip in place to do it. My husband had meetings there and I convinced a friend to watch our (then) three kids for three days so I could go too. It was going to be a second honeymoon of sorts. But then, it turned out that the NGS (National Genealogical Society) Conference was going to be in Richmond at the same time - and that one of my magazine articles was going to receive an award from ISFHWE (International Society of Family HIstory and Writers). AND it turned out that I could get a plane ticket for less than $100 and stay at my brother's house in DC. In the end, I couldn't resist. I ditched the second honeymoon in favor of the genealogy conference. (Terrible, isn't it?)

But now I had a second chance - genealogy and vacation in one! We decided that the whole family would drive, spend a day in Quebec City, a day in Montreal, and a day in Ottawa (and lots of time driving too, of course). Initially I had thought it unfortuntate that the trip would take place in October instead of the summer, but I soon decided that the middle of October was perfect. The leaves on the drive through Vermont and in Canada were absolutely breathtaking.

It's a little embarrassing to admit that the only other time I had been to Canada was in 2004 when we went to Niagara Falls. Of course, we only spent four nights there this time, but it was fabulous. And, as I told the group, now I can put on my biography that I'm an internationally known speaker, right?

Here are a few highlights from the trip:

First, the classic photo of the Chateau Frontenac in Quebec City. Rachel (age 11) liked the old city so much, that she decided we should move there!

We also made a stop at the nearby Montmerency Falls.

Did you know Montreal is famous for its bagels? Two bagel shops compete for the title of "best bagels." The kids sampled bagels from both to determine who was the winner of what we called the "Great Bagel Debate." (I originally called the "Great Bagel War", but Sarah Ann (age 6) wanted to know if they used swords...) Christian slept through our taste test.

We loved Ottawa! The downtown area was beautiful - even better than I expected. We loved walking by the government buildings and the Rideau Canal.

Everything You Need to Know About German Research in Two Hours or Less

2011-10-05T18:23:00.000-07:00

I guess I really am breaking back into this blogging thing slowly...Where does the time go?

As I mentioned in my last post, Friday I flew to Toledo, Ohio (actually, I flew into Detroit and then drove to Toledo)to do a two-hour seminar on Saturday at the Toledo Public Library on tracing German ancestors. First, I have to say that I get really excited when I get to talk about JUST German ancestors. I like to talk about lots of things, but since I am a resident of Massachsuetts and do the majority of my speaking engagements in New England, I don't get to do many lectures that focus exclusively on German research. It's just often too narrow of a topic around here. Now, the same is not true in Toledo because just about everyone from Toledo is German (well, okay - that may be an exaggeration - but not by much).

I had two hours to share with people everything they ever needed to know about tracing German ancestors. Well, as I'm sure you know - that's impossibe. German research is not the kind of topic that can be covered in much depth in two hours. So, that is where the challenge was: choosing which information to share. The program coordinator and I had worked together to select two of my already-prepared lectures: 1) Jumping Over Hurdles in German Research and 2) The Journey Takers: An Inside Look at the German Immigration Experience. It was a nice combination of talks. The first focused on sources and methodology and the second brought it together in a case study.

I felt good about the seminar and really enjoyed doing it. Still, when it was done, my head was still filled with all the other things I COULD have told the attendees about German research.

The main message I wanted to get across was this: German research is NOT impossible. You can do it. People get intimidated of German research easily - mostly because of the language barrier and the handwriting I think. But truthfully, I really believe that German research is easier than US research. When I told my audience that, they all looked at me like I was crazy. It takes a little while to used to German research, but once you do, it really is very manageable - and lots of fun too!

So why do I say German research is easier? The main reason is because German research relies very heavily on one source: parish records. There is no source as important to US research as parish records are to German research. So I am going to focus the rest of my comments on using parish records.

In order to access these local records, you need the name of your ancestor's German hometown. This is the first hurdle I talk about in my lecture - and for many researchers, the highest of the four hurdles.

Once you have a hometown, you need to access records (the records hurdle). First, you must figure out where your ancestors went to church. This may not be the same as their hometown, because many villages were too small to have churches of their own. You can utilize gazetteers to find this information. Very few German parish records are online. Fortunately, many have been microfilmed and can be ordered to your local family history center. Otherwise, you may have to write for them.

The third and fourth hurdles are almost a combination hurdle: language and handwriting. Here's my advice: take advantage of the resources available at www.familysearch.org. Click on the "learn" tab to search their wikis. Here, you will find word lists, letter-writing guides, and handwriting guides (as well as research guides). Be patient with yourself as you become familiar with the handwriting in particular. Go slowly and it will start to come together, little by little!

Blog Awakening

2011-09-29T17:00:00.000-07:00

It's been four months since I posted on my blog. I didn't plan to stop writing. I just did. It's not coincidence that my second to last post is seeking advice for burnout. Last year was an intense year. It was good intense, not bad intense. But it was still intense. I'm hoping to keep the good this year but loose some of the intensity. (I've found this is easier said than done though when you're the mom of four kids!)

Just to show how complete my burnout was, I hadn't even looked at my blog for probably three months. Then last week, I pulled it up. I thought about writing a post, but then I didn't. It's been in the back of my mind for a couple of days. Then tonight, I got an email from someone saying she missed my blog. It was just that little bit of motivation I needed to tip me off the fence - and into writing a blog post.

So, since I'm sure you've all been dying of suspense, I thought I would catch you up on what I've been doing the last four months instead of blogging! My book reached its one-year anniversary. I feel good about it's first year. I hope it will continue to reach people and I hope to continue speaking about it. But, I also somehow felt permission to slow down a bit now that the first year mark has passed. My speaking calendar has slowed back to a "normal" pace, instead of the fast-forward frenzy it was in. I'm excited about that. I love really love speaking to groups and I'm looking forward to my engagements this fall. I have two particularly exciting speaking adventures coming up. Tomorrow, I'm flying to Ohio where I will do a two-hour workshop at the Toledo Public Library on German research. Then, on October 15, I will be giving my book lecture as the Ryan Taylor Memorial Lecture for the Ottawa Branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society. My whole family will go with me on this trip (but don't worry - not to the lecture!). We decided to drive and make a five-day vacation of it, including overnights in Montreal and Quebec City. I've wanted to go to Quebec City since we moved to Massachusetts five years ago.

I've also been writing. I love writing! I finished a BIG project that I've been working on for some time and submitted it last Friday. That's one reason I feel ready to start blogging again. I don't want to say more about that right now, because there will be a long wait before I know anything else. Right now, I am just enjoying the accomplishment of having completed it. I have not done much magazine writing, but I am currently working on two articles for the Godfrey Update, a publication of the Godfrey Memorial Library. I've been writing for their semi-annual publication for several years now and enjoy that too.

And best of all, I've been spending lots of time with my family. My kids were home for the summer, of course. I really, really love summer. Mostly I love summer vacations. We had some great trips including a two-week trip where we drove to Austin, TX for my sister's wedding and saw some sites along the way such as Smoky Mountain National Park, Memphis, and Shenandoah National Park. We also spent four days in Acadia National Park (ME) later in the summer. It was beautiful. And, my husband and I flew to Brazil for a week in August. We laid on the tropical island beaches, hiked through a rainforest, listened to samba, fed mango to wild monkeys, and wandered the big city sites of Rio de Janiero. If I was motivated, I'd post photos - but I think I'll break back into this blogging through gradually. School has now started and the summer fun is over - back to fall craziness with an incredibly tight schedule and a little bit of chaos most of the time.

That's it in a nutshell I'd say. The question is...am I going to start blogging regularly again? I'm just going to blog when the desire strikes, and not worry if it doesn't. Hopefully, I'll blog about my Ohio trip and share some thoughts on tracing those tricky German ancestors.

Winchester Award

2011-05-28T10:47:00.000-07:00

In an earlier post, I mentioned that I had another award coming soon. Last night it was announced. Unfortunately, I couldn’t be there. The Journey Takers received the Winchester Award from the Mormon History Association for the best thoroughly researched family or community history relating to the Mormon experience and published in 2010. The award was announced at their annual awards banquet held in conjunction with their conference, this year in St. George, UT.

You can see the Deseret News listing of the awards here. My award is listed on the second page. They gave out awards in several categories including some for graduate papers, thesis and dissertation awards, as well as a couple of other book awards.

I was very excited about the award – and sad I couldn’t attend the banquet. I actually considered going for a while – looking into plane ticket prices etc. I’ve never been to the Mormon History Association conference, but I’m sure I would love it. Maybe someday….

One of the reasons I couldn’t go was because my oldest (turning 11 on Monday) had her birthday party last night. It had a cat theme. Here are a couple of pictures.

Facepaint and headband ears turned all the kids into cats

My friend made this cute cat cake.

One of the funnest parts of the party was having the kids eat and drink like cats. They really got into it!

So, I could have been receiving this wonderful honor in St. George, but instead I was hot gluing fluffy pompoms to help the girls make their cat craft.

By the way, I plan to actually have a blog post with information for doing genealogy research soon! I have a post in mind about hints for finding your ancestors’ hometowns, so stay tuned…I’m feeling my burnout fading. I’m not sure if this is due to the award or the fact that we are taking a little trip to Cape Ann for Memorial Day. Can’t wait to sit on the sand (no way am I getting in that frigid water) on the beach – as long as it doesn’t rain!

Advice for Burn Out?

2011-05-24T07:55:00.000-07:00

I should start my post by saying this is not an entry giving advice on avoiding getting burned out. It is a post seeking advice!

This last week I believe I have come down with a serious case of burn out. I hadn’t expected to come down with this ailment this spring. In my mind, I associate burn out with getting tired of doing something – or having to do something you don’t want to do anymore. That’s simply not how my burn out is functioning – and probably why I was surprised to get it. I am not having to do something I don’t want to do. And, I’m not really even tried of doing what I have been doing. I’m just tired in general.

I actually LOVE what I do. Although, like everyone else, my life is pulled in many directions, I tend to think of myself as having two major categories of demands. One is family. The other is work. This is not unique to me obviously. I thoroughly enjoy both aspects of my life. I love my four children (and my husband) and while I find it frazzling sometimes, I enjoy being a mom. And I love genealogy and writing and all that goes with it. Overall, I feel happy and content in my life. So why am I so burned out lately?

I think it has to do with intensity. It has been a very intense spring. In fact, as I thought about it I decided that this past year has been the most intense year of my life possibly second only to my second year of graduate school when I had a toddler and was miserably sick from being pregnant with our second child. It has not been a bad intensity (unlike that year in graduate school). It has been a good year filled with wonderful things – FILLED being the key word here.

Both categories of my life – family and work – have been extra busy for the past couple of months. My kids have intense schedules in the spring because this is when sports get going full swing. We also have all kinds of end-of-the-year events now – dance recitals, piano recitals, band concerts, programs at school etc. Add to that that three of my children have birthdays and I find that just keeping up with my family is a scramble. Then, spring is also perhaps the most intense time of year in the genealogy world. I have been doing a lot of speaking and book events lately too.

The result of all of this is that lately I have a burning desire to plan trips all the time. This is generally what happens to me when life gets stressful. I have been able to justify it because we actually do have some trips coming up this summer that I need to get the plans made for. We are driving to Texas for my sister’s wedding at the end of June and then taking our time coming back, spending time in Memphis, Smoky Mountain National Park, and Shenandoah National Park. In the past week, I’ve gotten all the details worked out about hotels etc. I have also reserved our hotels for Brazil in August and planned our basic itinerary and started looking into plans for a short trip to Acadia National Park we’ll make in August also. While this all has to be done sooner or later (and in the case of Texas, sooner), I am also aware in the back of my head that I am doing this now because I can’t bring myself to do some of the other things I need to do. Soon, I am going to run out of trips to plan and besides, my to-do list is growing.

I would love to hear thoughts from others. Does this happen to you? How do you avoid it? How do you cope with it once it happens?

An Writing Award, a Review, and more to come....

2011-05-15T11:08:00.001-07:00

Something went wrong with blogger for a few days, so my last post on "A Speaker's Perspective" appeared, then disappeared, then appeared two times in a row (all without me doing anything), but now appears to be right again.

I have a couple of exciting book news tidbits to share. First, this past weekend the International Society of Family History Writers and Editors had their annual awards banquet which takes place every year at the National Genealogical Society Conference. I was not in attendance this year (this week has already been the busiest one of the year for me....), but I just learned that my book excerpt, which was published in Family Chronicle last December, received first place for articles published in 2010. Hooray!

The excerpt is on my book's website. You can read it here. Just click on "excerpt" from the top. I read part of this excerpt in my book talk too!

I also just got an email from Miriam Robbins Midkiff letting my know that she has reviewed The Journey Takers on her blog, Ancestories. Yuu can read her review here. She concludes her review with this paragraph:

"Family historians will benefit greatly from this title for a variety of reasons. The depth and scope of research required to create a quality history of Huber's ancestors' lives is marked. The careful documentation and source citations are to be applauded. Creating a realistic and sequential narration out of the bare bones of facts is to be commended. To be able to research, analyze and synthesize the details of family historians' ancestors in such an interesting and valid manner is something to which we all should attain. Huber's book is a strong example of a fascinating story married to a quality researched work and as such would be a excellent addition to any genealogist's personal library."

If you're not familiar with Miriam's blog, you should check it out. It has been consistently rated in several places as one of the top genealogy blogs out there.

Finally, I got another exciting email last week about an upcoming book award. However, the banquet for this award hasn't taken place yet, so I'm not allowed to share for a couple weeks...(Is that obnoxious?)

I can't resist just two photos. My third child, Sarah Ann, turned six yesterday. We had her birthday party with 14 kids (counting three of mine - Christian was NOT invited)! Here's her with one of her two butterfly cakes and then one of the whole group (minus one child who preferred not to be in the photo). By the way, I gave three book talks last week and I just want to say that frosting those birthday cakes was WAY more stressful than any of the book talks!

A Speaker's Perspective

2011-05-12T11:09:00.000-07:00

I am a crazy person this week. Well, maybe this whole month. For parents of school-aged children, May might be a busier month than December. We have soccer (with two players in the family – one doing travel soccer which requires driving an hour each way for some games) and softball season (one player – also traveling for games) both in full swing. On top of that there is the regular two dance classes and two piano lessons a week. There are end of the year dance recitals, piano recitals, and band concerts all coming up. AND, my three oldest children all have birthdays in the next month – which means three birthday parties. My husband, a college professor, is grading finals and calling in students who cheated (because of an error in the answer key, he determined that 25% of his class cheated on their homework) and attending graduation, and I am deeply involved in the busiest part of the year for genealogy speakers.

Which brings me to my topic at hand. (No, it’s not the woes of being a mother of four and living in the car – French fries are okay for toddlers to eat for dinner, right?) The topic is being a genealogy speaker. My topic was inspired by Thomas MacEntee who challenged bloggers to write about this – a couple of weeks ago. (I’m a little behind the times. What else is new?)

I gave my first genealogy lecture in the fall of 2006. Now I’m confessing personal information here. Maybe I shouldn’t….Oh well….here goes anyway. I had never attended a genealogy meeting of any sort until August of 2006 when I went to FGS in Boston for one day. I particularly remember listening to Craig Scott speak about…speaking. I was enthralled and instantly thought, “I can do this.” How’s that for arrogant? I had experience in genealogy. I had studied genealogy in college at Brigham Young University and had worked full time as a professional genealogist tracing other people’s families. I had also been writing for genealogy magazines since 2003. Until I started writing for magazines, I had remained unaware that there even were genealogy societies, meetings, or conferences. I had just moved from Valencia, Spain to Massachusetts a few weeks before FGS that year – and decided to see what it was all about.

I brought some speakers’ brochures home from FGS with me and went about designing my own brochure. Then, having never been to a genealogy society meeting in my life, I mailed them out to local genealogy societies I found in my area. I attended my first local society meeting in September of 2006, and gave my first lecture in November. I loved it and was instantly hooked.

My speaking has increased dramatically since my book launched last July. Since July, I have given nearly 80 lectures in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York, Connecticut, Utah, Iowa, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Wisconsin, California, Maryland, and Virginia. I have spoken to large groups and small groups, to genealogy societies, state historical societies, libraries, senior centers, museums, book clubs, and other places.

Here are some of my thoughts on it:

1) The pay. Let’s be honest. The pay is not great. I once had a society offer me $75 for a one hour talk with this question: “Does $75 sound fair for one hour of your time?” Sure, but that’s not the exchange here. I’m giving WAY more than one hour of time. (And, except in very special circumstances I don’t speak for $75 a lecture either.) I use time to correspond with the society, to prepare the lecture, and to travel (more below). I’ve never known a genealogy speaker who feels like he or she can make a living from speaking.

2) The travel. I love to travel. By that I mean, I have tickets to Rio de Janiero in August and I can’t wait. I’m super excited for our family trip in June to Rocky Mountain National Park, Memphis, etc. Loving to travel doesn’t generally include three hour drives to little New England towns. I have done a lot of traveling in the last year – a lot for me and my family anyway. Tonight I will drive two hours each way to speak in WInchester, MA and on Saturday, I’ll drive almost three hours each way to speak to the Falmouth Genealogical Society. In March, I spoke in Virginia and Ohio and in February, I spent 11 days in Utah. That said though, I actually don’t mind the travel so much. I enjoy listening to a good book on CD or listening to NPR in the car (as a mom of little kids, “alone time” is pretty exciting!). And I also try really hard to combine speaking engagements with other travel. For example, I was invited to speak in Ottawa in October and we have decided to make a family trip out of it and stay five days in Montreal and Quebec City. And in June when we do our big trip, I’ll have three lectures along the way.

3) The prep. It’s A LOT of work to put together a new lecture. I always try to turn lectures into magazine articles to maximize the benefit. I have a dozen or so prepared lectures. I am usually not willing to put together a new lecture at the request of a society, although I am willing to tweak or adjust a lecture I already have. Every so often, I develop a new lecture. This past year, I’ve given my book talk MANY times. I know it so well that I don’t even glance at my notes ahead of time. I just hop in the car and head to the next venue.

4) The nerves. Actually, I generally don’t get nervous. When I first started speaking, I got nervous for the question and answer period. I was afraid I wouldn’t know the answer to something someone asked me. I have gotten over that. Not because I always know the answers. I don’t. But I’m okay with that now. Setting up my equipment can make me jittery if something isn’t working well. This is why I ALWAYS bring my own projector and laptop – even when the group is providing it. I leave it in the car…just in case. There have been several times when I have needed to get it. Sometimes nobody in the society knows how to work the library’s equipment or something similar. I KNOW that I know how to work my own equipment. I also bring an extension cord with me.

5) The benefits. Of course, practically the main reason I have spoken so much lately is to get the word out about my book. Besides, as I mentioned before, I love to speak. Why? I really enjoy the dynamic of interacting with a group of people – and of sharing information that I’m excited about. I love to feel like something I’ve said is useful to others. I have especially enjoyed talking about my book. It is extremely rewarding to have people tell me that they have read my book and that they related to it, or that it emotionally impacted them, or that it inspired them to want to write their family story.

One Simple Truth of Writing (or should I say editing?)

2011-05-05T19:20:00.000-07:00

I suppose I should start this post with a disclaimer. I am a big believer in editing. I spent lots – and I mean LOTS – of time editing my book, and I spend lots of time editing each and every magazine article I submit. However, I do not believe in editing my blog posts. Why not? The main reason is simple: I don’t have time. I really don’t have time to blog. But if I’m going to blog, I really don’t have time to edit. Is that terrible? Maybe so. I think of blogging as a much more casual, conversational kind of writing. When I give a lecture, I prepare my remarks carefully, but of course when I’m just talking to someone about genealogy, I just talk – I don’t prepare ahead of time. I think of my blog as a conversation with others about genealogy while an article is a prepared lecture.

Okay, enough of philosophy. Really that is just all an excuse because I want to “talk” about editing here, yet I don’t want anyone to hold my blog entries up as examples of how to edit. They would be very bad examples because they are NOT edited.

The editor I worked with on my book (and by the way, her name is Kristine Thornley and she’s great if you are looking for an editor) has George Orwell’s Six Rules of Writing on her webpage. Actually, I think of them as editing rules. To me, writing is just the stage where the information spews forth. To shape the writing together into something meaningful and enjoyable to read – that takes editing. Anyway, I have taken the rules to heart. They are:

1. Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech that you are used to seeing in print.
2. Never use a long word where a short one will do.
3. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
4. Never use the passive where you can use the active.
5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

Aren’t those great? I love them because they remind me of a simple truth about writing. When I first started writing, I wanted to somehow sound smart – or at least fancy – when I wrote. I wanted to use impressive words arranged into poetically abstract sentences. The simple truth I was missing was this: Really good writing is clear, succinct writing.

This sounds simpler than it is. We usually don’t speak succinctly, and, without concentration, most of us don’t write succinctly either. So, to have this clear, concise writing, we have to edit. And edit. And edit. We have to read through our writing and look for these extraneous words, these unnecessary long or complex words. We have to read and reread to focus our language and thoughts more effectively.

In my lecture on “Writing a Page-Turning (But True) Family History,” I describe how after I “finished” my book, I had to do many revisions. In one of these revisions, I cut 50,000 words or about one-third of the manuscript. This always makes people gasp. They are concerned about this deleted material. Afterwards, people ask me what I did with those words. They want to make sure I saved them somewhere. (Some of the words came from deleting entire sections and chapters, but many also came individually out of the middle of sentences.) Well, don’t’ worry. I did save them. I save everything (of substance – not individual words obviously) I delete from a manuscript and paste it into its own little file – in case I ever decide I want it back. But guess what? I never have. Not once have I re-pasted the deleted material into my document. With my book, I had found a way to say the same thing with many fewer words by tightening and weeding out unnecessary material.

With that little pep talk for myself, it’s off to some more editing for me.

Let's Start at the Very Beginning (A Very Good Place to Start)

2011-04-30T18:04:00.000-07:00

Today I drove to a library in Albany to speak to the Capital District Genealogical Society about “Writing A Page-Turning (But True) Family History.” I have only been to Albany one other time – that was in October to do an interview with Joe Donahue on the Roundtable (a show on Northeast Public Radio) about my book and about genealogy in general. But as I was looking at my schedule this week (trying to get myself organized), I realized that I am speaking at that exact same library in Albany next week – giving the exact same lecture – but to a different group. Quite a coincidence, don’t you think?

Like everyone else, I get lots of email. I mean to answer all of them. Really I do. But it doesn’t always happen. There’s just only so many hours in the day. I get lots of email from people who ask me questions about their specific genealogy research problems. Some of them are complex problems, but many of them are questions from people who are just starting to do genealogy research and don’t know where to turn or what to do first. So, since I don’t get around to answering all these emails individually, I thought I would address some of these basic beginning steps all at once here.

What should you do when you first begin tracing your family? Here are ten do’s and don’ts to help you get started.

1) DO start with yourself and your own family. You are the first person on your family tree. Make sure you have the relevant documents for yourself and your own family. Then move back to your parents and grandparents. You would be surprised at how many people do not know basic information about their parents or grandparents. Many people don’t know their parents’ marriage date – or even the maiden names of grandmothers. Track down this information first.

2) DON’T get ahead of yourself. Don’t try to start your research with some famous ancestor in the 1800s. You will want to work your way back one generation at a time – ensuring that the connections are correct and you actually are related to this person in the first place.

3) DON’T try to tackle your entire family tree at once. Besides being overwhelming and discouraging, this is also impossible. You will want to eventually choose one family line to focus on.

4) DO educate yourself. Check out books from the library about how to get started in genealogy research. Find a book about how to do research in the particular place your family lived. Join a genealogy society and learn from their classes – and from talking to people there who may be more experienced.

5) DON’T miss the resources on www.familysearch.org. Under the “learn” tab, check out the different Wiki pages to get oriented on a wide variety of topics. For example, type in “German Research” to get a detailed guide on researching German ancestors. You can also find guides for each of the 50 states and most Western European countries – as well as other places too.

6) DO develop a system to organize your research results. For one thing, you will need a computer software program. You can download PAF from www.familysearch.org. There are many other options you can purchase. These allow you to enter information about your family and also list the sources.

7) DO contact family members. Express your interest in gathering information about the family. Find out what others might have or might know that can be useful to you.

8) DON’T swallow online family trees whole – or lineage society records – or really any other record for that matter. Online family trees are riddled with errors from minor inaccuracies to completely incorrect people listed on your tree. You will want to do as I suggested and start with yourself and move back one family at a time, verifying what you find – even if you find a large family tree online.

9) DON’T miss opportunities to interview family members. Documents will be there (okay, not always – but generally), but family members won’t. Get their memories and experience recorded before they slip away.

10) DO take advantage of online sources, but DON’T expect to do all your genealogy research online – or assume that all needed records are online.

By the way, my daughter got a Sound of Music CD for Christmas and lately I often have Doe a Deer in my head - can you tell? The other song I have in my head a lot lately is Here Comes the Sun because my son got a Beatles CD. I don't mind too much because I actually really like both CDs - and it's certainly better than My Little Pony which I have also found myself singing while alone in my car before (maybe that is too embarrassing to admit...)

A Free Conference, a Book Review, and Some Easter Pictures

2011-04-25T17:06:00.000-07:00

Spring break is over and it’s back to regular life for me. What that means this week is three lectures: tomorrow to the Central Massachusetts Genealogy Society (CMGS) in Gardner. They meet at 7 p.m. at the American Legion building (22 Elm Street). On Friday, I am speaking at a conference that should be of interest to those interested in genealogy within reasonable driving distances of Worcester, MA. The library (with the help of Kay Sheldon and others) is hosting a two day genealogical conference that is completely free. Pretty exciting, don’t you think? You can read more about it HERE. I’m speaking on Friday afternoon at 3:45 on Beyond Names And Dates: Uncovering Your Ancestors’ Stories. You’ll see a long list of lectures on a variety of topics – some by well known lecturers, and some by lectures who are not so well-known (but I know many of them and they’ll be great!). Then on Saturday, I’m driving to Albany, New York to speak to the Capital District Genealogical Society (LINK) on “Writing a Page-Turning (But True) Family History.” It will be a busy week! (I will also be driving children to a total of two softball practices, two soccer practices, two soccer games, two piano lessons, and two dance classes, among other things. Spring is the busiest season in the genealogy world – but it’s also the busiest season in the parents-of-school-aged-children world since so many sports take place now.)

On another note, I received in the mail a recent issue of the VASA Star, which is the publication for the international organization of VASA – an group that celebrates Swedish heritage. If you have Swedish roots, you might want to check out their website. They have branches located all over the country, including many in Massachusetts. They hold monthly meetings as well as periodic larger gatherings. Anyway, a recent issue of their publication reviewed my book, The Journey Takers. The review is rather lengthy, but I wanted to share the first few paragraphs:

“Leslie Albrecht Huber’s book The Journey Takers is a highly interesting account of how emigration from three European countries through seven generations crystallize into the family in which the author and her children so far are the latest members. In addition she has gone back three generations in the three countries (Germany, Sweden, and England) and arrived in the middle of the 1700s.

The book is extraordinarily comprehensive, based on nearly ten years of very thorough genealogical research in each of the countries concerned. The footnotes and bibliography take up 55 pages.

The author has previously published hundreds of articles in the fields of genealogy and history, but this is her first book. She was honored for one of her articles in 2004 with the “Franklin D. Scott Award” by the Swedish American Historical Society in Chicago.

A book with so many factual details risks being boring, but such is not the case here. The authoress lends to the presentation her imagination, which gives life, above all to the older generations in the countries of origin and the USA. Furthermore, she portrays her own life and her family at the same time in relation to the research work carried out in each of the places visited and the people she has met there in the present. These aspects of fiction and autobiography make the book easily accessible and at times as thrilling as a novel.”

The review concludes with the following sentence: “Everyone interested in delving deeper in these matters (referring to immigration) ought to read the book, which so far has only been published in English.”

What a nice review!

Finally, I can’t resist closing with a few photos from our Easter celebrations.

We started the week by visiting my brother and his family in New York City. We visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art which was fabulous – and more kid-friendly than I expected. Here are my children and their cousins in one of the Egyptian rooms in the museum. That night, I gave a lecture at the Connetquot Library in Bohemia, NY (on Long Island).

Rachel and her friend helped make fruit pizza in preparation for our annual Easter egg hunt. This year, we had 77 people at our house!

Sarah Ann and her friends looking for eggs in the front yard.

Christian quickly figured out that there was chocolate in these eggs. After that, he became a very motivated egg hunter. In the end though, he still preferred finding balls instead of eggs in the yard.

The Easter bunny brought coordinated clothes (which about did the Easter bunny in since she had to shop with an assistant who spent his time hiding under the clothes racks at Macy’s.)

My brother and his family joined us for our Easter dinner.

A Conversation With My Daughter About Evaluating Sources

2011-04-19T09:42:00.000-07:00

Yikes! Where has the past week gone? It’s spring break this week for my kids, which means I’ll be saying the same thing again in a week. We are leaving in 30 minutes for a couple of days in New York City with my brother, but I’m hoping I have time to jot a few thoughts down. (Can you jot thought down when you’re typing on a computer?)

My oldest child, Rachel, is ten. She’s in fifth grade. Recently she came home with the assignment to write her first “research paper.” Now – remember we are talking about fifth grade research papers here. That means the entire “paper” was supposed to be a few paragraphs long. They were required to use three sources, one of which had to be an actual book – as opposed to an online source. (I’ll try to resist the urge to become nostalgic reflecting on the fact that there were no such rules when I was in fifth grade or even high school since of course there was no internet to use.)

Rachel selected the topic of “The History of Irish Step.” Yeah, I know – I should have tried to persuade her to do some sort of genealogy topic, right? She chose this all on her own since she and I had gone a few weeks before to watch Riverdance in Springfield. (Again – trying to fight the urge to depart from my topic – but WOW! – it was fabulous.)

Her class had spent an hour or so at the computer lab and so Rachel had come home with several “articles” printed out from the internet that she had found. As we sat down to look at them, she soon discovered that the articles contained conflicting information. She was baffled. She figured out quickly that they couldn’t both be correct. So, HOW could this EVER happen? HOW could INCORRECT information get online? And HOW could she know which one was correct? And finally, wouldn’t the solution to this problem be to get a book from the library? Surely, it would be correct because nobody would PUBLISH something that was WRONG.

Oh, the genealogist in me was getting so excited about the conversation that was about to follow that I could hardly contain myself. It’s a conversation I have often at genealogy meetings and conferences with people beginning their research and I couldn’t believe I was going to get to have this heart to heart with my daughter at the tender age of ten.

I started out with discussing with her how information gets online. Anyone can put it there. Anyone. Here I am putting this online right now. Nobody is making sure I know what I’m talking about (a question you may have already asked yourself…) One of her sources was Wikipedia – the ultimate example of anyone putting anything online. (I’m not slamming Wikipedia – actually, I’m a big fan but it doesn’t mean I take it as gospel truth.)

This made her head spin and she suddenly became concerned not just about the conflicting information, but about ALL the information she had found. How did she know that ANY of it was true? Hooray! I wish every genealogist asked herself this very question when she found something online. She noticed that some of the “facts” were in every article. Those must be true then, right? They couldn’t all get it wrong.

Oh yes they most certainly could. Again, this is an argument I hear a lot. ALL the family charts say the father is this person. Therefore, he must be. This is nonsensical logic. All those charts could be very well be based on the same original chart that was wrong in the first place. They are just all repeating the same information. If you repeat incorrect information one hundred times, it doesn’t somehow become correct.

But, she reasoned, there’s still hope that a book will straighten it all out. Again, I had to burst her little bubble (poor kid). There are lots and lots of books out there with lots and lots of incorrect information. Nobody fact checked my book, for instance. In fact, only a very few of the magazines I write for fact check articles I submit either. (Once FamilyFun called to verify that my daughter really was the age I said she was in an article. This made me laugh since they were asking me – the original provider of the information – to verify that the information I provided was correct. Luckily, I hadn’t forgotten how old my daughter was in the few months since I had sent in the article.)

It’s enough to throw your hands up in despair, isn’t it? Well never fear. Just as there is no hope remaining, in enters ORIGINAL records. It’s at this point when my daughter gave me a look that said, “You’ve got to be kidding.” I didn’t even begin the discussion of original records that are WRONG. Instead I just said, “Don’t worry. It’s a fifth grade paper. Your teacher doesn’t expect you to dig through archives in Ireland to find original records of Irish Step. I’m sure Wikipedia will be just fine.”

Two Common Mistakes People Make Tracing Immigrant Ancestors

2011-04-12T10:52:00.000-07:00

NERGC is over now for two years. It was such a fun conference that I was sad to see it end. I‘ll post a couple of pictures at the end of the post.

Over the past three weekends, I have spoken at three fairly major conferences: The Fairfax Genealogical Society Spring Conference, The Ohio Genealogical Society Conference, and the New England Regional Genealogical Conference. During those three weeks, I have had lots of opportunities to talk to people about their immigrant ancestors – and their immigration research hurdles. This has gotten me thinking….

Of course, there are a wide variety of reasons that we may have trouble finding our immigrant ancestors. It is certainly possible that a person could be doing everything “right” and still be having trouble finding their immigrants ancestors. Some of these research problems can be very tricky and our ancestors aren’t always in the records we think they should be.

That said, I have noticed two major mistakes that people tend to make that prevent them from finding their ancestors. If you’ve been doing research for a while, you may not find these surprising. (And you may have different opinions. I’d be curious to what others feel are the most common mistakes that prevent people from finding immigrant ancestors.)

1) Flexibility in name spellings. There’s a quote I use in one of my lectures from William Thorndale in The Source that says, “An enormous amount of genealogical research fails because people do not take simple precautions in searching for spelling variants.” This is ESPECIALLY true in immigration research. (And no – it wasn’t because your ancestor’s name was changed at Ellis Island. You can read my thoughts on that here.)

There are lots of reasons that our ancestors’ names change spelling and many of them are covered in my post on Ellis Island. But what it comes down to are a couple of things: our ancestors spelled phonetically – based on how things sounded instead of how they were written. Spelling was not important to them. Add to that the language barriers that occurred when our immigrant ancestors said their names to US record keepers. Often they were unfamiliar names spoken with unfamiliar accents and sounds. And the record keeper wasn’t that concerned about spelling either. Think of EVERY possible way your ancestors could have spelled his or her name. Also become familiar with how the name may have been pronounced in the country of origin. As a researcher, you must be flexible – and sometimes creative. You can read more in my article here.

2) Trying to jump to Western European records without fully utilizing US records. Often people ask me what GERMAN (or SWEDISH or ITALIAN etc.) records they can use to find their immigrant ancestors. In many cases I tell them, “You can’t use any German records. You need to use US records.” In most cases, you need the European home town FIRST before you can start using Western European records. Sometimes, if you have fairly specific information, other Western European records will be accessible before you have a town name. For example, if you know the state or county etc. and it happens to have some type of large, indexed database available, you might be able to check this.

Even if this is the case, before you jump across the ocean and start trying to use those records, gain everything you can from US records. I always ask people if they have already gathered (or tried to gather anyway…) some of those basic sources such as census records, vital records, church records, naturalization records etc. You may find the town name you need. Even if you don’t, you’ll be able to narrow your search in other records more effectively.

Also, the more information you know about your ancestor on this side of the ocean, the more likely you will be able to confirm that you have the right person on the other side of the ocean. For example, if you know your ancestor is named Johann Schmidt and he was born in 1857 in Mecklenburg and you find a birth record that “matches”, will you know you have the right person? Of course not. Similarly, often people find a person with the “right” name on a passenger list – but it can be difficult to determine if this is really your ancestor. If you know the age, traveling companions, occupation, home region, year of travel, port etc. – all this can help you identify your person.

On a side note, don’t dismiss someone who doesn’t match up perfectly either. Just as name spellings aren’t perfect in the records, other information isn’t perfect either. Having an age off a bit should not alarm you. Similarly, if the naturalization record says your ancestor came 17 years ago, but the passenger list shows 16 years – this is not a cause for throwing out the record.

The point is that the more you know about your ancestor, the more likely it is that you will be able to find him in the European records – and the more confident you will be that you are really looking at a record for your ancestor.

Here I am at NERGC with Ed Zapletal and Rick Cree at the Family Chronicle booth where my book was available for purchase

I was one of the NEAPG (New England Association of Professional Genealogists) table hosts at the luncheon on Saturday. My table's topic was German research.

Elissa Scalise Powell came for a post-NERGC visit

New England Regional Genealogical Conference

2011-04-08T09:30:00.000-07:00

I am home for a pause from the three day NERGC (New England Regional Genealogical Conference) and just wanted to share a few thoughts. I had such a wonderful time yesterday! I love genealogy conferences in general, but I REALLY love NERGC. Here are my top reasons:

1) The People. I was trying to explain this to husband. I told him I almost felt like I was going to a high school reunion (I don’t think this helped him “get it” very much). What I meant though is that one of my favorite things about NERGC is connecting with “genealogy people” from all over New England – and beyond – that I don’t get to see very often. For just three days, they are all in one place. It’s great! I was talking to someone in the hall and he explained it to one his friends this way, “I’m going to a conference filled with people just like me, people who are all nuts about genealogy.”

2) Great Lectures. There are a wide variety of topics at NERGC, and at any one timeslot you have a number of lectures to choose from. Since the conference is in New England, you’ll find lots of lectures targeted to New England topics, even research in specific New England states. But, you don’t have to have New England roots to benefit from the conference. I spoke about immigration research yesterday, and saw other talks on census research, probate records, and on tracing ancestors from different countries. There are well-known speakers from around New England – and from across the country giving these lectures.

3) Well Run and Extremely Organized. I have the opportunity to have a very small part in the planning of NERGC. I oversee the Special Interest Groups which occurred last night. (These are informal discussion groups led by knowledgeable facilitators on different topics such as Italian Research, French-Canadian Research, Irish Research, Becoming a Professional, DNA Research, etc.) Being involved just a little gives me a peek into the running and organizing of the conference. Once again this year, I have been amazed at how well everything comes together. Everybody does their part and works together to pull it off. And of course some of these people devote a huge number of hours to making this conference run smoothly.

4) Close to Home! I only live about 40 minutes from the Springfield Marriott and Sheraton where the conference takes place. This means that I can sleep in my own bed and work around my family’s schedule a bit more. Yesterday, I got my kids on the bus, dropped my toddler off with a babysitter and headed to my third grader’s school – dressed in my suit since I was speaking at 12:15. At Taylor’s school, I helped the kids with some activities designed to increase their understanding of children’s lives in the 1700s and 1800s. One of these activities consisted of shaking milk until it became butter. As I was shaking this Tupperware in my suit, the teacher commented, “Don’t worry if some buttermilk leaks from the container and sprays on your clothes. It always does this.” Yikes! I tried to shake it away from me so I wouldn’t have to stand in front of a room full of people with buttermilk all over my clothes. Then, I jumped in my car and headed to NERGC.

I feel sad to miss out today, but I suppose my husband does have to go to work sometimes! But, I’ll be back tomorrow for the last day. I am doing a book signing at 11 a.m. in the Exhibit Hall at the Family Chronicle booth. So stop by and say hello! Then, I’ll be hosting a German discussion table at the NEAPG (New England Association of Professional Genealogists) luncheon, followed by Ancestor Roadshow appointments – where people have signed up to come and talk to me for about twenty minutes each about their German brick walls.

Conference attendance was nearing 800 yesterday – which I believe is a record for NERGC. So, if you weren’t able to come this year, keep it in mind for 2013!

Hobbyists in Our Midst

2011-04-03T19:14:00.000-07:00

I just returned last night from the Ohio Genealogical Society Conference. Of course, I had a great time. It was fun to reconnect with people I don’t see very often and talk to other people for the very first time. Another highlight for me – and this may sound strange if you are not a mom of little kids – was sleeping in a hotel room by myself. I always miss my kids and I’m relieved that I only have “local” speaking assignments for the next couple of months (including NERGC coming up this weekend!), but I cannot tell you how much I look forward to sleeping in a hotel room by myself. There is something incredibly luxurious about going to sleep at whatever time I want and waking up at whatever time I want. And my room at the Hyatt was absolutely fabulous…

Anyway, I am already digressing from the topic I mean to write on. While I was in Columbus, I began to reflect on the type of people who attend conferences like these. Now, I don’t mean age, gender, income levels, or even personalities. I mean what level of skills people who come to genealogical conferences have. Most of you probably know the answer to this question: they have all different levels of skills and backgrounds. I notice this so much as people come ask me questions after my lectures. Some of the questions begin like this, “I’m brand new to this and I just wanted to know….” This is followed by a very basic and general question such as, “I think my great-grandfather might have been born in Germany. What should I do?” On the other hand, I also have people who ask questions that begin like this, “I’ve been working on tracing my family for the past twenty years, but I’m a stuck on this one line.” The question that follows will show extensive efforts in searching a variety of documents and advanced skills in analyzing evidence.

Apart from this spectrum of skills, there is another important divide between people at conferences that we don’t talk about as much. Some are professional genealogists – or aspiring professional genealogists, while others are hobbyists. These hobbyists love doing genealogy (and may be new or may be experienced), but their only intention is to trace their own families.

These differences present unique challenges. When you are a speaking, you have to be aware that out there in your audience are hobbyists and professionals – sitting next to each other, each hoping to gain something from your lecture. And let me say - I think conferences generally do a good of job of meeting these diverse needs. My comments that follow are not a reaction or commentary on OGS at all – I just happened to be at the conference when some of my thoughts came together on this.

I feel like most of us recognize the difference in experience levels among people at conferences (or local genealogy meetings). But, sometimes I wonder if those of us who are “professionals,” sometimes forget that there are hobbyists in our midst. Not only are there hobbyists in our midst, but MOST of the people around us are hobbyists. It’s not a difference of skills necessarily; it’s a difference of goals. These hobbyists have no intention of taking on a client – ever, and have no desire to ever publish in a scholarly journal. And, that is just fine.

This should shape our approach. I especially think of this in regards to writing family histories – a topic I speak on frequently. In Ohio, I was thinking about what the main message I want to get across in my lecture is. It’s not “Make sure you use Evidence Explained – and follow it EXACTLY.” It’s not “There is only one way to number the generations in your family history that makes sense, so be sure you get it right.” I realized the main message I wanted to send was, “You can do it. You can write your family history.” I want people to leave my lecture with hope – not fear.

I am, of course, not saying we should promote sloppy research. But let’s face it: the great majority of people in my lecture have no interest in publishing in the NGSQ. They want to write a family history for their family. Lest you be alarmed, I talk about documentation in my lectures. I talk about Evidence Explained and the Chicago Manual of Style. I stress how important it is for others to be able to see where they got their information from.

I also talk about some writing techniques. I warn people about passive verbs, cheer for proofreading (despite the fact that I don’t proofread my blog much!), promote deleting adverbs in favor of using stronger verbs, etc. But, my deep thought after lying in my Hyatt room in wonderful solitude is that there is a more important message than verbs and footnotes.

I hope professional journals continue to hold their standards high. I hope those who publish in them meet these professional standards with their writing style and with thoroughness in documentation.

As for everyone else though, I want something a little different. I want people to write the best, most accurate, most well-researched family history they possibly can. But most of all, I want them to write their family history. Because a written family history – even if it doesn’t meet “professional” standards – is much better than no written family history at all. And you don’t have to be a Pulitzer Prize winning writer – or a certified genealogist – to write a family history that your family will treasure for generations to come.

Thoughts on Researching Family Histories from the Harford Airport

2011-03-31T05:50:00.000-07:00

I am writing this from my gate at the Hartford airport as I wait to get on my plane to Columbus, Ohio. (Or actually to Philadelphia – even though the flight isn’t that far, I still have a layover.) This weekend is the Ohio Genealogical Conference. It should be an intense, fun weekend.

The official conference starts tomorrow, but this afternoon and evening, a series of two-hour workshops are offered in addition to the conference for (generally) a $15 fee. I will be presenting one of these workshops entitled “Researching and Writing Your Ancestors’ Stories” at 4:30 p.m. I hope my flight isn’t late!! Saturday morning I will give a presentation called “Crossing the Ocean with the Internet” about immigration research, before hopping on my plane to come back home. I have glanced at the rest of the schedule and it is packed full of interesting

I love talking about doing the research to write full and interesting family histories. I often have people express to me that this is what they love about family history – not just discovering names and dates, but coming to understand their family – what their lives were like, etc. I talk about three mains ways to do this:

1) Dig Deeper in the Records. Often, the “basic” records have more clues than we realize – if we take the time to thoroughly study them.

2) Rely on the Personal Accounts of Others. Even if our ancestors didn’t write anything about their lives, we can still glean those insides glimpses by reading first-hand accounts written by their family members or friends – or complete strangers that experienced similar events and circumstances in their lives.

3) Create the Historical Context. We understand a lot about our ancestors simply by understanding the time and place in which they lived. What kinds of homes did people live in? How did they dress? What did they eat? How were family role expectations different?

In fact, even just typing this now makes me feel a flutter of impatience. I love talking about doing the research to write something – but I love actually doing the research and writing even more! And I have an exciting project underway that I haven’t had time to work on for a while. I am looking forward to life slowing down a bit so I can get back to work on it.

Actually, I think I may end my post and go do that right now…(or maybe I should glance at my lecture notes again….)

A Weekend in DC

2011-03-28T11:04:00.000-07:00

We just returned last night from a long weekend in the DC area filled with conferences, family, and sight-seeing. What more could you want?

We drove down (about seven hours plus on I-95) on Wednesday night, arriving around midnight since the last supposed 15 minutes (according to our GPS that fails to recognize traffic lights) took close to an hour. Then we were up bright and early on Thursday morning. I had grand plans of getting in line early to get tickets to go up the Washington Monument and to watch money get printed. We were in one line at 7:30 while my brother and sister-in-law were in another. It was about forty degrees with drizzling rain. (What nice relatives I have – I don’t think they were all that interested in seeing either the monument or the money, but they still stood in line in the cold rain for an hour to get tickets.) Due to the misery of the weather, we easily got tickets since anyone with any sense had stayed inside. Here's a picture of the National Mall and the Capital as seen from the Washington Monument.

We had planned to take a peddle boat out on the tidal basin and see the cherry blossoms – but we were forced to reconsider. Or I should say I was forced to reconsider. My children BEGGED to go still, but even their pleading could not persuade me to climb into a boat filled with puddles of frigid water. Here’s a super cute picture of my brother and son walking next to the tidal basin under the cherry blossoms and then a picture of everyone together.

We did still walk over to get a look at the White House, which somehow in all our trips to DC, I had never laid eyes on. We couldn’t actually go inside since you have to get your Congressman to get tickets for you months in advance and I wasn’t that organized. Here are the kids in front of the White House.

By then, we were more or less ice cubes, so we headed for the American History Smithsonian where we saw the original Star-Spangled Banner. I had actually seen it before, but it still gave me chills. It even impressed my kids.

Friday morning, we spent a couple hours at the Air and Space Museum before driving into Old Town Alexandria for lunch. Then, George and I did the kid-switch (he had been at a conference), and I headed to my conference.

I spent Friday evening and Saturday at the Fairfax Genealogical Society Spring Conference. Friday started with consultations. I found it so fun to talk to other people about their research problems which ranged from basic immigration questions to complex records and methodology questions with family stories of Germans immigrating to Argentina, German Russians coming to the US and others. I did one lecture that night then joined some of the conference planners for a late dinner. It’s a fun group of people in Fairfax and I enjoyed the dinner. I did four more lectures on Saturday, mostly focused on immigration and European research again.

Saturday night, we had dinner with some cousins. The next morning we made the long drive back to Massachusetts, with a quick stop for lunch at my brother’s house in Forest Hills, NY (in Queens).

When we got home last night, my husband asked the kids what was their favorite part of the trip. After seeing the White House, Roosevelt Island, the Jefferson Monument, huge spy planes, Dorothy’s ruby slippers, and many other amazing things, as well as playing with all kinds of cousins on Saturday, Sarah Ann (age 5) remarked instantly, “seeing the deer cross the street on the way to Uncle Tim and Aunt Chris’s house.”

I’m so glad we spent 15 hours in the car for that.

My Glamorous Job Writing About Western European Civil Registration Records

2011-03-22T08:34:00.000-07:00

The other day I was checking out at the grocery story and for some reason (I can’t remember exactly), the clerk asked what I do for my job. I told her that I write for magazines.

“Oh, wow,” she said, her eyes wide. “That sounds so exciting….” I could see her looking at me - wrestling my toddler, with my hair tied in a knot on the back of my head - trying to figure out how I got such a “glamorous” job (people have actually even used the word "glamorous" before). “So what kinds of things do you write?”

“Right now, I’m working on article called ‘Using Civil Registration Records in Western European Research,’” I told her. I could have just said, “I write for history and family history magazines,” and left it at that, but I just couldn’t resist.

She stared at my blankly for a minute – maybe to see if I was kidding. When it was obvious I wasn’t, she said, “Oh.” Her moment of being impressed with my glamorous job was now over. Suddenly, it didn’t seem too exciting anymore.

But, it IS exciting! I submitted my article yesterday morning and absolutely thought it was interesting. So I wanted to share a few things I wrote about here with other people who might also think civil registration records are exciting and glamorous! For a full account, you’ll have to wait for a forthcoming issue of Internet Genealogy Magazine. (I’m sorry to leave you in suspense until then.)

Here’s some random (and interesting) tidbits about civil registration records in Western Europe:

1) Civil registration records usually don’t go back nearly as far as parish records, but some do date back fairly early. For example, in France they begin in 1792.

2) Napoleon brought civil registration to many of the countries he took over, but these countries weren’t so sold on the idea. As soon as he left, most of them quit recording the information. But many places have these brief, early records sometimes written in French – and possibly using the French Republican Calendar.

3) In the Netherlands, civil registration records are the most important records for post-1811 research. And, they are coming online at Genlias (a fee-charging website).

4) Civil registration records began at different times in different states of Germany and Italy since these countries didn’t form until relatively late.

5) The Scandinavian countries do not have very good or very useful civil registration records.

6) Scotland has great civil registration records that begin in 1855 and can be accessed at ScotlandsPeople.

7) Civil registration records can often be more complete than parish records, and in many areas are indexed (sometimes even with ten-year indexes).

8) I haven’t written anything here about English civil registration records, because I find them annoying. (Don’t worry, I did include them in my article – and I didn’t say I thought they were annoying). You can find the indexes several places online, most notably FreeBMD – which is, surprise, surprise, FREE. But, the records are not open to the public and must be ordered. And if you have tried using these indexes and have an ancestor with a name like James Harris like I do, you will understand why they annoy me. That said, civil registration records provided the key to unraveling a mystery on my family. But that’s a story for another day. Here’s the record that did it though:

Now, if that’s not glamorous, I don’t know what is.

Tomorrow we leave for the DC area. I will be speaking at the Fairfax Genealogical Society Spring Conference on Friday evening and Saturday. I will be giving a total of five lectures and doing some consultations too. I’ve never done five different lectures all at once like this. I’ve done four a number of times. I’m worried about all that information fitting in my brain at one time….But, I’m excited for the conference. And I’m excited to be a tourist with my kids on Thursday. We’ve been to DC a number of times before, but there’s always more to see. (I’m not excited about spending seven - or more - hours on I-95 on Wednesday night though...)

One Lovely Blog Award

2011-03-19T18:27:00.000-07:00

In my last post, I mentioned the "One Lovely Blog Award" I had received. Here are the rules for acceptance:

1. Accept the award, post it on your blog together with the name of the person who granted the award and their blog link.
2. Pass the award on to 15 other blogs that you've newly discovered.
3. Remember to contact the bloggers to let them know they have been chosen for this award.

So, here is my list of 15 blogs that I'm passing the award along to. Some of them are newly discovered, and some are blogs I've followed for a while.

1. Renee’s Genealogy Blog, by Renee Zamora - lots of great info for the Utah genealogy scene (including FamilySearch updated) and beyond

2. Greta’s Genealogy Bog, by Greta Koehl Her blog post from March 11 has got to be the funniest one I have ever read!

3. Nutfield Genealogy, by Heather Rojo

4. AnceStories: The Stories of My Ancestors, by Miriam Midkiff I wrote about Miriam’s blog in an article some time back in Discovering Family History called “Genealogy Blogs You Need to Read.”

5. The Accidental Genealogist, by Lisa Alzo

6. FrustratedGenealogist, by FrustratedSue – This one is brand new.

7. Amy’s Genealogy, etc. Blog, by Amy Johnson Crow

8. Life from the Roots, by Barbara Poole

9. Granite in My Blood, by Midge Frazel

10. Growing Up in Willow Creek, Mary Nunn Maki

11. Musing by Linda, by Linda Woodward Geiger

12. Clue Wagon by Kerry Scott, She starts out with “My name is Kerry. I like dead people.” How you can you not like a blog with this beginning?

13. What’s Past is Prologue, by Donna Pointkouski

14. The Educated Genealogist, by Sheri Fenley

15. BeNotForgot, by Vickie Everhart

Family Skeletons in the Closet

2011-03-15T14:07:00.000-07:00

Before I write on the topic at hand, I have a comment first. You may see at the side that I have been award the “One Lovely Blog Award.” Actually, I got nominated twice. How fun! I want to say thank you to Lisa Swanson Ellam from the Faces of My Family blog and to Ginger Smith at Genealogy by Ginger’s Blog. I will be passing the award along to fifteen recipients in the next week, so please check back here for a listing of them coming soon.

Okay – but on to skeletons in the closet. One of the lectures that I give often lately is called “Writing a Page-Turning (But True) Family History.” In this lecture, I walk everyone through a step-by-step process describing how to write an interesting and accurate family history. One of my slides is entitled “Be Sensitive.”
My four bullet points for this slide are:
• Protect your family’s privacy.
• Be tactful – but truthful.
• Consider the feelings of others.
• Don’t reveal your family’s “skeletons in the closet.”

I only spend a few minutes covering this – it is not one of the main themes of the talk. But it seems that inevitably it is the topic that gets the most comments and questions – both during and after the talk. It seems apparent to me that many people struggle with this - where to draw the line between being open and honest and being sensitive in their written family history. So, I am going to share my opinion. Now, keep in mind, this is just my opinion. Other people may certainly feel differently – and I have heard lectures where other people put forth a different opinion. But, here’s what I think:

For the sake of time, I am not going to talk about protecting privacy of living people. Instead, I want to focus on skeletons in the closet. I often have people share stories from their families with me that include events such as illegitimate children, severe mental illness, incarceration, extramarital affairs, and so on. What do you do with these things on your family tree?

First, keep in mind that none of us have a perfect family tree. We all have dirt under our tree so to speak. So, don’t despair. Second, I think we should differentiate between skeletons in our ancestors’ closets and skeletons in our own (or our living family’s closets). Now before I go further though I want to add a disclaimer. Each situation is unique just as each family is unique. I will share some general thoughts, but you must make your own decision about what to include in your family history based on the specifics of your individual situation.

My general opinion is if we are talking about events that happened a long time ago that do not involve living people – then put them in the history. There is nothing to be gained from hiding the fact that your great-great-great grandfather committed a crime or secretly had a second family or whatever else he did. I am not a believer in only painting our family in the best light. We need to be truthful (which is not the same as dwelling on the negative). This may bother some of your family members, so you may want to discuss it with them. If it bothers them because is involves their mother or father or someone they knew and loved, then we are moving into a gray area (possibly involving the scenario discussed in the next paragraph). If it bothers them just because it is embarrassing to admit that their ancestors were not all honorable – well, I think it’s time to move past that.

When we are talking about skeletons in the closet that include living people, then I think we should rely on sensitivity and discretion. I do not believe that a family history is the place where grandchildren should first hear that their grandmother (who is still alive) spent years in an institution for mental illness or that their grandfather committed a heinous crime. Now, if this information is freely discussed in the family and family members are comfortable with it – then by all means, put it in. The purpose of not putting it in is not to hide that it happened. It is to demonstrate sensitivity. There may be a time – further down the road – to include this, but a family history is not where it should be first revealed. We have to ask ourselves: what is the purpose of writing this family history? Hopefully it is to preserve our heritage and increase our family’s awareness of their history – but also, to draw our family together. Announcing a family secret that others are not ready to discuss is not an effective way of bringing families together. Sometimes it’s not a question of whether or not to include it, but how much to say. For example, you can certainly acknowledge that your father had a drinking problem without sharing horrific stories of his drunken behavior.

One closing comment: Please do not misinterpret my advice to mean that we should hide bad behavior in our families. I am not a psychologist and am not saying that we shouldn’t discuss and deal with these problems openly. I am only addressing family skeletons as they relate to a written family history. Also, I am not suggesting we write untruthful, glowing reports of family members whose behavior was far less than glowing in reality. I am just suggesting to be tactful when considering which bits of “truth” to include. Of course, you must also keep in mind who your audience is. If you are just sharing the family history with your own children then you have more latitude (you can feel confident including more of the “secrets”) than if you want to pass it on to all of your ninety-three second-cousins.

Why I Do This

2011-03-11T07:26:00.000-08:00

I mentioned I had some thoughts and analysis from my trip to Utah to share. I really can’t stand sentimentality (the chicken-soup-for-the-soul approach to writing), but at the risk of being sentimental, here goes anyway.

On the way home from my Utah trip last Sunday, Christian fell asleep about thirty minutes into the second flight. This left me in the position of trying to hold as still as possible for the next couple of hours so as not to disturb him. It sounds simple enough – but it’s not. Any position on an airplane with a twenty-three pound toddler draped over you gets uncomfortable quickly. I was much too uncomfortable to sleep. I had brought a book (One Year Off: Leaving it All Behind for a Round-the-World Journey With Our Children by David Elliott Cohen – I like to pretend I am someday going to follow in his footsteps…) but after an hour or so I was too uncomfortable even to read (balancing the book and supporting Christian at the same time was giving me arm cramps). This left me sitting there with nothing to do except ponder the meaning of life – or at least ponder the events of the last week or two. Specifically, it left me pondering why I do this (referring to writing and genealogy research, not sitting on airplanes with toddlers draped over me).

I’ll tell you up front it’s not for the money. I’m sure this doesn’t come as surprise to any of you, but neither genealogy or writing as a career path is likely to make you wealthy. If you are wise with your choices in your genealogy career you can make a decent amount of money and if you are wildly talented or lucky (or probably both), you can make an absurd amount of money as a writer. But in general, there are more efficient ways to get ahead in the rat race. Maybe I overestimate myself, but I feel fairly confident that I could make more money doing something else.

It is because I enjoy doing it? Well yes – I do enjoy it. I love writing and I love doing research. I find it exhilarating to speak to groups about writing and doing research. But for all those wonderful moments, there are plenty of moments of frustration, rejection, and just plain exhaustion. I don’t think enjoyment really explains it either.

It would be nice to say that I do it in order to do something that matters in the world. I feel like helping families connect to one another and learn about their heritage is important. I had people during the week tell me that my book had inspired them to want to learn about their families. That was wonderful to hear. But I’m not sure if I am altruistic enough to be solely motivated based on this. (Although maybe I should claim that I am…)

As I was thinking about the week, my mind settled on one experience that I think best sums up why I do it. It’s an experience I mentioned briefly in my last post. I was sitting in the West Jordan bookstore last Friday at a book signing at Seagull Bookstore. And although I probably shouldn’t admit this, let’s just say book signings are definitely not the reason I do this. I hadn’t been there very long when a woman came up and introduced herself. She had emailed me before and mentioned that she might come to my signing – but truthfully, in all the hustle and bustle of the trip and lectures and preparations, I had forgotten.

This woman was a descendent of Georg and Mina Albrecht, the couple on the cover of my book, also – a distant cousin of mine who I had never heard of before her email. We talked about the book for a while and about her memories of the family.

She said, “Well, you’ve certainly done a lot of work on this. A LOT of hard work.”

And I answered with my ready-answer that I say whenever someone says this. “Yes. It has been a lot of work. But it wasn’t hard work. I enjoyed it. I got so much out of it.”

Then she asked, “So, I just want to know. Why did you do it? Why did you write this book? You could have written about so many other things – even so many other ancestors. Why them?”

It had been so long since I had thought about that. Lately I think about pitches and sales and conferences and newspaper articles (and sometimes even overdue blog posts). I don’t think anymore about why I did it.

I sat there for a while and then I said. “I don’t know.”

She looked perplexed by my answer. Finally I added, “Maybe because they had a story that needed to be told. They had a story that I didn’t know.”

Then she leaned closer to me and her eyes got watery. “I just want you to know how much this book has meant to me.”

And that’s the scene I thought of on the plane as Christian made my right hand go tingly from smashing it flat against the arm rest and cutting off the circulation.

If the conclusion you came to after reading my experience is that I do this for my ancestors (to tell their story) or for this woman (because it meant a lot to her), then you are wrong on both counts.

What I realized is that I do this because of the way I felt right at that moment in the Seagull Bookstore. I suppose I do it because of the meaning it brings into my own life. And that’s why I’ll probably continue doing this (despite claiming on a regular basis that I’m going to find another profession…).

Unless of course I find someone who wants to fund sending my family on a year-long trip around the world… In that case, I would happily switch to being a professional traveler – at least for a year.

Conferences, Lectures, and Book Signings. Oh My!

2011-03-07T08:25:00.000-08:00

I just returned last night from my whirlwind eleven days in Utah. It was fun to arrive in the airport last night and see my kids. I missed them so much!

But I had a great trip. Here’s a run down of the last few days of my trip:

On Wednesday, the Cache Valley Historical Society hosted a book lecture. It was in the beautiful historic county courthouse in Logan. It was well attended and lots of fun. I was born in Logan, but moved when I was a baby, so although I don’t know many people in Logan, it still has a “home” feeling to it.

Thursday I had two book signings – at the Logan Seagull Bookstore and then at the Harrisville store (near Ogden). Although this seems to surprise people, I get more nervous for book signings than for lectures. I really enjoy speaking to groups of people – I find it energizing. I love to talk to people who come up to talk to me at book signings. But, authors are also encouraged to greet people who come in the store – hand them a postcard and tell them about your book. This is what I find a bit uncomfortable. These are people who did not come to the store to talk to me. Some are excited about my book and end up buying it. That’s great, of course. But some of them don’t even stop walking and make it clear that they want me to go away. I try not to take it personally.

Thursday night, I spoke at the Ogden Regional Family History Center. When I visit Utah, it’s hard not to feel jealous of these family history centers. In addition to the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah also has these large regional family history centers that are open long hours, have lots of wonderful resources, and are staffed with people available to answer questions for those starting out.

I headed from Logan down to West Jordan for a book signing on Friday afternoon. This was my favorite book signing up until then. I had barely arrived when I met a woman who told me some fun family stories and bought my book. I noticed another woman standing in the background waiting to talk to me. It turned out that this woman, Kathy, was a distant relative who had seen my book in the Seagull catalogue and recognized the pictures on the front as being her relatives! It was wonderful to talk to her about the family and the book. Because she comes through a different side of the family, Kathy has stories and memories that I haven’t heard before. We arranged to talk later so I can record some of these. Here’s a picture of Kathy, Kathy’s granddaughter, and me at my signing.

Towards the end of the signing, a friend I hadn’t seen since high school and an old college roommate (if you’ve read the book, this is the friend whose wedding I went to in Salt Lake City in the Swedish section) arrived at the signing too. It was fun to catch up a little.

Friday night, the Utah Genealogical Association hosted a talk at the Bountiful Arts Center. They told me they had expected about 25-30 people, but 110 showed up. That was a fun surprise due partially to the fact that Kathy Palmer, the organizer of the South Davis Regional Family History Fair, sent out an email notification of the event to all those registered for the conference, and partially due to an article that ran in the Davis County Clipper (click on the link to read the article) about my book and the talk (thanks to my husband’s aunt who contacted the paper!). It was a lively audience and I very much enjoyed the presentation.

Saturday, I attended the South Davis Regional Family History Fair. This was my first experience with the fair and I was very impressed. It was HUGE! It was held at the Bountiful High School, with the various lectures taking place in the classrooms. I taught three classes: The Journey Takers: An Inside Look at Immigration Research, Eight Ways to Cross the Ocean, and Writing a Page-Turning (But True) Family History. The whole conference appeared to be packed. Each of my classes had every seat filled and some had people sitting on the floor. I heard people commenting that every class they went to was top-notch. I didn’t get to attend any other classes, because I taught three in a row, signed some books, then headed for my next event. The conference also had a large exhibit hall with all sorts of vendors. If you live in Utah and haven’t attended this event in the past, be sure to watch for it next year. With free registration, it’s the best deal around!

That evening I had a book signing at the Seagull bookstore in Centerville. Besides talking to people I’d never met and signing some books, I also had two relatives and one of my best friends from graduate school stop by. It was great. But by this time, I was so wiped out that I had a hard time standing, smiling and greeting every person that came in.

Sunday, I packed up and Christian and I headed back home. The plane trip was tiring, but we made it! I appreciated my parents who watched Christian while I was at all these events.

I have some thoughts and analysis from my Utah trip, but I will save that for the next blog post!

The Amazing Phone Call Follow Up Part One

2011-03-02T10:47:00.000-08:00

A few weeks ago I wrote about the phone call I got from a distant cousin who had letters and photos of the Albrechts. We arranged to meet at my lecture in Provo on March 1. Well, that was yesterday so I wanted to follow up.

By the time I got to the Provo City Library, Toni and Dave Walters were already there. Toni showed me two big, clear envelopes filled with papers and pictures. My heart started to thump as Toni began to pull out the contents. I have only begun to look at the things inside. I’m sure this will be a process that takes months. But, I have already discovered some treasures and I know there are many more. On the cover of The Journey Takers are pictures of Georg and Mina Albrecht. I had these remade from negatives that another distant cousin, Steve Taylor, sent me. Toni had the original. Here’s Toni and Dave with that original picture.

A few of the photos are labeled, but most aren’t. I’m super excited to post some of them here, but I will have to wait until I get home because I don’t have a scanner here. I tried to take pictures of them with my camera, but it’s not working out very well. It’s going to take some serious detective work to track down who these people are! (A note to all genealogists: LABEL your pictures!)

Perhaps even more exciting is a stack of letters and documents written in beautiful German script. Some of the documents are dated before 1880 when the Albrechts came from Germany to Utah. I’ve already seen some letters dated post-1880 and labeled from places where I know the family lived before they immigrated. I am guessing these are letters sent across the ocean between the Albrechts in Utah and the Albrechts still in Germany. So, you may be thinking, don’t I have the letters? Shouldn’t I know what they say? The answer is: I will know what they say - eventually. But it will take me a while. They are written in the old script and my German is rusty. I feel like I have the hidden family story right here in my possession now and it’s of course very frustrating that I can’t just sit down and read it. But, genealogy requires patience sometimes, doesn’t it?

A few of the letters are in English and are, of course, easier to read. One is a four page handwritten life history of Henry (Heinrich) Albrecht, the son of Georg and Mina Albrecht - the German journey takers. It tells a little about the family's life in Germany including a story of when Henry's little brother fell in an icy lake head first and Henry saved him by grabbing him by the feet and pulling him back out. There is also a letter that describes in detail the death of Sarah Harris (the daughter of the Edmond Harris and Karsti Nilsdotter - the other two journey takers).

I will report back in another week or so with more details – and some scanned images to share.

Tonight, I will speak to the Cache Valley Historical Society (and anyone else who would like to attend) at the Historical County Courthouse in Logan, UT. Then, tomorrow I have a signing at the Seagull Bookstore in Logan, a signing at the Seagull Bookstore near Ogden (in Harrisville) and then I’ll give a lecture at the Ogden Regional Family History Center. It will be a busy day.

I am on day 6 of this 11 day trip. It has been fun, but I am really missing my three kids at home (Christian came with me). They put 11 envelopes in my suitcase before I left – one to open each day that I’m here. Isn’t that cute? They have letters, pictures, and origami. Every time I open one, I just miss them more though!

Enough writing now though. I’ve got to go start trying to read those letters!

The Inside Scoop on FamilySearch

2011-02-28T09:30:00.001-08:00

The St. George Family History Expo is over and I am now in Logan, UT. I drove the first 45 minutes to Cedar City on Saturday night after my book signing. I knew a snowstorm was coming through, but I was confident I could manage. After all, I have been driving in snow for sixteen years! Well, let’s just say it was the worst driving experience of my life. About the time I got too far to turn around, the rain changed to snow – thick, blowing snow. I went 20 miles an hour the rest of the way, often barely able to see the road in front of me. I was a nervous wreck by the time I arrived. Fortunately, the five and half hour drive the next day was much smoother!

I had a great time at the Expo. One of the highlights was a fascinating hour-long conversation I had with Jim Greene, the Marketing Director of FamilySearch. I interviewed him for an article I am writing for Family Chronicle magazine. You’ll be able to read all about it in that magazine in a few months, but I wanted to share some of the highlights about the changes – and what lies ahead for FamilySearch.

First, Jim and I spent some time talking about what has changed the most at the new FamilySearch site (not to be confused with new.familysearch.org – but the new version of www.familysearch.org). I hope most of you have had the chance to see the site and experiment with some of its new features. The site has now integrated the Wikis that have been in development for some time. You’ll find them under the “Learn” tab. I was relieved to learn that EVERYTHING that was formerly included in the Research Outlines, Resource Guides, Letter-Writing Guides etc. is now found here.

Access to original records continues to expand. Many of the changes that I had been hearing about for years have now been implemented in this section. In addition to adding digitized, indexed records that you can access on FamilySearch, they have also begun to implement two other models of accessing records. First, they have begun to put digitized images online that you can browse even before they are indexed. And second, you can now find searchable indexes on FamilySearch that link to commercial websites (often requiring paid subscriptions) for images of the original records.

Finally, I have been hearing rumors for years of a new, integrated Family History Library Catalogue (FHLC). In fact, I was supposed to write an article on it some time back, but the article was canceled because the new version of the FHLC kept getting delayed. But, now it is up and running – or some parts of it are, anyway. Now, when you search the FHLC, if the record is available on the FamilySearch site, there will be a link to the record. And here’s a sneak peek into the future: FamilySearch envisions a day when this will be open to the community just like the Wikis are. Anyone will be able to add links to records – and not just FamilySearch records, but any online record. Sounds exciting, doesn’t it?

I also learned what else the future holds for FamilySearch. Of course, more original records will be added to the site. FamilySearch has 200 camera crews working with other repositories such as NARA to digitize records. They also continue to digitize their own records. Of course, indexing lags far behind the digitization. So if you aren’t already helping with indexing, don’t forget that your help can bring these indexes online faster by participating in the program (you can learn more here).

I also wanted to know what the future was for the confusing array of sites. Now, there is www.familysearch.org which has the new facelift. From there, you can link to the “old” FamilySearch site. And finally, if you are a member of the LDS Church you can access the interactive family trees available at www.new.familysearch.org. In the future, these will all be combined to one FamilySearch site – open to everyone. The interactive family trees will not only allow people to change and correct information as they do now, but upload original documents, photos etc. to the trees like many personal software programs currently do. When will the general public gain access to these trees? FamilySearch plans to begin to unroll it soon – but only a little at a time to make sure their server can handle the additional users.

I also asked Jim about the reception the changes have received. He was very honest about this, telling me that at first the response was overwhelmingly negative. He attributes this both to changes they needed to make and to the simple fact that is often hard for people to get used to something new. Over the past couple of months, the feedback has shifted to include more positive responses, but negative responses still outnumber the positive. He encourages anyone with specific criticisms (not the blanket “I hate the new site”) to send their comments in to FamilySearch because they read these carefully and try to make adjustments accordingly.

For more information, watch for my upcoming article in Family Chronicle Magazine.

I also wanted to post a few pictures from the conference. Author Bridget Cook was the dinner speaker on Friday night. Here she is (in the center) talking with two attendees. She talked about our genealogy skeletons in the closet and her new book, Shattered Silence: The Untold Story of a Serial Killer’s Daughter. Probably few of us have skeletons in the closet that large!

Here I am at my book signing in the exhibit hall with a distant cousin I just met. I mentioned one of my ancestors in my lecture and Joyce came up afterwards to tell me that we shared this ancestor. What a fun surprise!

Hanging Out at the Exhibit Hall at the St. George Family History Expo

2011-02-25T14:52:00.000-08:00

I am now sitting inside the exhibit hall at the St. George Family History Expo. It’s a little dead right now since most people are in a lecture. There’s a lot of wonderful lectures, but I also like hanging out in the exhibit hall.

After my lecture in Henderson last night, I hopped in the car and drove an hour and a half to stay with my old college roommate. We stayed up until 1 a.m. (which is 4 a.m. in Massachusetts) talking and catching up – and now I am feeling the consequences of it! I wish I could find a little corner and curl up to take a nap right now!

This morning, I drove the rest of the way to St. George and gave my first lecture at the conference “Beyond Names and Dates: Uncovering Your Ancestors’ Stories.” In this lecture, I read a section of my book at the end. This section tells the story of Edmond and Eliza Harris. I don’t want to steal my own thunder, but the basic premise is that Eliza and her two small children set sail in 1855 from Australia to California. On October 4, their ship crashed into a reef – with disastrous consequences. Although my ancestors didn’t leave behind any descriptions of the event (or anything at all actually), others described the wreck in detail. It really is a tragic, heartbreaking story.

I have read this story lots of times as part of a lecture. Yet, as pathetic as this may be, I still get emotional when I read it. It’s actually kind of embarrassing. It reminds me though of how deep the personal connection we feel to ancestors can be when we do the research to “get to know them” – when they cease to be just names and dates to us and become actual people.

But, back to the conference! Why do I like hanging out in the exhibit hall so much? I enjoy wandering around all the booths and seeing everything they have to offer. There’s someone here with a “black sheep” display. He is an expert on researching criminal ancestors. He sells a book, a T-shirt, and even stuffed black sheep that he collects from around the world. I enjoyed talking to a woman from the Daughters of Utah Pioneers (DUP) here in St. George and had a nice conversation with a woman from the UGA (Utah Genealogy Association) that it turns out is the sister-in-law of my husband’s uncle – whose house I will be sleeping at tomorrow night. What a small world! FamilySearch has a large booth here as do several genealogy software programs, where people can answer your questions and help you learn to use the product more effectively.

The point here is that, of course, the main reason most people go to genealogy conferences is to attend the lectures. But, don’t forget that another one of the best reasons to attend a conference is to wander around the exhibit hall – see the newest genealogy developments and talk to people who share your interest. Often, exhibit halls are open to the public. So even if you don’t register for the conference, you might consider stopping by to visit the exhibit hall!

Viva Las Vegas

2011-02-24T16:04:00.000-08:00

I am typing this from the Paseo Verde Library in Henderson, Nevada – right outside Las Vegas. I have begun my whirlwind trip! And I am pleased to report that I survived the airplane ride with my sixteen-month-old. I do not consider myself a wimp when it comes to flying with children. Christian flew when he was one week old. By the time my third child turned one, she had flown to all corners of the United States, across the ocean on two different round trip tickets, as well as to London, Paris, and Rome. I even flew across the ocean alone with three children – ages 5, 3, and five months.

But, I was really nervous for this flight with Christian. He is a pleasant, vibrant, charming toddler – but he is BUSY. He does not sit still for two minutes. Fortunately, we had a very patient person sitting next to us on the first flight (who didn’t seem at all phased when Christian latched hold of his shirt or threw his fruit snacks at him) and even lucked out with an empty seat next to us on the second flight. Christian hardly cried (which wasn’t what I was worried about). He climbed all over me during the first flight and slept through the second one. I was absolutely exhausted when we landed in Salt Lake City, but it was not nearly as bad as I had feared. (Of course, I still have to fly home with him….) Now, he is in Logan hanging out with my parents while I am enjoying the sunshine and 60 degree weather here!

My other three children are having a “daddy party,” as they call it, at home. I cried when I went through security because I felt so sad to leave them! I talked to them on the phone this afternoon and they seem to be surviving without too many emotional scars so far.

In a couple of hours, I will speak here at the Paseo Verde Library. Then when the lecture is finished, I will drive an hour and a half to sleep at my old college roommate’s house. Doesn’t that sound fun? I hadn’t seen her in years – I’d never met her husband or any of her four children – until this past summer. While on our marathon summer trip, we drove near her house on our way to Bakersfield, CA and stopped for a couple of hours. Now, I’ll get to see her again after just seven months.

Then, tomorrow I will join the St. George Family History Expo. I am excited! They have a wonderful program lined up. I will be blogging from there as they have internet access just for that purpose. You can check out their program here. Hopefully, I’ll be back again tomorrow with a report on the conference.

My Marketing Philosophy

2011-02-20T18:43:00.000-08:00

Many of my blog posts are prompted by interactions I have with other people – and this is one of them. I got an email recently complimenting me on my energy and efforts in promoting my book. As I told this person, her comment made me smile a little. I love writing and I love doing research, but – believe it or not - I do not love marketing.

Before my book was published, I had done basically zero marketing in my life. I mostly wrote for magazines. When I would finish a magazine assignment, I would send it to the editor and be done with it. I never gave a second thought to how many people were buying that magazine or how many people might read the article. That was not my responsibility.

In case you didn’t already know this, the same is not true for a book. In most cases, the author is very concerned about who is buying the book and who is reading it. And many authors feel a great deal of responsibility for it. For those of us lacking marketing experience, it can feel like a steep learning curve.

However, I think the most difficult part of marketing is not about knowing what to do – it’s about actually doing it. Most people find promotion to be uncomfortable. It was easy enough to read books with advice on how to promote a new book. It wasn’t always too easy to follow the advice though. But, as with anything else, the more I did it, the easier it got.

Let’s take lecturing for example. I speak at various events and conferences quite regularly. When I first started speaking, I would get nervous. I really don’t get nervous now – unless it’s a particularly large or intimidating (for one reason or another) crowd – or sometimes if it’s a new lecture. I just really enjoy speaking. When my book came out though, speaking took a different turn and I felt myself becoming nervous again.

The great majority of the lectures I gave before my book would come about because a society or library or other organization would contact me and indicate that they would like to invite me to speak. With my book coming out though, I needed a different approach. In order to get the information out there, I needed to speak at more places and I needed specifically to speak about my book. My book was new so nobody would know that the book existed to even consider inviting me to speak about it – unless I told them about it.

Instead of waiting for invitations to come to me, I began choosing places I wanted to speak at. I contacted societies I had spoken at in the past to let them know about my new topic, but I also needed to reach outside my comfort zone. I chose some places that I would drive through on our marathon summer trip or other trips. Then I contacted them. Of course, the least threatening way to contact people is by email. But this doesn’t always work – especially when it’s not really clear who you should contact. Emails fall between the cracks. Phone calls sometimes work better. But they can be scary. I remember calling a major library to pitch my idea for a talk soon after my book came out. I was so nervous that I had a hard time catching my breath while I was talking to the woman. I must have sounded like I had paused my exercise video in the middle to call her!

As I have thought about my marketing efforts the last few months, I have come to the conclusion that I have developed three main marketing philosophies that have helped me.

1) (This philosophy was inspired by words of advice from another genealogist.) I began to think of my pitches etc. not as attempts to sell my book, but as simple efforts to disseminate information. Although really just a shift in my thoughts, it helped me feel less pressure. I also could feel like I was doing something useful (often offering to share my knowledge) instead of something semi-obnoxious - trying to convince people to buy something.

2) I would remind myself that I believe in my book (or for you, it could be another product – your lecturing skills, your research skills etc.). I think my book has something positive to contribute. In my case, I never wrote it with sales goals in mind anyway. I wrote it because I had a story to tell that I believed mattered.

3) Rejection is part of life. Now this was not a new philosophy. This is a necessary lesson to learn if you want to be a writer at all. I would sometimes give myself a little pep talk and say, “The worst this person can do is say no. And then I will be no worse off than I am now.” I wasn’t going to risk missing out on an opportunity just because I was afraid of what someone I would never see again (in most cases) might think of me or my idea.

So there you have it. My marketing wisdom. I am still learning as I go, but I have found that having these basic philosophies in place helps make the path a little less bumpy.

My Amazing Phone Call

2011-02-16T10:31:00.000-08:00

As anyone reading this knows, I published a book last summer called The Journey Takers. It uses the story of my immigrant ancestors to tell the larger story of the Western European immigration experience. To tell their stories, I did research for ten years. I tracked down every record that mentioned my family, every town history of any place they ever lived, and stacks of first-hand accounts of events they experienced written by all kinds of other people, in addition to reading scholarly journals and books describing the political, historical, social etc. setting of their lives. I visited the Family History Library in Salt Lake City lots of times, ordered in dusty, forgotten manuscripts from libraries across the country to the University of Wisconsin library (we lived in Madison at the time), and even trekked to archives and local churches in Germany, Sweden, and England.

In other words, I was thorough. I knew everything there was to know about the family. Or so it seemed.

Then last week, I got a phone call. This is the kind of phone call every genealogist imagines getting one day. This phone call was from a long, lost cousin (third or fourth cousin, I think) who had (are you ready for this?) original letters written from my family in the 1800s in Germany. She’s not exactly sure what they are because they are in German and she can’t read them. Maybe they are letters the family wrote to each other while they still lived in Germany. Or maybe they are letters the family wrote and sent across the ocean.

Amazing.

What do they say? I don’t know yet! She’s meeting me at my lecture in Provo and I’ll get to lay eyes on them for the first time – and leave the lecture with them in my possession.

I did thousands of hours of research, but I had no idea about these letters. Surprising? It shouldn’t be.

When I was in college, one of my professors used to talk about the “one true branch of the family tree fallacy.” (Note: I went to Brigham Young University which is probably the only place where college students can take classes about family history and professors develop theories such as this.)

The fallacy goes something like this: (I seem to be big on fallacies lately. I’m not really sure why.) Great-Great-Grandma Mary did not leave behind a dairy. If she had left behind a diary, I would definitely know about it (added silently: and probably even have the diary itself in my possession).

What is being implied: Something as important as a diary would be known to my family because, after all, I belong to the ONE TRUE branch of the family tree.

Logically, this doesn’t make sense of course. We can use my family as an example. My immigrant ancestors, my great-great-great grandparents came from Germany in 1880. They had ten children, eight of whom married. My great-great-grandfather had thirteen children, nine of whom married. My great-grandfather had six children, five of whom married and four of whom had children (one had 12 children). My grandfather also had six children. I have dozens of first cousins. Think of how many second cousins I have – or third cousins. If my immigrant ancestor kept a diary and passed it on to his youngest daughter (I’m descended from the oldest son), it’s very possible that I would have never heard of it. After all, I have no idea who these people are. Even if they had disseminated the information about the diary to their several hundred closest family members, I STILL wouldn’t know. And what if the person who had it didn’t realize its value and kept it in a box in the basement? (We won’t even consider the ghastly possibility that someone tossed it out with the trash…)

So, what can we do? Well, we can expand our circle as much as possible. Let everyone in the family know that we are collecting information about the family. Post information online so that others can find us that way. Contact not only first cousins, but second and third cousins if possible.

Of course this distant relative of mine contacted me because of my book. If there had never been a book, I would still have no idea about these letters.

It makes me wonder what else might be floating around out there about my ancestors!

Valentine's Day Traditions

2011-02-13T17:43:00.000-08:00

It seems to me that holidays are all about kids. (Now maybe this is because in my life these days nearly everything is all about kids!) It’s hard for me to imagine Halloween without children. Or what about Christmas without kids? And, I even feel the same way about Valentine’s Day.

This might not be how other people feel about Valentine’s Day at all. When most people think of Valentine’s Day, they think of romance and love – adult sort of themes – not children. But I don’t find that part of Valentine’s Day to be all that exciting (maybe that says something about my marriage…just kidding!) Celebrating Valentine’s Day in our house is still a kid-centered activity – and it’s a lot of fun (a little tiring too).

I also think that holidays are about traditions. Some of these are traditions from our families when we were children that we are passing on. But often we have traditions that we start in our own families. I wanted to share a couple of our family’s Valentine traditions.

My family lives in Massachusetts. Our families (just counting parents and siblings) live in California, Oregon, Utah, Wisconsin, Maryland, and New York. Obviously, we don’t see them on Valentine’s Day. So, every year the kids make valentines and we send them to our relatives. We go shopping a few days before and choose out special Valentine’s Day paper, stickers, ribbon etc. Then, we spend a few hours creating the masterpieces. The kids have lots of fun. (I usually want to pull my hair out about half way through the project – but evidently I’m not too terribly traumatized because I still do it again the next year.) This year, while Rachel, Taylor, and Sarah Ann designed their works of art and I helped operate the glue gun and cut our hearts, George (my husband) kept Christian (age 16 months) from climbing on the table and eating their projects. Here's a couple pictures of them.

The other thing we do every year is make heart shaped sugar cookies and decorate them. Here are the girls making the dough.

The past couple of years, we have also had a Valentine’s dinner which involves lots of heart shaped and red food. This year, we invited another family over to enjoy the dinner with us. We had some heart-shaped calzones, red strawberries, and red Cherry 7-Up (and a salad – not red). Then after dinner, all six kids (Christian was banned again, although he did manage to eat quite a few m&ms) decorated cookies.There was lots of giggling at the table as the kids read the messages on the conversation hearts to each other. (What would Valentine's Day be without conversation hearts?)

And tomorrow, my husband and I will go out to dinner by ourselves and have a little of the Valentine’s Day celebration without children!

I just can't resist one more picture - especially since I don't have any of Christian here. While I was trying to get things together for our Valentine's Day dinner, this is what Christian was doing.

(This scene - of Christian and the cat standing on the table - is one that occurs about a dozen times a day at our house.)

Hope you all have a happy Valentine's Day!

My Upcoming Utah Schedule!

2011-02-08T15:25:00.000-08:00

So, my Utah schedule is finally in place! I am excited! I will be arriving in Utah late on February 23rd and leaving early on March 6th. In those eleven days, I have eleven lectures and six book signings. It's going to be a whirldwind.

If you live in Utah - or near Las Vegas, I hope you can mark one of these down on your calendar so you can attend a lecture or stop by and say hi at a book signing. If you have friends or family in Utah, please help me spread the word by sending them a link to this blog page. If you contact me (lahuber@understandingyourancestors.com), I would be happy to send you a flyer or anything else that might be helpful about any of the events.

Please note that all the lectures (and of course the book signings) are free and open to the public. In other words, you do NOT have to be a member of the Cache County Historical Society to attend the lecture in Logan. They are sponsoring it, but they welcome anyone to attend.

The two conferences (in St. George and Bountiful) require registration. They will both be HUGE conferences with tons of speakers, vendors, and other genealogists - and fabulous opportunities for you to improve your research skills. The St. George conference costs only $65 if you pre-register and the Bountiful conference is free. You can register at the door for either conference.

You may notice that the only lecture with incomplete information is the Salt Lake City lecture on Friday, March 4. The location of the lecture is not yet known. If you are interested in this one, check back here as I will update this blog post when the location is known. You can check my website here also (note that it is in the process of being updated at the moment).

24 Feb Book Presentation, Paseo Verde Public Library, Thurs 6:30 p.m., 280 South Green Valley Parkway, Henderson, NV, lecture free and open to the public
lecture and book signing: The Journey Takers

25-26 Feb St. George Family History Expo, St. George Convention Center, 1835, Convention Center Drive, St. George, UT
Conference registration required for attendance
lectures: 11:30 a.m., Fri: Beyond Names and Dates: Uncovering Your Ancestors’ Stories
8 a.m., Sat: Crossing the Ocean with the Internet,
2:30 p.m., Sat: The Journey Takers: An Inside Look at Immigration Research
Book signing: 3:40 p.m. at the Family Roots Publishing booth

26 Feb Seagull Bookstore, Sat, 5-7 p.m., 967 West Red Cliff Drive, Washington, UT
book signing: The Journey Takers

1 Mar Seagull Bookstore, Tues 4-6 p.m., Provo, UT, 2250 North University Pkwy #C56
book signing: The Journey Takers

1 Mar Book Presentation, Provo City Library at Academy Square, in the Bullock Room on the 3rd floor of the Academy Building, Tues, 7 p.m., 550 North University Parkway, Provo, UT
The lecture free and open to the public.
lecture and book signing: The Journey Takers: An Inside Look at the LDS Immigration Experience

2 Mar Monthly Meeting, Cache County Historical Society, Wed, 7 p.m., Historic County Courthouse, 179 North Main Street, Logan, UT
The lecture is free and open to the public.
lecture and book signing: The Journey Takers: An Inside Look at the LDS Immigration Experience

3 Mar Seagull Bookstore, Thurs, 11 a.m.-1 p.m., 1114 North Main Street, Logan, UT
book signing: The Journey Takers

3 Mar Seagull Bookstore, Thurs, 4-6 p.m., 514 N 325 East, Harrisville, UT
book signing: The Journey Takers

3 Mar Ogden Family History Center, Thurs 7 p.m., 539 24th Street, Ogden, UT The lecture is free and open to the public.
lecture: The Journey Takers: An Inside Look at the LDS Immigration Experience

4 Mar Seagull Bookstore, Fri, 2-4 p.m., 1625 West 9000 South, West Jordan, UT
book signing: The Journey Takers

4 Mar Utah Genealogical Association, Fri, 7 p.m., location to be determined, Salt Lake City, Utah
The lecture is free and open to the public.
lecture and book signing: The Journey Takers: An Inside Look at the Immigration Experience

5 Mar South Davis Regional Family History Fair, Sat, Bountiful High School, Bountiful, UT
The conference and lectures are free and open to public (onsite registration required).
lectures and book signing:
9:20: The Journey Takers
10:40: Eight Ways to Cross the Ocean
12:00: Writing a Page-Turning (But True) Family History
book signing: 1:10 p.m. at the Family Roots Publishing booth

5 Mar Seagull Bookstore, Sat, 5-7 p.m., 316 North Marketplace Dr. Suite C-100, Centerville, UT
book signing: The Journey Takers

A Conversation with Pamela Boyer Sayre

2011-02-08T08:47:00.000-08:00

Last week, as part the effort to share some information at the upcoming New England Regional Genealogical Conference (NERGC), I had the opportunity to talk to one of the speakers, Pamela Boyer Sayre. I have never met Pam before, but I will meet her a couple of weeks before NERGC at the Fairfax Genealogical Society’s Spring Conference. It was a fun conversation (although interrupted by my toddler who refused to nap like he was supposed to…) and I am looking forward to meeting Pam. I thought you might enjoy learning a little about Pam too – and learning a little about her “life before genealogy” and the path that led her to where she is now.

Pam has nearly always been curious about her family’s history. When she was a child, she would listen at the door to the stories of the “old days.” In 8th grade, her teacher gave the class an assignment to find out about the origins of their surname. Pam started looking into it, and before she knew it, she was hooked! Genealogy has been part of her life ever since. Still, it has been a winding path from 8th grade to being the well-known genealogy teacher and writer she is now.

While Pam was in college, she worked for a police department in New Mexico. She didn’t have good enough vision to get a job in a high profile police department, so she worked for the New Mexico University Campus Police, mostly investigating sex crimes. Pam enjoyed the problem solving aspect of her job. She liked thinking logically and reaching conclusions that she could prove – and that would stand up in court. She also honed her skills writing solid reports. After a while though, Pam began feeling restless in her job, and got tired of the focus on the negative that was inherent in investigating crimes.

So, Pam made a career change. And no – it wasn’t to being a genealogist. Not yet! First, she worked in personnel administration, first in New Mexico, then in California, and finally in Boston, Massachusetts. Here, her boss persuaded her to learn some computer programming. Pam soon became involved in technical writing, documenting software program, and seeking to make technical subjects understandable to the average person. This new career path led her St. Louis.

Pam enjoyed her job – but there was something she loved even more. Her love of genealogy had only increased through the years. She spent her lunch breaks reading family history journals and her evenings at the local Family History Center. One day, she said to herself: There’s got to be a way to make a living doing this. And there was! As Pam said, “I finally found my niche. And I was able to use everything I had learned along the way.” Pam draws on her background of problem solving, writing reports, developing proofs, and using – and explaining how to use – computer programs to be a more effective genealogist.

Today, Pam is an integral part of the genealogy community (and a resident of Virginia). She has run a genealogy business entitled Memory Lane and has been involved in numerous societies, serving on boards for groups such as the Federation of Genealogical Societies, the National Genealogical Society, and the Genealogical Speakers Guild. Pam's real passion, though, is teaching and writing. And she has certainly been busy in these fields. Pam is the co-author of Online Roots: How to Discover Your Family’s History and Heritage with the Power of the Internet and Research in Missouri, and is the past editor of the Association of Professional Genealogists Quarterly. She has spoken in 31 different states and has taught at Samford University, Boston University, and in many other settings.

Pam will be giving two lectures at NERCG. She will speak about “Effective Editing and Writing” and on “Maps: Where to Find Them And How to Use Them.” You can check out the entire program for NERGC on its website here. And, you can register – because you won’t want to miss it! – online here. NERGC will be held April 6-10 in Springfield, Massachusetts.

Watch for interviews of other NERGC speakers being posted on other genealogy blogs this week – and get a more personal view of some of these fabulous speakers!

Life Before Genealogy - And How It Shapes Our Genealogy Paths Now

2011-02-05T17:04:00.000-08:00

I have had some interesting conversations lately that have gotten me thinking about the paths we all take to genealogy – particularly those who are deeply involved in the genealogy community either as volunteers or as professionals. I love to hear about people’s “lives before genealogy.” Of course, we each have a different path that brought us to genealogy. And I think this is wonderful – and important. Because we come to genealogy from different directions and backgrounds, we bring different skills and experiences with us. That means that we each have something unique to contribute.

The first conversation that got me thinking about this was an interview I did with Pamela Boyer Sayre. I’ll post the interview next week – so be sure to check back then. She talked about her life before genealogy working as a police detective and a computer programmer. I’ll write more next week, but you can imagine the skills that she brought with her to genealogy. The second was an interview my friend, Marian Pierre-Louis of the Roots and Ramble blog, did with me. As we talked about genealogy research and my book, The Journey Takers, I thought about how I got where I am – and then where I want to go in the future.

I have wanted to be a writer, specifically an author of books, since I was five years old – long before I had any idea what a genealogist was! There has never been a day since then that I didn’t want to be a writer. My interest in genealogy didn’t get sparked until years later. That’s a story by itself – maybe I’ll write another post about that.

In college, I was a history major. I studied at Brigham Young University, probably the only college in the country where it was actually possible to major in family history. But I didn’t. I actually considered it, but my advisor said that since I planned to go to graduate school, I would be better off with a straight history major. I focused on German history and on social history. In fact, I had a minor in sociology. One of my favorite college courses was a class called “Social History” taught by Dr. Kathryn Daynes.

In some ways, I only had a short life before genealogy. My first job out of college was working full time as a professional genealogist, tracing other people’s German roots. Still, my interest in writing and social history has continued to impact my genealogy path. I don’t take clients now. Instead, I write for genealogy magazines. I do not see myself as a genealogist who likes to write. I see myself as a genealogist and as a writer. In other words, writing is not simply part of my genealogy identity. It is an identity of its own. I have never written exclusively for genealogy publications. I have also published articles in straight history magazines on topics like colonial etiquette and Henry Hudson and in other publications on topics not really related to genealogy at all such as indigestion in pregnancy and on a program that helped narrow the racial achievement gap in Wisconsin schools. I have also hoped that The Journey Takers can reach beyond the genealogy community to appeal to people who relate to its story as mothers of small children even if they don’t relate as genealogists.

As for what the future holds, I hope to continue combining writing, social history, and genealogy. To me, they are so intertwined that it is impossible to separate them. I hope the future holds another book or two too! (A small confession: my “dream job” for the future would also combine being a professional traveler – but I haven’t figured out a way to get paid to go on vacation yet. I’m still pondering this…)

I’d love to hear about your “life before genealogy” or your "life outside genealogy" and how that has shaped your course as a genealogist – what skills you have brought with you or what skills you continue to focus on now because of your “other” interests.

Some Thoughts (and a little ranting) on Family Myths Or Why Original Records are MANDATORY in Genealogy Research

2011-02-02T07:47:00.001-08:00

I have been researching and working on writing the story of another one of my ancestors’ lately (I have grand plans for it too…) and I have been running into a little problem. At first, I could just work around it. But I keep running into this problem in different forms and it is starting to FRUSTRATE me.

What is this little problem? There are just a few pieces of information floating around out there about this ancestor that some may call family stories but I am tempted to call family myths or legends. You know what I mean. I’m sure you have some in your family too. In fact, in my Journey Takers lecture, I make the statement that we all have these stories that have been passed down and passed around in our family. Exciting, dramatic, inspiring stories that EVERYONE in our family knows. The classics are that out ancestors are descended royalty, from Indian princesses, or the classic German one that I have referred to before: the-my-ancestor-was-a-noble-who-fell-in-love-with-a-peasant-girl-and-stowed-away-on-a-ship-to-come-America-and-escape-service-in-the-Prussian-military-story. Yeah, right. I don’t believe it. But I do continue to hear it after many of lectures. (Don’t worry – I’m polite when I do. I don’t just stare the person down and say “that never happened.”)

Not all of the family stories fall into these “classic” categories. For this family I’m researching now, they mostly have to do with important events in history that my ancestor experienced. This is suspicious enough. But even more suspicious is when the events themselves may well have never happened. In other words, the event may be a myth or legend itself. Now, you may be curious by now, but I’m sorry: I’m not going to share the family story here. The reason is simply that in its little niche of history it is a hotly debated item and my point here is not to take a stand on whether this event happened or not (although I have serious doubts).

For historians and genealogists, these family stories and even historical events can be problematic. The confusing thing is there appears to be plenty of evidence that the story is true. After all, as I mentioned before EVERYONE knows about it. It is in EVERY family history. So, it is easy enough to assume that EVERYONE can’t be wrong.

Yes they most certainly can. Why? Well, because everyone got it from the same place and that place was not correct. What often happens is that this story creeps into one branch of the family or into one family history – LONG after the event supposedly happened. From here, it makes it way outward. It might start out innocently enough with a comment like “perhaps Great-Great-Grandpa Harry fought in the Revolutionary War.” After all, he lived at the right time. It’s possible. But pretty soon the comment is “Great-Great-Grandpa Harry fought in the Revolutionary War.” So did lots of other people. That’s not a very exciting story. So maybe someone adds “Great-Great-Grandpa Harry fought in the Revolutionary War and risked his life in many heroic deeds on the battle field.” And since your great aunt heard that story, that’s what she writes down in THE family history that is passed around to ALL the cousins. It has become FACT- and if you attempt to dispute or question this, your relatives will stare at you aghast: How DARE you question Harry’s integrity and bravery. He is the family hero.

Myths creep into history in general, not just family history. You all probably know that much of the Pilgrim story is now disputed, including the fact that the Pilgrims first stepped on Plymouth Rock. (And how sad, because I have been to this rock – which is a disappointment in itself since it’s about as big as my pillow.) What is the problem with the rock story? Now, I am not expert on this, but my understanding is that there is no mention of it until two or three generations later. I believe the first evidence is in a speech by Cotton Mather. So what has happened, people now say, is that Cotton Mather created the story – and it disseminated from there. After a while, it is so removed from the source that nobody knows where the story came from – and nobody cares because EVERYONE knows it is true. Once again, a story has become FACT.

So, how can you avoid this in your family’s history? It’s simple. You MUST use original sources. You must go look in the records to see if Harry really fought in the war. Historians have to go read the accounts that the original Pilgrims wrote themselves to see if they mention this rock. Back to my original problem, my ancestor was supposedly at this amazing event that occurred in 1845. The problem is my ancestor wrote NOTHING, not one word. Nobody at the time wrote about her presence at this event. This story has simply been passed down. The bigger problem is that nobody at the time recorded this event happening at all. Not until a decade later did stories of it begin to pop up in people’s retelling of what happened. LOTS of people saw it happen – but none of them mentioned it in their diaries or none of the newspapers reported it at the time? (And some of the people who reported later that they had seen it happen didn’t even live in the right town…) Fishy, isn’t it?

The moral of the story is not that all family stories are false or that you should ignore all family stories. The moral is that you must not rely on family stories alone. You must see what the records tell you – even if it means popping the beloved family myths.

BYU Magazine Review

2011-01-30T12:28:00.000-08:00

Just wanted to share my excitement in a quick post here. The current BYU Magazine has a little blurb about my book. It says:

The Journey Takers is family history at its best. Leslie Albrecht Huber (BA ’98) transforms a buried past into a living present by following her journeying ancestors as they left their homes in Germany, Sweden, and England to travel to Zion in the American West. Huber’s exhaustive research takes her to her family’s homelands and enables her to reconstitute the communities, daily life, and eras in which her ancestors lived. Following them on their various journeys, she examines the historical impact of their decisions to emigrate.

I'll post more later: my attention is needed to help my ten-year-old daughter create an eighteenth-century courtesy book for her social studies project. Due tomorrow, of course. Then, my attention is requested to read another chapter of Ramona the Brave because it is due back to the library in two days.

Upcoming Genealogy Conferences

2011-01-28T09:50:00.000-08:00

January and February tend to be slow months in the genealogy world. But spring brings an onslaught of conferences, seminars, and other opportunities to increase your genealogy skills. My inbox is filling with reminders of upcoming conferences and announcements of open registration for various conferences. I already wrote about NERGC – coming up at the beginning of April. Here are a few other conferences that are on my spring speaking schedule that you also might want to consider adding to your calendar.

Feb 25-26, St. George Family History Expo, St. George, UT There is a February conference! And in a nice warm place too. I think St. George, Utah is a much better place to be at the end of February than anywhere in Massachusetts. I’ll blog more about it as it approaches. At $65 (for those who pre-register), this conference is a steal! If St. George is too far for you, check out their website anyway. Upcoming Expos will be held in Salt Lake City, Utah; Loveland, Colorado; Overland Park, Kansas; San Mateo, California; and Duluth, Georgia.

5 March, South Davis Regional Family History Fair, Bountiful, UT. If you live near Bountiful, you won’t want to miss this free conference. They have an amazing 20 classes occurring at one time, so you’re bound to find the perfect class for you.

25-26 March, Fairfax Genealogical Society Spring Conference. Fairfax, VA If you’ve been wanting to make a trip to DC, this would be the perfect time to go – especially since it coincides with the start of the beautiful cherry blossom festival. I love to combine genealogy trips with sightseeing trips! You can register, see the program, or sign up for a consultation at their website.

31 Mar-2 Apr Ohio Genealogical Conference. Columbus, OH. This huge conference attracts hundreds of attendees every year – and brings speakers from all over the country. You can find a lecture on almost any genealogy subject imaginable. You can check out the program and register online.

16 April TIARA (The Irish Ancestral Research Association) will be hosting a Writing Conference. Details will be forthcoming on their website.

29-30 April, Worcester Public Library Genealogy Conference in Worcester, MA. The best news is that this conference is free! Hard to believe, isn’t it? Watch the Worcester Library’s webpage for more information.

10-12 June Southern California Genealogy Jamboree. Burbank, CA. There is some confusion about exactly what I’m doing at this conference at the moment, but I was invited to speak so I plan to be there! There will be a one day writing conference on June 9.

Another big conference to consider (that I won’t be attending this year – a person can only attend so many conferences in on season) is the National Genealogical Society Conference which will be held in Charleston, South Carolina on May 11-14.

And finally if you live in Massachusetts, don’t forget The New England Family History Conference on Saturday, March 26. Sponsored by the LDS Church, this conference is FREE. I’m sad to miss this one that I have spoken at for the last two years, but I will be in Virginia! You can register online and read more about the conference on their website.

Online Sources for English Research

2011-01-25T14:58:00.000-08:00

I mentioned in an earlier post that I am putting together a new lecture entitled Online Sources for Western European Research. I will give it for the first time at the Fairfax Genealogical Society’s Spring Conference.

Well, I am STILL working on it. It is taking me a ridiculous amount of time because every time I visit a website to include in my lecture, I get sucked in…I want to make sure I’m familiar with the major record sources there. Then I want to make sure I know how to navigate it. Then I find a REALLY interesting set of records that I hadn’t used before and I get sidetracked. Before I know it I have about 20 screen shots from one website which will never work since I want to cover about 15 or so major website in under an hour without sounding like an auctioneer. So, then I have to go back and focus my comments to only the VERY most important parts of the website, which I find almost painful since I hate to cut out some of my other discoveries.

Right now, I am working on the section of the lecture that pertains to English records. I thought I’d share them here too:

Genuki: UK & Ireland Genealogy
This fabulous free site has an amazing amount of useful information for genealogists with UK or Irish roots. The site is broken down into countries, counties, and even towns.
What you’ll find:
*descriptions of records, links to websites, lists of useful resources and addresses, histories, and photos.
*a gazetteer with maps.

Free BMD
The founders of Free BMD undertook the noble project of transcribing the English and Welsh Civil Registration Index (of birth, marriage, and death records) and making it available online for free.
What you’ll find:
*Two hundred million total records online
*Indexes – not the actual records.
Related sites: www.freecen.org.uk (free census records, not currently being updated) and www.freereg.org.uk (free parish records, only a small percentage online)

Find my Past
Focused on English and Welsh families, this database has millions of records to help the family history researcher. You can buy a subscription or opt to pay as you go.
What you’ll find:
*index images of civil registration records (1837 to 2006), births and marriages are fully indexed, deaths are soon to come
*complete set of census records from 1841 to 1911, with images available
*migration records including 24 million people who left the UK from 1890 to 1960
*military records – the collection is strong in World War I and World War II records

I’m still working on a section for the Origins Network. They have a new National Wills Index, which is just getting started, but looks exciting. In the past, I thought one of their most important collections was the Boyd’s Marriage Index which indexed 3.5 million marriage records, held by the Society of Genealogists in London. I am confused by their site now and can’t figure out where it went. Can anyone out there enlighten me?

On an unrelated note, I would just like to add another thought to my previous Snow Days post. My children did not attend school last Friday either – for snow of course. When I woke up this morning, there was another two inches of snow, but school was not cancelled. And now, we are under another winter storm watch for a big storm coming in tomorrow evening, when of course my husband will be out of town again and I will be shoveling. I read that many cities (including Hartford and Boston) have already passed their normal average snowfall for the year. Not to sound like a snow hater (I am a winter hater, but not usually a snow hater), but enough already!

Register Now for NERGC (New England Regional Genealogical Conference)

2011-01-23T06:27:00.000-08:00

Have you noticed that genealogists are really into to acronyms? Most of the societies I belong to or speak to are known only by a series of letters. There’s MSOG (Massachusetts Society of Genealogists), NGS (National Genealogical Society), PalAm (Paltines to America), SARA (Swedish Ancestry Research Association), OGS (Ohio Genealogical Society or possibly the Ontario Genealogical Society), and many others. My favorite is ISFHWE (International Society of Family History Writers and Editors) – try pronouncing that one! Researchers search in the IGI (International Genealogical Index) or use records from NARA (National Archives and Records Administration.

But today, I want to write about NERGC (New England Regional Genealogical Society Conference). I will be there – and I hope you will too! If you are planning to be there, now is the time to sign up. You will save $25 on registration if you register by February 15.

If you are not familiar with NERGC, of if you are still on the fence about attending, let me apply some persuasion. There are lots of genealogical conferences that I enjoy, but NERGC is my favorite! Really. I’m not just saying that because I’m on the board. (I just have a little job so I can’t take any credit for how wonderful the conference is.) If I could only attend one genealogy conference during the year, it would be NERGC. Here are a few reasons why:

1)It’s convenient. If you live in New England or even near New England, this is a conference that’s within driving distance for you.

2)It’s relatively inexpensive. This is partly because it’s close, but partly because the price is reasonable.

3)It has top-notch speakers. You won’t find a conference with a better line-up of speakers. We have fabulous, nationally known speakers here in New England – and the conference brings in top speakers from across the country. The keynote speakers this year are John Philip Colletta and Paul Milner.

4)There’s a huge range of lecture topics. Even if your ancestors didn’t live in New England, there will still be plenty of lectures of interest to you. Other topics center on immigration research, methodology, DNA research, ethnic groups, and more.

5)Besides lectures, there’s all kind of other things to do at NERGC. You’ll want to spend some time wandering around at the Exhibit Hall. You can sign up for the Ancestors Road Show and ask an expert your genealogy questions. I’ll be helping people with German research problems on Saturday from 1:45 until 3 p.m. And you can attend the Special Interest Groups on Thursday evening (I’m the coordinator for these groups). These are informal groups where you can share ideas and sources with others who have similar interest. You can see the list of topics here.

6)It’s really fun to run across genealogy friends you haven’t seen in a while – and make some new friends.

Remember, NERGC only happens every other year – so you don’t want to miss it. This year, it’s practically in my backyard – in Springfield, MA. So, mark your calendars for April 6-10.

Also, you can join me for a lecture on the European immigration experience, including tips to uncovering your own immigrant ancestors’ stories on Thursday at 12:15 p.m. The lecture is called The Journey Takers: An Inside Look at the Immigration Experience. That evening, I will probably be at the Family Chronicle booth during the opening of the Exhibit Hall since they will be selling my book. Stop by and say hello!

For more information, check out the NERGC website and read the blog. There should be a post by me with more information about my lecture coming soon on the NERGC blog.

Snow Days

2011-01-19T17:30:00.000-08:00

My kids have had two days of school cancelled and two delayed days in the last week because of snow. Blah. I really do not like snow days. This is not because I dislike my children and don’t want them to stay home. All these “canceled” days get tacked on at the end of June; and a day of canceled school in January (where we are all trapped in the house because of the miserable weather) is nothing like a summer vacation day.

Here's all the snow at our house.

Here are my two daughters "helping shovel" (notice the shovels in their hands) on a snow day last week.

On these snow days, I often get an overabundance of emails from other people who are also stranded at home. Their emails often begin “Since you’re stuck at home with some extra time, maybe you could…” Let me provide a little rundown of my “extra time” on Tuesday.

The day started at 6 a.m. when the phone rang with a prerecorded message from the school letting us know they had canceled school. (Is it really necessary to wake me in order to tell me: don’t worry, your kids don’t have school so you can sleep in?)

By 8:30 a.m., George had left for work (at 7:15 by catching the bus because the roads were too bad to drive), the kids had eaten breakfast, and then immediately Taylor (age 8) had thrown up. Great.

I was determined to do my little aerobic video like I would on any other day, so I optimistically put on my exercise clothes. I wore them around the house for the next hour while I fixed hair, set out clothes, gave Christian (age 15 months) a bath, started laundry, and cleaned up the graham crackers Christian had dumped out and then stepped on. Finally at 9:30 I started my video. I use a system called (don’t laugh) the Firm which involves a two-tiered step. After ten minutes, Christian had discovered (as he does many mornings) how fun it is to climb up and down the step while I try to not step on him. After ten more minutes, he was tired of being ignored and had attached himself to my leg and begun shrieking. I asked Rachel (age 10) if she could play with him for a few minutes. This worked for approximately 90 seconds. Twenty minutes of exercise is good for something, right?

At 10:30 I put Christian down for a nap. The kids had rented a video and so I thought this was the perfect time to work. I turned on my computer. At 10:55, Sarah Ann (age 5) came to tell me she wasn’t feeling well either. Could I take her temperature? Taylor was cold. Could I get him a blanket? I finally sat down again and (no joke) the cat walked across my keyboard and somehow turned it off.

At 12:30 I made a gourmet lunch of pancakes, eggs, and strawberries. Christian (awake again) ate all the strawberries and threw every piece of pancake on the floor. Sarah Ann looked at her food, then went and lay back down. Taylor ate a pancake, then went and threw up.

I was worried if we didn’t shovel before the freezing rain came, we’d be in trouble. So, Rachel and I went outside with shovels while the others stayed inside. I shoveled while Rachel ate snow off the top of the car. After 45 minutes (with me checking on the kids every five minutes), we were about half-way done. Sarah Ann opened the door and yelled “Taylor is throwing up and Christian is calling someone in China.” That was the end of shoveling.

In the afternoon, I helped Taylor with spelling homework, Sarah Ann with coloring homework (in theory kindergarten homework has some higher purpose, but I can’t really tell what it is), and helped Rachel read rules on eighteenth-century etiquette for a social studies project. (She got the idea from an article I published in American Spirit Magazine called Mind Your Manners.) This was followed by laundry folding, dinner cooking, dish washing, floor sweeping, etc. George was home by now and he gave Rachel a trombone lesson (I will refrain from commenting on this). I read Sarah Ann a chapter of “Ramona the Brave” and Taylor and I looked at my favorite book, Lonely Planet’s “The Travel Book” with pictures from every country in the world. Taylor told me his number one travel destination is “a country in Africa with the most animals.”

Bedtime was 8 p.m. I opened my computer again and began going through the emails with tasks for me to do during my extra time. Does answering emails count as work? (Or does blogging about snow days?)

Book Reviews, Plane Tickets, and Lectures

2011-01-17T17:36:00.000-08:00

Whenever I hear a new review is out of my book, I get nervous (excited, but nervous too)! My heart always beats quickly as I scan the review the first time, trying to intake as quickly as possible what the reviewer’s general impression of the book was. I have experienced this twice in the past week as I have run across two new reviews of my book. First, (and this one isn’t all that new, I’m just a bit slow…) The Journey Takers was discussed on the Genealogy Guys Podcast at the end of November. You can access it here . They said The Journey Takers was a book that every genealogist should read!

Second, if you subscribe to the FORUM through FGS (Federation of Genealogical Societies), you will find a review in the current issue. You can also access it online (subscribers only) here. I was also pleased with this review. Here are the first two paragraphs:

“Have you ever looked beyond your ancestor’s names and thought about what they might have said, thought or felt as they traveled the road of life? Leslie Albrecht Huber intertwines her twentieth century life with that of her ancestors’ nineteenth century lives, in her quest to understand where her ancestors came from and how the generations came to her.

Huber travels to the places in Europe from which her families originated. She began in Mecklenburg-Schwerin, Germany where the Albrechts lived before sailing in 1880 from Hamburg bound for the United States. Huber tours the towns in which the Albrechts lived in an attempt to capture their emotions during the tides of historical changes. Huber explains how she comes to different realizations about her ancestors as she walks through her own life journey. She weaves a story of life, using historical context and what might have been into a story that is hard to put down.”

I have been enjoying the relative calm of January. (Don’t confuse this statement to mean I have been enjoying January, because this would not be true at all. It is currently about 5 degrees, we have approximately two feet of snow outside, and I just read that we should get 5-10 inches tomorrow, coated by another inch of ice on top of that. Delightful. But, I have digressed again….)

I only have one lecture this month, which I gave this past Saturday. It was “Beyond Names and Dates: Uncovering Your Ancestors’ Stories” which I gave to the Greater Lowell Genealogical Club.

The calm won’t last though, so I have been trying to get prepared for the whirlwind to come. (I love speaking and look forward to my lectures – it’s just the scheduling of these along with piano recitals, basketball games, etc. can make life a little hectic.) For one thing, I bought two sets of plane tickets last week. One was to Columbus to attend the Ohio Genealogical Society Conference at the end of March where I will be presenting a two-hour workshop entitled “Researching and Writing Your Ancestors’ Stories” as well as a one hour lecture on online immigration sources. I also bought my plane ticket to Utah. I am flying to Utah at the end of February for about a week and a half to do some lectures and book events. I will post my schedule soon in case anyone from Utah is interested.

Some Advice on Hiring a Professional Genealogist

2011-01-14T08:11:00.000-08:00

First a disclaimer: This is a really long post, but I just couldn’t stand to omit any of it.

On a fairly regular basis, I get an inquiry – either by email or from someone at one of my lectures – who wants to hire me to trace their family. The short answer to this question is: you can’t. I don’t take clients. There was a time when I worked on tracing other people’s family – specifically German families – full time. But, I no longer do that. There are a few reasons for this but again the short answer: I don’t have time. I like writing too much! I spend my work time lecturing, writing for magazines- and, of course, researching my own family! This works well for me.

The next question people then ask is: could I recommend someone they can hire? What I would like to do instead of recommending a specific person is answer this question in general here on my blog. How should you go about hiring a professional genealogist?

Well, I think the first question most people ask themselves is if they should hire one at all. I can’t tell you the answer to that question. It depends, of course. However, it can be a very worthwhile thing to do. People are often surprised to learn that even professional genealogists hire other professional genealogists who may have access to records they don’t have or have needed skills in certain types of research and/or languages. A professional can save you many hours and lots of frustration. Keep in mind that you can always hire a professional to help with a certain aspect of your project, without turning the research over for ever after to this person.

So, back to the original question: who should you hire? You should hire someone with experience and knowledge in your area. Sometimes when I get an inquiry I’m tempted to reply that the person can’t hire me, but even if they could – they shouldn’t. Why would I say that? First, my expertise is in tracing German families. More specifically, it’s in tracing people who immigrated from Germany to the US in the 1800s. Genealogists have specialties because research varies depending on the place and time period in which the family lived. Could I help you with your Pennsylvania Germans who came in the 1700s? Possibly. But there are others who would be more effective. Could I help you trace your Polish family? I would probably be able to help you with the immigration part of this problem, but once we got to Poland, we’d be in trouble. Sure, basic parts of research are the same from project to project even in different locations– methodology and even some sources. I am familiar with basic sources for many places and would know where to look to figure out how to trace your Polish family. But the fact remains that I don’t have experience tracing Polish ancestors. And, I have no ability to read even basic Polish. Just because I publish articles about immigration does not mean that I have the credentials to accept money to find Polish ancestors.

As a side note: the great majority of professional genealogists would not accept a client outside of their area of expertise – and would let you know this right away. I think it’s safe to say that as group genealogists are honest and hard-working. But you should still be aware of how things work before you hire one. My point is just that nobody is an expert in everything. It’s certainly possible for people to have an expertise in more than one area, particularly if those areas share research approaches. Many US researchers specialize in regions, not just one state. Some researchers might list their expertise as including more than one Scandinavian country. However, you should be concerned about anyone who says they can do research ANYWHERE in ANY time period. You don’t want to pay someone to figure out how to research your Italian ancestors. You want to pay them to research your Italian ancestors.

Now, that leads me to another point. When I first wrote the sentence above, I wrote you want to pay them to FIND your Italian ancestors. That would be nice. That’s the goal. But, remembering you are paying a professional for his or her TIME spent searching for the family. You are not (at least not in any arrangement that I’ve ever heard of) paying him or her for RESULTS. A genealogist cannot guarantee results. She can look in the places most likely to yield results, but she can’t do hocus pocus and make your family appear there. Sometimes our ancestors just simply aren’t where they should be (which is a whole other topic….). Just because the person you hired didn’t find one single ancestor doesn’t mean she did anything wrong. Of course, people who know what they are doing are much more likely to find ancestors than those who don’t! A professional can usually tell you up front how likely she thinks it is to have success, but this is still just her best guess. Anything can happen.

There’s more to say on this topic (or at least I have more to say – but I always have more to say…) but I want to conclude with a couple of comments. First, another thing to take into consideration is what access the person has to the needed sources. This is one reason I don’t take clients. It would be difficult (but certainly not impossible) to trace German immigrants while I am living in Massachusetts. It was much easier when I lived close to the Family History Library in Salt Lake City. But for other types of research, living in Massachusetts is perfect. And finally: Anyone can claim to be a professional genealogist. There are two main organizations that provide programs to test these skills. They are: The Board for Certification of Genealogists and The International Commission for the Accreditation of Professional Genealogists. Their websites have lists of professionals. Should you only hire someone listed on one of these websites? I didn’t say that. What I am saying is take some time to make sure you hire someone with knowledge and experience in your area.

Online Sources for Western European Research

2011-01-11T08:43:00.000-08:00

I have been working on a handout for a new lecture that I will give for the first time at the end of March at the Fairfax Genealogical Society’s Spring Conference. The lecture is entitled “Online Sources for Western European Research.”

Obviously, this is a HUGE topic. I could easily fill an hour lecture with online sources for just one Western European country. But, I am going to attempt to cover all of them. Of course, I’m not really going to be able to talk about every Western European online source out there. So I suppose it would be more accurate to say that I am going to attempt to provide an overview. I am not including immigration records since I am giving another lecture which focuses on these.

This lecture is based on an article I wrote for Internet Genealogy Magazine a year or two ago. (Nearly all of my lectures are based on magazine articles I wrote.) I chose this topic because I felt like it was an area that has changed quite a bit in recent years, and I felt that many people are not aware of what is online that could make their lives easier. (And I’m all about making life easier.) I was excited about the article and I am also excited about putting the lecture together.

That said, I am having all kinds of problems. I’m having a hard time choosing which websites to include, deciding how to arrange the material, and figuring out how to make the presentation informative AND entertaining – so that people don’t feel like I am just jamming website after website down their throat (which I believe would make people inclined to fall asleep – a scenario that I try to avoid as a speaker, although I have had on more than one occasion someone snoring in the audience and once even on the front row. I like to tell myself that it was because they took some decongestant that says it is “non-drowsy” but actually is very much drowsy-inducing and not that I am so boring that sleeping while sitting up in a hard chair was more appealing than listening to me. But, I have digressed….)

I haven’t come up with the secret to making a list of websites exciting (except that the websites, of course, are EXTREMELY exciting just in their existence, although not everyone may share my enthusiasm). But, I did want to share just a small sampling of websites here. I’ll start with a couple of overview sites, then include a couple of country specific sites that have original records available.

WorldGenWeb

Similar to US GenWeb, but on a global scale, WorldGenWeb is a geographically organized volunteer-run website. Each Western European country, and sometimes even state or county, has its own site. The sites are all different in their thoroughness and content but may contain maps, descriptions of records, addresses of archives, query boards, social history descriptions, and a variety of other types of information.

ProGenealogist’s Specialty Websites for Genealogy Research

Progenealogists is a professional genealogical service, but it’s site is also packed full of useful information. On this section of their website, you’ll find a list of countries with links. Follow these to find great articles about history, research methodology, and records written by some of the most knowledgeable experts out there. You’ll also find, maps, gazetteers and sometimes extracted records.

Danish Demographic Database

Researchers with Danish ancestors won’t want to miss this site. Start with the “Emigrants” section to find information on nearly four hundred thousand people who left Denmark from 1869 to 1908. The search, which brings up transcribed entries, is free. Also, try the “Census” section to search an extensive collection of census records (organized by parish and then county). The “Other Sources” section contains some other odds and ends. You can pay to get actual copies of the records or have further research done.

Digital Archives of Norway

The Norwegian National Archives channels their material here as it becomes digitized. With free services, lists of databases, and millions of names, this site is the online place to look for Norwegian ancestors. (Do a google search for the title of the website if you don’t want to type in the long address.) Here you’ll find several censuses, and a growing collection of parish records that will eventually include 1.85 millions pages. You’ll also find other records, photos of farms, and links to tutorials in Norwegian research.

Genlias, www.genlias.nl/en/

Genlias represents the collaborative effort a number of archives in the Netherlands. Their ambitious aim is to enter all the data from the open civil registers (the most important Dutch genealogical source covering the post 1811 period). The project is well underway with 14.4 million records representing over 58 million people already available online. The search is free; copies of original records can be ordered for a fee.

Oh, I have to stop…But there are so many more….You see the problem?

My Thank You Card

2011-01-09T15:39:00.000-08:00

About a month ago, I wrote about doing my book talk for my daughter's fifth grade class. I shared a few of their very creative questions.

A while ago, my daughter brought home a thank you card that her class had put together for me. I wanted to also share a few of these. They're great!

First, my favorite one of all:
"I am glad I don't have to live with a cow in my house." (My PowerPoint presentation included a diagram of a typical landed household in Germany in the nineteenth century - which shows that the family and farm animals all slept under one roof.)

"I'm so glad that John didn't get thrown overboard for seasickness." (My great-grandfather, John Albrecht, who immigrated from Germany with his family when he was nineteen, wrote only one sentences about the immigration experience. He said "I know it might sound babyish for a boy of nineteen, but I was so seasick that I begged my parents to throw me overboard and my misery." This really alarmed some of the kids!)

"You're a good detective."
Isn't genealogy work really like being a detective? That's why it's so fun!

"I want to buy that book!"
This makes me smile because the book is not really a fifth-grade book. But hey - I'll take readers of any age!

Then there were a couple that to me really embody why I (and others like me) do this in the first place - why we enjoy so much speaking to others about our families and about how others can find their families.

"After your speech, I've wanted to carry on some Lithuanian traditions! This Christmas we are!"

"I know a few stories about my ancestors, but I want to learn lots more."

This made me feel like my presentation had been a success! I also thought one of my daughter's friends summed it nicely with this comment:

"I learned how hard but wonderful it is to write a book."

Don't you love kids?

A Tale of Toddlers and Grocery Stores

2011-01-06T08:57:00.000-08:00

This has nothing to do with genealogy, but I think others might be able to relate my experience.

Tuesday, I took Christian (my fourteen-month-old) grocery shopping with me. Let me give you a quick background: We have a grocery story in our little town that I make quick trips to in order to buy specific things I’m missing. But, this store is a bit overpriced. Twenty-five minutes away is another store: a Super Wal-mart where everything is much cheaper. About every two weeks, I head out there to restalk on just about everything. And when you have four children, this means massive grocery shopping. Basically, I stalk my cart until nothing else can fit in it.

I dread, DREAD going to Wal-Mart. It is crowded, a bit disorganized, and overwhelming. But being the devoted mother than I am, I suck it up and make my trip anyway (only when we are out of EVERYTHING from butter to toilet paper and my husband absolutely CANNOT go). So, off Christian and I went to Wal-Mart on Tuesday with my carefully prepared, long, detailed grocery list.

About one-third of the way into my grocery trip, I realized we had developed a problem. The grocery stack in the back of the cart had now grown high enough that when Christian twisted himself around, he could reach the groceries. As soon as he could grab something – anything – he began his favorite grocery store game: throwing as many things as possible from the cart onto the floor. And every time a new item made a resounding thud on the ground, Christian would laugh gleefully.

This is my fourth child. I am not easily flustered. I tried distracting him. I tried scooting everything to back of the cart. I tried taking things out of his hands before he could throw them (which made him laugh even harder – convinced that this was a really fun tug-of-war game). But no matter what I did, as I tried to choose which spaghetti sauce to purchase, Christian chunked canned creamed corn over the side. Soon, I was not carefully selecting spaghetti sauce – I was grabbing sauce – with mushrooms, the gourmet expensive kind – whatever – as long as it was spaghetti sauce – and shoving it into the cart in an effort to speed up the process.

Before long, our problem developed a new dimension. Whenever I parked the cart near the shelves, Christian began gathering everything he could reach from the shelf and dumping it INTO the cart. As I mentioned before, Wal-Mart is crowded, so parking out of reach of the shelves was nearly impossible.

A few minutes later, Christian became fixated on my pen and grocery list. I was still not flustered, but I was distracted. So, I let him hold the grocery list. Can’t hurt, can it? We turned down another aisle and then one more. I needed my grocery list again. That’s when I noticed that Christian didn’t have it anymore. I went back to the previous two aisles, but it was nowhere to be seen. (I still can’t figure out what he could have done with it….) I was about half way through the grocery trip, and I had no idea what to buy.

We finished the trip quickly, with me doing the best I could to remember what I had meant to buy, and Christian throwing lunch meat, cheddar cheese and granola bars on the floor with amazing speed.

We got to the check-out line to discover there was a long, slow line (surprise, surprise). Christian had had enough of the cart by now and decided he wanted down. I know what happens when you put toddlers down in the grocery line. So, I tried distraction – peek-a-boo with tortillas, guess which hand the green beans are in – but none of it worked. I even tried a pacifier (usually reserved for nap time). He wanted OUT. He screamed loud enough that people around me in line turned to stare at me.

I pulled him out just as my cart reached the front of the line. I tried placing items on the conveyer belt while I held Christian in the other arm – as he kicked and screamed and did everything possible to propel himself down – out of my arms. I found it impossible to pick up food while trying to manage a 24 pound mass of flailing arms and legs.

Now I was flustered. Just a little.

I sat Christian down. He ran behind the cart and began pulling things off the shelf. I pretended I didn’t notice and piled my groceries onto the belt as fast as possible. When I stole a glance back at him, I found that he had stacked teddy graham containers six high, carefully balancing each one.

I paid for the food, crammed the teddy grahams on the shelf, forced Christian in the cart, and headed for my car.

When I got home, I realized I had forgotten to buy toilet paper.

Uncovering the Stories of Immigrant Ancestors

2011-01-03T08:31:00.000-08:00

The January issue of Internet Genealogy is now available. If you are unfamiliar with this magazine, it is a practical, how-to magazine that focuses on websites that are useful for genealogists. It is published by the same group that publishes Family Chronicle Magazine.

On page 22 of this new issue is an article I wrote called “Uncovering the Stories of Our Immigrant Ancestors.” I thought I would share some tips and resources from my article. I start out by explaining that in order to uncover your immigrant ancestors' stories, you have to first know that basic facts. Begin by finding those bare-bone documents that will provide you with the outline of their lives. For immigrant ancestors, this means parish records for their early life in Europe (or wherever they came from), immigration records that show their ocean voyage, and then records such as church, vital, and census that provide dates and places for the remainder of their lives in the US.

I don’t want to spend too much time on that aspect of research. Instead, I want to move on to the next step – on resources that can help you take your ancestors’ stories from a listing of facts to an actual story. The key is to fit them into their environment. Here are some suggestions that I included in my article:

1) Get oriented by reading a general history of the time and place your ancestors lived.

2) Next, learn about the social history of their time and place – what life was like for the “common” people. One book I like for Europeans in the 1800s is Life in the Long Nineteenth Century, 1789-1913, edited by David Kertzer and Marzio Barbagli.

3) Become familiar with what the immigration experience was like. One suggestion here is: Coming to America: A History of Immigration and Ethnicity in American Life by Roger Daniels. A great website is by Harvard University: Aspiration, Acculturation, and Impact: Immigration to the United States, 1790-1930.

4) Narrow your search to local histories (this isn’t in my article, but it’s a good idea anyway!). Many towns and parishes kept their own histories. Contact a local historical or genealogical society – or the town or church itself. I’ll post more about this later.

5) Read firsthand accounts written by others. This gives you that personal insight into experiences your ancestors might have shared with others who kept written accounts. Pay attention to sources in social histories or look for sources covering specific events that your ancestors were part of.

For more suggestions on books that might help you, visit my website. Choose the “Ancestors in Specific Locations” from the bar on the left hand side. Each of these sections has a subsection with books and websites that cover sources relevant to that place. Sources in the Mecklenburg section, for example, will be useful to anyone with German roots, not just Mecklenburg roots.

To see more of what is available in the January issue of Internet Genealogy, visit their website here.

Also, some of you might be interested to know that Internet Genealogy currently have an “appeal for submissions.” To quote from the magazine, “We are in the early stages of planning a new book, a follow-up to our successful Brickwall Solutions series. Tentatively titled Internet Brickwall Solutions, we want to hear how you overcame your brickwalls using the World Wide Web! Please e-mail your submissions (Word document or RTF file) to brickwalls@internet-genealogy.com. Please limit your submission to no more than 500 words, and include images (200 dpi or higher) as a separate email jpeg attachment, with caption details.

So, here’s a chance to have your story in print!

Favorite Narrative Family History Books

2010-12-30T12:46:00.000-08:00

During the holidays and particularly on my long flight to and from Hawaii, I was able to do a little bit of reading. (Imagine that.) It was quite a production even for me to select which books I wanted to bring on the plane with me – I had such a long list of things I wanted to read. I ended up bringing a ridiculous amount of books (I think I had 5 books), of which I only read part of one. In ordering my books, I began reflecting on some of the best “family history” books I have read. I thought I would share some of these.

First, my criteria: I did not choose any “instructive” how-to books. These books had to be narratives. They had to be nonfiction and cover several generations of a family’s story. Some of them are old, and some are new - and on my desk right now. (Of course, my book would go at the top of this list, but these are ideas for after you’ve FINISHED reading my book!)

1. Family by Ian Frazier. This is one of the books that truly shaped my course in life. I read it as a college student and instantly knew that I wanted to write a book like that someday. This book describes Frazier’s “ordinary” family through several generations of American history. Frazier is the master of understatement. I have tried to model this in my own writing – describing actions that show emotions instead of always stating emotions directly. For example, he describes losing his brother when he was young. He tells about his parents getting back in the car after his brother’s death, describes their slow, methodical actions. Then states simply “It was the worst day of my life.” That’s all he needs to say. It’s so powerful! One of my favorite quotes, one that I use in my book lecture, comes from this book. Frazier says (I am paraphrasing): While we are required to love all of our descendents equally, the same doesn’t apply to our ancestors. We are allowed to have favorite ancestors because they aren’t around to know about it.

2. The Big House: A Century in the Life of an American Summer Home by George Howe Colt. He uses the history of his family’s vacation home to describe his family and the changes that have come over them – and their environment - during the past one hundred years. (The house is on the Cape which endears it to me even more.)

3. Red House: Being a Mostly Accurate Account of New England’s Oldest Continuously Lived-In House. Here’s another New England house book. Messer parallels the life of the family that owned this house for generations with her own family who buys the house.

4. Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China by Jung Chang. This is possibly my favorite book of all time. Everyone, everyone, should read it. Chang traces her Chinese family through three generations, weaving in the incredible events of Chinese history that shaped them – and those around them.

5. The Sacred Willow: Four Generations in the Life of a Vietnamese Family by Duong Van Mai Elliott. Fascinating! Elliott’s book starts in the past in rural Vietnman and finishes with Elliott’s life as her family escapes from Saigon and she eventually marries an American man.

6. Mosaic: A Chronicle of Five Generations by Diane Armstrong. This tells the story of a Jewish family beginning in 1890 and stretching to present day, including stories of her family during the Nazi regime.

7. In My Blood: Six Generations of Madness and Desire in an American Family by John Sedgwick. This is the book I read on the plane to Hawaii. I’m about two-thirds finished with it. The thread that extends through time as he traces the generations of his family is mental illness. I’m enjoying the book.

8. Shaking the Family Tree by Buzzy Jackson. I ordered this in from the library, but haven’t started it yet.

Of course, this is only a few of many possibilities. I would love to hear other people's favorite books in this category.

My Family History Christmas Present

2010-12-25T17:58:00.000-08:00

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas. We had a delightful day with our kids and my parents. Monday morning, we will travel to New York City for a couple of days to see more family.

I wanted to share a little with you about a gift I got this year from my mother. Under my tree were three binders:

1) The "Document Binder", as my mom called it, contained pages and pages of documentation of my life. This binder contained a vareity of papers such as my birth certificate, kindergarten report card, standardized test scores, a newspaper announcement from when I won a story writing contest in second grade and got to read it on the local radio, a school newspaper article announcing the winners of the kite-flying contest (I won 3rd place in the "most unique" category), swimming class certificates of completion, dance recital programs, my high school graduation program, etc.

2) A Photo Album of my childhood. The photos began with baby pictures and school pictures such as this one:

There were sections with my siblings and me, as well as some photos of me with my grandparents and great-grandparents. The one below shows my brother Mathew (age 1), my great-grandmother, and me (age 3).

A section at the back was entitled "Heritage." Here, my mother had placed photos of her parents, my dad's parents, both of my parents as children, and pictures from my parents' wedding.

3) The last binder was the thickest. It contains dozens and dozens of family letters my mother had written to her family when I was growing up. They're full of stories of me writing on my walls with crayons, blessing the butter, bread, and even my shoes in the dinner prayers, and sleeping with a dozen dolls in my bed. They stretch until when I was adult and include some letters that I wrote to my parents from college, and even my mother's reaction when she learned I was pregnant with my first child. One of my favorite letters is dated October 1979. It's a letter my mom wrote to me on my third birthday. I wanted to share a couple of sentences from it:

"When I think of you, I think of scraped knees and golden hair clear full of sand. You love hot dogs, going to the park, and having books read to you. You dislike sharing your toys with Mathew (my younger brother) and being quiet and sitting still in church. You can ride your trike all by yourself almost all of the way over to the university and back. You can count and read the alphabet. Because you act so smart and are so tall, everyone thinks you're older than you are. But when I tuck you in bed and you put your little arms around my neck and give me a hug, you seem so small and vulnerable. I wish that I could protect you from all of life's sorrows, but I can only hope that life will greet you with the same enthusiasm and love that you rush into it with it."

Needless to say, these binders were my favorite gift. Part of the reason, of course, is because the family historian in me was cheering at how these pictures and letters had been collected and preserved. But the bigger part was because of the memories and feelings these binders brought flooding back into my mind. It made me motivated to save some of these important things - documents, photos, and letters - for my children so that someday perhaps I can give them a gift as special as the one my mom gave me today.

Hawaii Part III (last one - I promise)

2010-12-20T21:40:00.000-08:00

I promise to post something useful about genealogy research after this, but I just had to finish with some pictures from our last two days in Hawaii.

Sunday morning, we began adrive up north, stopping in the little town of Hanalei to attend church. The northern coast of Kauai is absolutely amazing. Kauai is known as the Garden Island, and it's easy to see why. We felt like we were driving through a jungle. Here's a picture of the scenery across the street from the church.

After church, we continued our drive to the end of the road - literally. The road on the northern coast of Kauai ends at the Na Pali mountains, which are too rugged for roads. The Na Pali coast is known for its breathtaking beauty, but the only way to see it is by helicopter, boat, or hiking. The first two options are out for me because of my suspectibility to motion sickness, so we had opted for hiking (my preference anyway). We started at Ke'e beach on the well-known Kalalau trail. We only planned to go the first two miles to the Hanakapaia Beach. Not to be cliche, but really I don't think there is any way to describe how absolutely beautiful the hike was. The photos don't do it justice. But here's a couple anyway!

When we got back, we were covered in mud and dripping wet (it drizzled for most of the hike). That night, we enjoyed an anniversary dinner - we've been married twelve years!

Monday was our last day in Kauai. We were worried that the weather would foil our plans (it rained basically the entire time we were in Kauai - I guess a place doesn't become the "Garden Island" without a lot of rain!), but it didn't. We drove to Waimea Canyon, known as the "Grand Canyon of the Pacific."

Before returning to the airport, we also made a quick stop at Spouting Horn, a lava tube where the ocean spurts up through.

I can't resist one more image of Kauai. Every place we went - the canyon, the beach, the jungle, our hotel, etc. - there were wild chickens and roosters (known as moa) everywhere.

I wanted to close my vacation posts with a little thought (yes - I'm waxing philosophical about vacations....). From the time I left Massachusetts, until the time I got to the Honolulu airport, I only checked my email - or got online at all - one time. I didn't lay awake at night and think about all the things I had to do. I didn't stress about how my book was or wasn't selling. And somehow, the world still didn't collapse. It has been an intense few months - but for a while, life wasn't intense. It was about beaches and flip flops and yummy food.

Obviously, life can't always be about beaches. And obviously I can't go to Hawaii every month - or even every year. But I can take a break from intensity, just by choosing to let go of the intensity - even for a little while.

I know - easier said than done. But I think it's worth a try every now and then.

Hawaii Part II

2010-12-20T20:51:00.000-08:00

We are now in the Honolulu airport waiting for our flight back to Massachusetts (via San Francisco). It was a fabulous trip. It already feels like a dream. I wanted to share some more pictures in a post today and then hopefully finish tomorrow.

Friday, after George's meetings, we headed east from Waikiki to the Nuuanu Pali lookout. We could see green cliffs stretching to the beautiful, blue ocean.

We stopped for a few minutes to see the Byodo-In temple, an exact replica of a 900-year-old temple in Japan.

Next, we drove to Kualoa ranch where we had reservations for an ATV tour of the mountains. The views were breathtaking - and the ATVs were fun too! Lots of movies have been filmed in these mountains including Jurassic Park.

We finished the day with a picnic at Koala Beach, across the street from the ranch. Our view included a little island known as "Chinaman's Hat."

The next morning, we caught a quick flight to the island of Kauai where we would be staying in the town of Lihue for two nights. We grabbed some of the famous Saimin noodles for lunch before driving a few miles north to the town of Kapaa. Here, we had reservations for a kayaking trip. We kayaked a few miles up the Wailua River. Then our guide led us on a one-mile hike to Secret Falls where we took a little swim before hiking and kayaking back.

We finished the day with dinner at the cutest little place ever, called Kalapaki Beach Hut, right on the beach near Lihue.

Tomorrow, I'll post a few more from pictures from our last two days. I'll see my kids in less then 24 hours! I can't wait! (I do wish I could skip the twelve hours of flights ahead.)

Hawaii Part 1

2010-12-17T10:59:00.000-08:00

We have now been here in Hawaii for two and a half days. Of course, I am missing my kids like crazy! But they are in good hands with my parents. We have talked and emailed pictures (Sarah Ann, my five-year-old, said "If you send me pictures mommy, then I won't miss you so much!").

But - we are having a great time. Hawaii is amazing! The weather is sunny and perfect. The beach and mountains are gorgeous. We are staying on Waikiki beach - which actually probably wouldn't be my first choice, but that's where my husband's meetings are. Waikiki is beautiful, I just usually prefer to stay in a little less touristy places. My husband is at his meetings right now so I decided to share a couple of photos.

We flew in on Monday evening and didn't do much but roll into bed. We still haven't completely adjusted to the five hour time change. I have woken up by 6 a.m. every morning (so much for sleeping in - it's impossible....)

Wednesday morning, we drove to Pearl Harbor to see the USS Arizona Memorial. I have included a picture below. The entire place is very nice and tastefully done. We watched a short video and then took a little boat over to the memorial that is right over the actual sunken ship where around 1000 people lost their lives on December 7, 1941.

Next, we drove up around the north shore to see the famous waves of the "surfing capital of the world."

Finally, we headed to the Polynesian Cultural Center where we spent the rest of the day visiting recreated villages from all across Polynesia, and enjoying a luau, and show. The villages and shows featured college students from the various areas of Polynesia showcasing the song and dance of their island. The night finished with a spectacular fire dance where several young men twirled and tossed sticks burning from both ends. (I could hardly watch!)Below are some of the dancers during the canoe pageant.

Yesterday, we began the day early with a visit to Hanauma Bay, about 30 minutes east of Waikiki. The bay itself is breathtaking. We rented snorkel equipment (we had never been snorkeling before) and headed out into the water. We soon found ourselves swimming directly above a coral reef among fish and even a giant sea turtle. Here's a picture from the top of the walkway looking down into the bay.

We concluded the day on Waikiki beach. We took a quick swim, watched the sunset (below), saw a hula show, and had a nice dinner at Duke's Canoe Club.

We have more fun plans on Oahu today before catching a flight in the morning to Kauai.

Lectures This Week

2010-12-11T19:45:00.000-08:00

This week I gave two really fun lectures about my book. First, on Wednesday I spoke to the Genealogy Club of Newtown (Connecticut). I drove up early and enjoyed a delicious dinner with Ray and Mary Maki, the founders, and Marian Wood, the program chair. Both Mary and Marian have blogs. You can read about the lecture on Mary’s blog or at Marian’s blog. The group meets at the Newtown library, which has a really interesting history. The money to build the library (and several other buildings in town) was left by a wealthy woman who lived in Newtown around the turn of the twentieth century. The library even has a genealogy room. The group was fabulous – so fun and interactive. As a speaker, it really makes a difference to have an audience that is responsive. (And it sure beats having someone snoring on the front row – which I have also had happen!)

Then on Friday, I went to my daughter’s fifth grade class at Chestnut Hill. I had a blast talking to those fifth graders. I got so many questions! On just one slide, there would be about six kids with their hands in the air. They wanted to know why our ancestors had so many children, what would have happened if my ancestors’ parents threw him overboard, if people gave their children Tylenol back then, if my ancestor got typhoid fever at the same time her mother died from it, and what would happen if a kid sneaked onto one of the covered wagons to ride when crossing the plains when he was supposed to be walking. Some of those are certainly questions I had never been asked before!

By the way, if you are thinking of ordering The Journey Takers as a Christmas present, you should consider ordering it from Deseret Book or Seagull Book (it’s cheapest here - $17.95). Amazon says they can’t guarantee it will arrive on time for Christmas. (Who knows why….)

My little Christian finally seems like himself today. He has been so sad and clingy all week. I could tell he felt better today because he spent his time roaming around the kitchen, opening all the cupboards and pulling everything out. As I was trying to help my other kids decorate Christmas cookies, Christian took several pot lids into the bathroom (I don’t know why) and of course dumped all the spaghetti noodles out again (I ought to smarten up and move those noodles, don’t you think?) That’s the Christian we know and love.

Two more days until we leave for Hawaii! Yesterday when my kids got on the bus to go to school, it was 3 degrees. On Tuesday, I will be sitting on the beach in flip flops and short sleeves. Amazing.

Maybe I should move to Hawaii.

Your Family's Name Was Not Changed at Ellis Island

2010-12-09T08:33:00.000-08:00

This week we had some people over for dinner. During the course of our discussion, I asked one of them about the origins of his surname. (What can I say? I’m a genealogist – I’m always fascinated by where people’s names come from.) He told me that it had been spelled differently in Sweden, but then his family immigrated and they changed it at Ellis Island.

If you are a genealogist, you are cringing now. I know you are. I had to concentrate to not actually cringe when he said it.

If you’re not a genealogist, then maybe you don’t know why we are all cringing. Maybe you even have a similar story for your name.

Well, I hate to be the one to break it to you then: Your family’s name was not changed at Ellis Island. And neither was this person’s name. This may be the number two myth in genealogy (next only to the “I’m-descended-from-royalty/Indian-princess/Charlemagne/noble-who-fell-in-love-with-a-peasant-girl-and-stowed-away-on-a-ship-to-America-in-order-to-escape-the-Prussian-military-myth”).

First, many of the people who say this didn’t even have family that came through Ellis Island. Ellis Island didn’t open until 1892. Immigrants who came to New York prior to this probably came to Castle Garden which served as the port of arrival from 1855 until 1890.

Second, there was not a conspiracy by the officials at Ellis Island to change as many names as possible and make it difficult for their future descendents to ever trace their heritage.

Have many family names changed in spelling from their “original” spelling in Europe? Absolutely. But it wasn’t because of a massive change at Ellis Island. So why have these spellings changed then?

Well, there are several things to keep in mind. First, often there never was a “correct” way to spell the name in the first place – even in Europe. Our ancestors spelled phonetically – based on how things were pronounced, how they sounded. They were not overly concerned with what exact letters were included. You will often find names spelled multiple ways within one record. Also our ancestors, and even record keepers, were often only semi-literate. They had bigger things to worry about in life besides “i before e, except after c.”

The other piece of this is that things got more complicated when our ancestors came to the US and another language was involved. These foreign names were unfamiliar to US record keepers. The recorder heard the name – as it was spoken in its original language – and recorded it as he heard it in English.

Yes, sometimes names were written “incorrectly” (which is actually impossible since if there isn’t a “correct” way to write a name, then there can’t really be an “incorrect” way either) at Ellis Island. But, this is usually just another warping of a name that had been – and would be – warped into many forms. Just because an official wrote a name a certain way in the passenger arrival records, did not mean our ancestor was forced to spell his or her name that way forever afterward.

In fact, names usually continued to warp and change after Ellis Island. If you collect a stack of records throughout an immigrant ancestor’s life, you will most likely see the name morphing over time – not a sudden break at Ellis Island (or Castle Garden). Some of ancestors made conscious choices to change their name’s spelling in order to make it sound more “American.” Sometimes, it just gradually drifted to a more “American” spelling. Then of course, some people’s names shifted drastically into a name that appears to be completely unrelated to the name they had before. Sometimes there are reasons for this that we can figure out when we understand naming patterns. Other times, there appears to be absolutely no logic behind the change at all.

Those ancestors are the most fun of all, right?

For more information on name changes, you can read my article about it here from Everton’s Genealogical Helper. Or, if you have a special interest in patronymics, read my introductory article from Ancestry Magazine here.

Christmas crazies

2010-12-06T08:06:00.000-08:00

It’s a new week – and not just any week – a week in December. I’m sure I am not the only person out there that feels that weeks in December are fundamentally different than weeks in any other part of the year. I LOVE December and I LOVE Christmas. But it also makes my life a little crazy. Here are some items on my list for the week:

-Two lectures. I will be speaking to the Newtown Genealogy Club in Connecticut this Wednesday at 7 p.m. about my book. I am looking forward to my lecture. Then, on Friday I am doing a very special lecture. I will be speaking to my daughter’s fifth grade class (and another class) about my book. I spoke to eight fourth grade classes in October and it was so fun! I loved the creative, thoughtful, unexpected questions and comments I got. I will be sure and write more about it after the presentation.

-Submitting an article for an upcoming issue of the Association of Professional Genealogists Quarterly entitled “Get Published in Magazines: Tips for Getting Your Words in Print.” This is based on a lecture I gave this past August in Knoxville, TN at the National APG Conference in conjunction with FGS (Federation of Genealogical Societies) Conference. You can watch the lecture online. You can also see most of the other presentations given at the conference at the APG website also on such useful topics as marketing, choosing continuing educational experiences, and your online presence. Check out the list here.

-Christmas cookies. We have a tradition of making Christmas cookies every year – LOTS of Christmas cookies. We have four kinds in the freezer already. We have three kinds left to go this week: gingerbread, Spritz, and a new one called “almond delights.” Over the weekend we will decorate and deliver all of them (hopefully…). I really enjoy making cookies with my kids, but every year it is an exercise in patience and in not micromanaging (snowmen can be green and it’s’ okay for the cookie to have five different kinds of sprinkles….)

-Christmas shopping. I am almost done…just a few hard ones left. And, there’s still one big gift left for my kids. It’s a surprise so I can’t tell you yet!

-Piano lessons, dance class, basketball practice, activity days (a church activity), Irish step. None of these activities are mine, of course, but they are still on my list for the week!

And an update: I took my little Christian to the doctor yesterday after he scared me by coughing until his lips turned blue. He has ear infections in both ears. So now he is on antibiotics – and hopefully on the mend. (And the doctor was unimpressed by my story of him coughing until his lips turned blue, which is, of course, unrelated to the ear infections.)

This and That

2010-12-04T19:42:00.000-08:00

My poor little baby is still sick. He doesn’t have a fever anymore, but he definitely still has a cold. I had all these good intentions to write a really useful post with lots of genealogy information. But, you know what they say about the best laid plans of mice and men….

So instead I thought I’d just share some of the random thoughts dancing around in my head:

1) I missed a NERGC (New England Regional Genealogical Conference) board meeting today. If any of you are New Englanders, I hope you are looking into attending this conference. It’s a fabulous conference with speakers from across the country. This year, it will be in Springfield, MA – just forty minutes from my house. (But today was the “Christmas tree day” at our house, so I had to pass on the meeting. They didn’t need my anyway:) You can read more about the conference here. And by the way, you don't have to be a New Englander to come!

2) My book was reviewed on the latest episode of The Genealogy Guys Podcast . It must be late, because I can’t make my computer cooperate so I can hear what they said.

3) I made our kayaking reservations for our trip to Hawaii. And I made reservations for the Polynesian Cultural Center. I’ve really wanted to see the Na Pali Coast, but boats and helicopters are not an option for me (motion sickness). So, I’ve decided we’re going to hike in a couple of miles instead for what is supposedly a stunning view. Can’t wait!! Sometimes I think I missed my true calling in life – being a professional tourist (or at least a travel writer).

4) Family Chronicle is about to put out a new book entitled, “Tracing Your Civil War Ancestors.” You can pre-order it now on their website. I have Civil War ancestors – maybe someday I will trace them, instead of only tracing my European ancestors. It always makes me laugh when people assume that because I’m a “professional,” I must have “finished” tracing my family.

5) Listening to a little baby cough is about the saddest thing ever! I hope my little guy gets better soon.

Complaints

2010-12-02T06:38:00.000-08:00

Since I recently wrote a post about the things I’m thankful for, it seems only natural to now write a complaining post. Here are my current life complaints:

1) I am sick. I am not deathly, horribly sick, but I do feel lousy. It’s really just a cold – but one of those severe colds, where my head is so fuzzy that I have a hard time forming coherent sentences because by the time I’m halfway through the sentence, I have already forgotten what I was talking about. I have the desire to climb back in my bed. But as you all know, moms don’t get “sick days” like everyone else.

2) Christian (my thirteen-month-old) is sick. He ran a fever of 103 for two days, but actually seems a bit better now. This means, I have spent large amounts of time sitting with him in the rocking chair.

3) My husband is out of town again. This, of course, confounds the problems of #1 and #2 above.

4) I am not getting anything done. Like all the rest of the world, I have long to-do list, but due to #1-3 above, have found it nearly impossible to do anything more than the laundry (wash it at least, it is still unfolded on my living room couch).

5) My computer died a couple of weeks ago, and I have been using my husband’s old computer. It insists on disconnecting itself from the internet at least once an hour. It is making me crazy! (My husband doesn’t think I need a new one – because this one works good enough. My question for him is: then why did he get a new one?)

6) As I am writing this, Christian (who definitely seems better today) has opened the hutch and pulled all the food out, including dumping nearly a pound of spaghetti noodles on the floor.

This is a picture from another day of Christian pulling food out of the hutch.

Fortunately though, there are some positives in life right now to balance these out. Here is my positive list:

1) I am going to Hawaii in less then two weeks! And I am going with just my husband. It is the first time we have gone anywhere without children together since we had children (except to a brief trip to Pittsburgh which doesn’t count because it was for adoption interviews and was stressful). My parents will stay with my kids. I have done absolutely nothing to plan this trip until the conditions described above hit. But now, since I have spent lots of time sitting in the rocking chair with Christian, I have started reading my Hawaii tour guide, and am now so excited I can hardly stand it!

2) I have a radio interview today with a Utah radio station about my book. I can do it here at home. I am going to concentrate really hard so as not to run into the problem described in #1 above in which I am unable to complete sentences that make any sense.

3) My book sold more on amazon in November than any previous month. (But it needs to sell more. December is supposed to be a big month for books. Anyone have a difficult-to-shop for person on your Christmas list? I know just the thing to get him or her….)

4) I feel rotten enough that I’m not even that concerned about all things I'm not getting done. I’m perfectly content to read about snorkeling in Hanauma Bay and kayaking on the Wailua River.

5) My husband comes back tomorrow night. The house can’t completely disintegrate by then, can it?

6) Christian is still happy – now pulling all the pots and pans out. This is the longest he has gone without me holding him since Monday evening. He looks pretty cute in his dinosaur sleeper surrounded by pans and spaghetti noodles.

7) Did I mention that I’m going to Hawaii for the first time in less than two weeks? Even better, my husband has meetings there, so the trip is highly subsidized by his work.

Well, how’s that? I have more things on my good list then my bad list. (Okay, so I may have put Hawaii twice, but I think it’s worthy of counting twice.)

Now the decision: should I clean up the spaghetti noodles or make kayaking reservations? (Or even better, put Christian down for a nap and go back to bed myself…if only….)

Regular Life and German Parish Records

2010-11-29T08:08:00.000-08:00

After being with family from Friday, Nov 19 when I flew into DC until yesterday when the last of my siblings left from the Thanksgiving break, we are now back to “regular” life. It seems a little sad – not because regular life is so terrible, but because there’s nothing like having family around!

Today, regular life consists of grocery shopping, taking Sarah Ann to dance, supervising homework and piano practice, and catching up on emails. I thought I would answer one of my emails here on my blog. (Of course, the other thing I need to catch up after having family around is sleep…)

So, here’s my email for today:

Leslie,
You have a wonderful website! I would like to know where to go for parish records of the Mecklenburg-Schwerin area from 1844.
Thank you!

I’m going to broaden this question to address parish records from Germany in general. Parish records have survived from many German parishes. Of course, there are some that have been lost to fire or other causes. How far they date back varies from place to place. The earliest known parish records that still exist are from 1524 in Nürnberg. In general though, it’s rare for records to date back further than the Thirty Years’ war which raged across Europe from 1618 to 1648. The widespread destruction of this war wiped out many records.

So how do you access these records? First, keep in mind that you need to know the parish church your ancestors attended. This is often not the same thing as knowing their German hometown. Most villages were not large enough to support a church of their own. Instead, people from numerous villages would come together to attend church in one village. This means that if you have the name of the hometown, you must find where people living in this town attended church. This is where you will find those all-important parish records. Many people come to the conclusion that parish records don’t exist for their ancestors, when the real problem is they are not searching for the correct town. Also, be sure you check a gazetteer to ensure you have the spelling correct. And remember that town names and jurisdictions have changed over time.

It would be nice if you could find these records online, as you can do for Swedish parish records. Unfortunately, right now there are not large collections of German parish records online. This should change in the future with FamilySearch’s Record Access program. You can see what is available for Germany now here.

Many microfilm records have been microfilmed through the LDS Church. Most of us don’t live close enough to the Family History Library in Salt Lake City to take advantage of its amazing resources. But we can still access these microfilms by ordering them to our local Family History Centers. You can search for a Family History Center near you at FamilySearch’s website (scroll down the bottom of the page where it says “Find a Family History Center”. The German states vary in how much of their parish records have been microfilmed. In Mecklenburg, nearly all of the surviving records have been microfilmed. But this is not the case everywhere.

If microfilmed parish records are not available for the towns you need, you may need to write for the record. The German archive system can be intimidating. I suggest you write directly to the church. Hopefully, if they do not have the records themselves, they will direct you to the placed that do. For information on how to write German churches (and templates to follow if you don’t know German), check out FamilySearch’s German letter writing guide.

For an overview of German church records, be sure to read the FamilySearch Wiki section on it.

The Thanksgiving Tree

2010-11-26T18:16:00.000-08:00

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving yesterday. I’ve included a couple of pictures below of our family gathered together for our meal:

We have a tradition in our family that Thursday evening, after everyone has eaten, we gather in my living room to do the “Thanksgiving tree.” I draw a giant tree and then we cut out fall leaves from construction paper. (The finished product is always interesting since drawing is not at the top of my talent list – in fact, it’s not on my talent list at all. This year, I convinced my sister and her fiancé to do the drawing and the cutting though, so the tree definitely took a step up.) Each person gets about five leaves. Then we go around the room and, one at a time, say something we are thankful for and write it on our leaf. The kids take turns sticking them on the tree. The only rule is that you can’t say something that someone else already said. In other words, if the first person says she is thankful for her family, then nobody else can say that.

We always get a range of responses. Some are serious and heartfelt, while others are creative or just silly. Here are some the things written on our “thankful leaves” this year (each line represents one leaf):
trees, plants, fungi, and the environment
air
platinum
clothes, glasses, and bodies
health
increased financial stability
love
wii (this was Taylor of course – see my previous post)
forgiveness
second chances
Central Park
Pumpkin pie

The kids put the leaves wherever they want, which results in an interesting looking tree by the end. Here’s a picture of my children putting their leaves on the Thanksgiving tree.

This year, I have been feeling particularly grateful. For many years, there were two things I wanted more than anything else. First, I wanted another baby. We had three beautiful, wonderful children. But, both George (my husband) and I really felt like there was another little boy out there for us. I get so sick while I’m pregnant (if you’ve read my book, you’ll know a little about that), that it had become apparent that another pregnancy was probably not the right path for us. We began to look into adoption. In October of 2009, our little Christian was born. I was able to be there at the hospital to hold him on his very first day of life. He has brought so much happiness into our family. I am very grateful for him – and for my other children.

The other thing I wanted was to publish a book. In fact, from the time I was five years old, I have wanted to write books. There has never been a day of my life where I didn’t want to be an author. It was a long and winding path, but The Journey Takers was released this summer. It continues to be a long and winding path. However, right before my book came I out, I thought that no matter what happens with it, when I am 80 years old, I will look back on my life and be grateful that this lifelong dream of mine was fulfilled.

So, this year I feel like I really have everything I wanted – at least, everything I wanted that really mattered! I have been blessed.

German Research and I-95

2010-11-23T18:27:00.000-08:00

In my last entry, I wrote about speaking in two states in one day. Today, I have been in six states. But I didn’t speak in any of them. I just drove through.

Last night, I spoke at the German-American Heritage Museum in DC. It’s always a treat for me to do a lecture that focuses exclusively on German research, since German research was really my first love (my first genealogy love anyway!). Back when I used to take clients, I only took clients tracing German ancestors – and usually nineteenth century German ancestors.

While we’re on the topic of German research, I thought I would share a few links for anyone tracing German roots. First, I have an article online (that first appeared in Internet Genealogy Magazine) that you can read here. It’s called “Getting Acquainted with German Research Through the Internet.” A few websites have changed since I wrote this article. In particular, my favorite German site has a new address. The German Roots site is now located at www.germanroots. You may want to check out this site’s “Basic Research Guide for German Genealogy.”

Then, this morning at 6 a.m. I sat off towards home on I-95 in the car with my brother and his wife. If you haven’t spent significant time on I-95, you are really missing something in life. I have spent quite a lot of time on this road, driving between my brothers’ homes in Virginia or Maryland to New Haven, where we leave I-95 to take I-91 closer to our house in Massachusetts.

The trip between our houses, theoretically, takes seven hours. I have driven back and forth on it two to three times a year for the past four years. It has sometimes taken us seven hours – but sometimes taken much more. One time, on the Sunday after Thanksgiving, it took us almost 12 hours. (It’s good thing we had lots of books on tape or the kids might have might have been climbing the walls – or I might have been climbing the walls.) Fortunately, today it took just a bit more than seven hours.

I was so excited to arrive home and see my kids again. I promised a report on the state of my house after leaving my husband home alone in it with our four kids for four days. So, he did pretty well. He had vacuumed, swept the floor, and done all those obvious things. He hadn’t cleaned up the kids rooms (where they guests will sleep), but all things considered, I was pleasantly surprised.

There will be 15 people at my house by Thursday. So from now until then, I will be cooking. My goal is to cook enough food to have a nice Thanksgiving spread – and to last these 15 people all the way through Sunday. (Last year, we had to borrow a friend’s fridge because mine was full…) It’s a lot of cooking, but it will be fun!

Maryland and Virginia

2010-11-21T13:07:00.000-08:00

Today I am in Hyattsville, Maryland in the apartment of my brother and his wife. I arrived here late Friday night – or technically, I suppose, early Saturday morning. That day (Saturday) I spoke in two states. That’s kind of a fun thought isn’t it? Speaking in two states in one day.

In the morning, I presented a two-hour workshop entitled “Researching and Writing Your Family’s Story” to the Fairfax Genealogical Society in Virginia. It was an enthusiastic, responsive group which made the workshop a lot of fun for me.

The thesis of the first part of my workshop is that in order to write an interesting family history, you have to gather interesting information. I share some ways to do this – even for ancestors who left little behind – no letters, diaries, etc. I point out that one way to learn more about our ancestors is to “dig deeper” in the records we already have. I think sometimes we get in a hurry to pull out the names and dates, and we miss some of the other information “hidden” in the records. Here is one of the documents I use as an example:

This is a German marriage record. It really has an amazing amount of information! (Try and find a US church with this many details from this time period – 1864. This is why I think it’s actually easier to do foreign research than US research.) Some of the things you can find in this record are: date of the marriage; date the marriage bans were read (when people had an opportunity to “object” to the marriage); name of the groom along with his occupation, where he is currently living, where he will be living soon, and his birth date and place, the name of the bride along with where she is living, and her birth date and place; and the names of the both of their fathers, the fact that they are both deceased, where they lived, and what their occupations were.

I think out ancestors’ occupations are one of the most overlooked pieces of information that in the records. And, they can tell us so much about our ancestors’ lives – especially if we take the time to do a little research to really understand these occupations.

After this lecture, I drove as fast as I could (without doing anything illegal of course) to Baltimore, Maryland where I gave my book talk at the Maryland Historical Society. Although I had driven by Baltimore many times (on I-95 on my way to DC), I realized I had never actually been to downtown Baltimore. I was surprised at the “old city” feel it had – with lots of neat, historic buildings. The Historical Society itself seemed very impressive, and I wished I had more time to wander around and look at the displays and artwork. It was also a fun lecture.

Tomorrow night, I speak at the German-American Heritage Museum.

Of course, I am missing my little kiddies. I had a fun conversation with them on the phone this afternoon. Sarah Ann (age 5) informed me that she has decided she wants to give her kindergarten teacher cheese for Christmas because she really likes to eat cheese. I suggested we make Christmas cookies instead. She then spent the next ten minutes trying to persuade me that she could make the cookies all by herself. Hmmm…..

I was excited to see a new review of my book on amazon and seagull. It's by Lori Linn Foster and says: "I enjoyed reading this book. The characters were brought to life as Leslie gave historical background information that brought me into the lives and times and places where the characters lived. I already enjoy family history; this book was a joy to read."

Letters to Me: Castle Garden and the Wii

2010-11-18T12:15:00.000-08:00

Like probably all of you, I get a variety of letters every day. I get letters in my e-mail inbox, letters in mailbox, and occasionally, hand-delivered letters. Today, I wanted to respond to two of them here. I’ve chosen two that I think represent the dichotomy of my life!

The first came to my e-mail last week:

Hi Leslie;

I saw your presentation at the GGG (German Genealogy Group) last week. You had a slide of an arrival record from Castle Garden in New York. I was wondering were you found these records since I thought they were all burned in a fire at Ellis Island.

Thanks

PS I enjoyed your book.

Here’s my response:
Castle Garden records are not burned, but are alive and well. In fact, at that same German Genealogy Group meeting, I ate dinner with a group of people beforehand – one of whom had worked with the actual original Castle Garden arrival lists.

Castle Garden was the New York receiving station prior to Ellis Island. It functioned from 1855 until 1890. Ellis Island opened in 1892. Castle Garden has a really interesting history. You can about it here in an article I wrote a couple of years ago for History Channel Magazine. Castle Garden was the most important arrival port of its time. During some periods, nearly 80% of US arrivals came through Castle Garden.

As for records: You can access 11 million Castle Garden arrivals for free at http://www.castlegarden.org/. This website covers the years 1820-1892, so it includes records of New York arrivals during times when Castle Garden was not the receiving port. Keep in mind though that the website does not have all the records for this period. It also links to transcribed entries, not original records. If you have an Ancestry subscription, or at least access to one, you can access all the New York arrivals here. These are linked to images of the actual lists.

If you have been to visit Ellis Island, you have seen Castle Garden – but probably didn’t even know it. It is the building where you buy your tickets! I find this a little sad, but the Battery Conservancy is working to restore it, so maybe it will get more recognition in the future.

Now, for the second letter…This was a hand-delivered letter from my eight-year-old son. They had an assignment in school to write a persuasive letter. (Let me preface it by saying that we have a family rule that my children can only play wii on Fridays and Saturdays – except in special circumstances such as school holidays or when children are home sick and playing wii would directly contribute to preserving everyone’s sanity.):

Dear Mom,

I love wii so please let me play wii on weekdays. I will do all my homework including spelling. I will only play for twenty minutes. A lot of my friends do. I will play outside first for an hour. A lot of my friends do. I will read for a long time. I should be able to play wii on weekdays.

Love,
Taylor

Do you like how he included the fact that “a lot of his friends do” two different times?

My response: No.

It is pretty cute though, isn’t it? The truth is – he doesn’t have time to play wii on weekdays. With homework, piano practice, and then whatever of the many extracurricular activities one or the other of them is in, we don’t exactly sit around the house looking for something to do.

Here's a photo of Taylor so you can have the entire persuasive effect!

Tonight, I fly to Baltimore. It's going to be an exciting weekend!

Upcoming Lectures

2010-11-16T12:40:00.000-08:00

This is one of those weeks where I feel a little like I’m sitting at the top of a roller coaster peeking over the edge, about to dive straight down. There’s nothing to do but grab the sides of the little cart and hang on!

Now, don’t get me wrong. It’s not an unpleasant roller coaster – or week. It’s just an intense one! Here are some of the upcoming highlights. Most of these events are open to public, so if you happen to be in the area, come and drop in. (Join my roller coaster ride for a couple of hours!)

Tues, (Nov 16), 7 p.m., 25 Boston Road, Chelmsford, MA
Tonight, I will be at the Chelmsford Library. I will be giving my “book talk” – The Journey Takers: An Inside Look at Immigration Research. But, it will be a new version of the book talk since some of the attendees heard it already at the Massachusetts Society of Genealogists Annual Conference on November 6. I’ve added new slides and new stories. I will talk about Edmond Harris, my English journey taker – and the journey taker who usually gets left out of the book talk, even though he has the most dramatic story in the book. (Only so much information will fit in a one-hour lecture – even when I talk really fast!)

On Friday, I will take a flight to Baltimore and spend a long weekend in the DC area. I have three talks there. And, I get to stay with my brother and his wife who live in Hyattsville, MD. I’m excited to see them. Here are my DC area talks:

Sat, Nov 20, 10 a.m., 2148 Gallows Road, Dunn Loring, VA
I will present a two-hour workshop to the Fairfax Genealogical Society called: Researching and Writing Your Ancestors’ Stories. This will also be a new workshop I’ve never done before. It combines parts of two talks I’ve given in the past. But, since it’s a workshop I’ve also thrown in some “worksheets.” Maybe I’ll post some of the problems I’ll present to the workshop attendees later.

Sat, Nov 20, 2:30 p.m., 201 Monument Street, Baltimore, MD
Soon after the workshop, I’ll jump in my car and race to another state to present my “standard” book talk, The Journey Takers: An Inside Look at Immigration Research, at the Maryland Historical Society. The lecture is free to members of the Maryland Historical Society or Maryland Genealogical Society. There is a charge of $10 for others. Registration is encouraged, but walk-ins are welcome.

Mon, Nov 22, 6 p.m., 719 6th St NW, DC
This lecture will be at the German American Heritage Museum in DC. This will be yet another version of my book lecture – this time only focusing on the German immigration experience. It is free and open to the public. (Their facebook page describes my book as “riveting and detail-rich”!)

Tuesday morning I will leave with my brother and his wife to drive back to Massachusetts. On the way, we will pick up my sister and her fiancé from the Providence, RI airport (did you know Providence was on the way from DC to Amherst?).

So, the real question is: What will my house look like when I return with four additional people – one who has never been to our house before (soon to be followed by my other brother’s family of five) after having left my husband home alone with our four children for almost four days?? I’ll let you know…

How Immigrants Paid for their Ship Voyages

2010-11-14T19:16:00.000-08:00

We made it back from Philadelphia last night. I did four batches of laundry today. How is it that we were only gone three days and I still had four batches of laundry?

I enjoyed my visit to the American Swedish Historical Museum. I had great intentions to take a picture, but for various reasons, it didn't happen.

At my lectures, I have noticed themes in the questions people ask. There is one question in particular that I get asked about two-thirds of the time when I give my “book lecture.” Yesterday, I just focused on my Swedish “journey taker” or immigrant, Karsti Nilsdotter Karsti left Sweden alone at age seventeen to come to America. At some point during my story of her immigration, someone in the audience usually raises their hand and asks some version of this question, “How did Karsti pay to come to the US?” or, more generally, “How did our ancestors pay for the ship voyage to America?”

I thought I would answer that question here. First, keep in mind that while we often think of the “tired” the “poor” and the “huddled masses” (from Emma Lazarus’s famous poem) coming to the US, the poorest of the poor, generally, did not come. They couldn’t afford it. In the 1700s, some of the poorest, particularly from the German states, came through the redemption system, where they basically sold themselves into servitude. This had long since come to an end by the mid to late 1800s, when my “journey takers” made their voyage across the ocean. For many immigrants, crossing the ocean was a huge effort that sometimes took years of planning and saving. Sometimes immigrants sold all they had to pay for the voyage, essentially arriving in the US with next to nothing. (The Irish were a special case, as during the potato famine of the 1840s, they really were the “huddled masses” arriving in the US in desperate conditions. Often, landlords paid to send these immigrants to North America- basically, just to get rid of them. You can read more about it here.)

Karsti came after joining the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or LDS Church. The LDS Church had a program that helped its members to make the trip to “Zion,” or what would become the state of Utah. This program was known as the Perpetual Emigration Fund (or PEF). Converts could borrow money from the Church. Careful records were kept, and these members were expected to pay the money back in full. The money they put back into the system was then used to bring other members over. You can read more about it here.

Of course, immigrants outside the LDS Church received financial aid to make the trip. Some received aid from other religious or benevolent society groups. Others received aid from family or friends.

Karsti did not receive aid from the PEF. Records indicate that she paid for the trip independently. I have a theory on how she was able to do this. By the time Karsti immigrated, she had lost both of her parents. Her father had passed away a couple of years earlier when Karsti was 14. Karsti probably received a portion of his inheritance when her father died. I assume she used this to fund her journey to Utah.

On an unrelated note, my computer crashed while we were in Philadelphia. It has been on its death bed for a while (although it is only two years old), so I had been careful to keep back-ups. In fact, just a couple of weeks earlier, I had invested in an external hard drive. I am currently typing on my husband’s old computer while I decide what to do. A computer crash is always a pain, but I am very glad I had recent back-ups, or it would have been a lot worse. If you don’t have your files backed up (in more than one place), do it tonight!

New York and Philadelphia

2010-11-12T17:00:00.000-08:00

I’m sleeping in Philadelphia tonight. From my hotel, I can see out over the Delaware River. I love visiting new places!

We spent yesterday in New York City with my brother and his family. The kids ran wild in Central Park and then we headed to Time Square. My brother reminded me of the last time we were there together. It was four years ago at Christmas, and it was so packed that we could hardly walk down the street. His then four-year-old son had told us that it felt like “a wildebeest migration.” It was busy, but not quite a wildebeest migration this time.

This morning we drove the rest of the way to Philadelphia. The last time I was in Philadelphia was two years ago when the FGS (Federation of Genealogical Societies) Conference was here. My tourist activites then lasted a total of about three hours. Besides, that was Philadelphia without children, which as you know, is not at all the same as Philadelphia with children.

The tickets were already gone for Independence Hall, so we will have to hit that in the morning. But here we are at the Liberty Bell.

Here’s another picture of it (Christian isn’t in the picture because he was asleep and Rachel looks like this because she is in the middle of yelling “Taylor keeps bumping me with his arm!” This is, of course, why Philadelphia with children is not the same as Philadelphia without children.)

The high point of the day was a multimedia presentation at the National Constitution Center about – of all things – the Constitution. It talked about the freedom the Constitution provides. As a genealogist interested in immigration research, I was most affected by the scenes of immigrants entering the U.S. – especially being here in Philadelphia, one of the major points of entry for immigrants in earlier centuries. Not to be sappy (because I really hate sappiness), but I couldn’t help thinking of my own ancestors and the millions just like them who took incredible risks to start new lives here where they believed they could find opportunities to create better lives for their families.

(By the way, if you are interested in immigrants who came to Philadelphia, check out one of my all-time favorite websites, German Roots. You can read about early arrivals to Philadelphia (1700s) here and about later immigrants (1800s) here.

The second high point of the day was finding Christian’s missing pacifier on the street corner of 5th and Market right outside the Independence Hall Visitor’s Center after having lost it a couple of hours earlier.

Tomorrow, I’ll speak at 1:30 p.m. at the American Swedish Historical Museum. I’m excited!

Why Everyone Should Wish They Had Swedish Roots

2010-11-10T08:01:00.000-08:00

I just looked at my lecture page and counted that I have given my “book talk” 20 times since July 1 (this is not counting lectures on related topics). Twenty times in a little over four months! It ought to be the most polished, well-put-together lecture ever now (notice I said "ought to be"). I have lots of different versions of it: there’s the genealogy version, the general audience version, the German version, and now this weekend for the first time there will also be the Swedish version. (There’s also the version I gave to eight fourth grade classes. That was exciting!)

So, I’ve spent some time in the last couple of days adjusting my lecture to focus on the Swedish section on my book – and on Swedish immigration. As I’ve been doing this, I’m reminded at how fun Swedish research is – and how many great resources there are available to people who want to trace their Swedish roots.

In my book lecture, I often tell people that if they have Swedish ancestors, they should do the little genealogy happy dance. Here are a few reasons why everyone should wish they had Swedish roots:

1) Clerical survey records. These records are found with the parish records. They were created when the parish pastor visited the homes of people within his parish, quizzing them on their knowledge of Luther’s catechisms. They also function kind of like census records. They record names, and often birth dates and places, dates of when people moved in or out or married, occupations, and death dates (if the person died during that period). The exact structures vary, but they may be kept every five or so years.

2) Genline. A huge amount of parish records are available online through this website. You can choose from a variety of subscriptions, and aren’t forced to commit to a year membership or anything like that. Of course, when I was doing the research for The Journey Takers, genline didn’t exist and I had to order the microfilms to my local family history center. (When will there be a genline for German parish records??)

3) Swedish Emigration Databases. Swedes kept great records of emigrants after 1868. You can read the details of the different databases available at the FamilySearch wiki here.

Notice I didn’t mention the patronymic naming system. That is definitely not part of the happy dance. You can read an article I wrote several years ago for Ancestry Magazine about using patronymics here.

While I’m putting together lists, I’ve thought of another one. My husband comes back tonight after being gone for five days. I’m ecstatic. No, it’s not because I miss him so much (who has time to miss him when I’m chasing four kids by myself?). So, here’s my second list.

How to survive five days with four children and no husband:

1) Always put children to bed on time.

2) Never stay up late working unless the world will end if it doesn’t get done (finishing blogging posts doesn’t qualify). Sleep is more important than most deadlines.

3) Remember that waffles and fruit are a completely acceptable, and even relatively healthy, dinner.

4) And this one is the key: When all children are in bed and there is not one sound in the house, take a deep breath, enjoy the silence, and eat a little bit of chocolate.

When my husband is going to be out of town a lot, he buys me some chocolate before he leaves. I’ve found that chocolate in small amounts can calm nerves after almost any stressful day. You should try it.

Welcome to my blog!

2010-11-08T08:00:00.000-08:00

So, I'm really doing it - I'm taking the plunge. I'm starting a blog! I know I'm not exactly cutting edge here, but I'm still pretty excited. I've been thinking about starting a blog for years. All of a sudden last night, I decided to stop thinking about it - and just do it. Yikes! Even though I write for magazines quite a bit and even have a new book out (The Journey Takers), writing a blog seems a little - well, scary. I'm supposed to think of something entertaining and informative to say a couple of times a week. Actually, thinking of something to say shouldn't be a problem. I ALWAYS have something to say. Now whether or not it's entertaining and informative - that's another question...

Why did I finally decide to start this long-thought-about-blog now? Nothing profound happened. Really, nothing happened at all. I just decided to stop worrying about making everything fit a certain theme - stop worrying about planning things out in advance. I decided to just start my blog - and see what happened. So, that's what I'm doing. I'm going to write about the things I love - about family, history, genealogy (particularly immigration research), and my travels. I know there are other people out there who get as excited about these things as I do. Maybe this blog can help us connect!

The blog is called The Journey Takers, after my new book that just came out this summer. The book interweaves my ancestors' experiences, all Western European immigrants, with my experiences in researching and discovering them. I have included carefully researched accounts of peasant life and ocean voyages paralleled with personal accounts of research and of motherhood. I describe the emotional impact of standing in my family's Old World churches, and the "excitement" of chasing my fourteen-month-old up and down the aisles of the Family History Library. This is also what I want to do in my blog - mix together the things I learn about genealogy research and history with the things I learn about life. Oh! But that sounds so heavy. I want the blog to be fun too!

Lately, my life seems to be in a constant whirlwind. I am doing lots of traveling and speaking to share information about The Journey Takers. I have gotten to talk to so many new people. And I have loved it! I have learned so much from their comments and questions. I want to share some of that here. With four children, all these adventures have created more than a little craziness as well. I might share a little of that here too!

This past summer, I drove from Massachusetts (where I live) to California with my four kids (ages ten to nine months at the time) and my mother (it would have been impossible without her!), doing book talks and seeing the sights. In 2010 so far, we have visited 27 states, I have spoken in 14 of them, and we have seen 7 National Parks - and many other fabulous things. It has been great. I don't have another cross-country trip planned for a while, but I do have some adventures on the horizon. This weekend, we will head to New York City and then on to Philadelphia where I'll speak at the American Swedish Historical Museum. So, stay tuned for some thoughts on tracing Swedish ancestors - and, of course, on my trip to Philly!