22 May 2013
Images at FamilySearch.org -- Here Today Gone Tomorrow?
.jpg) |
| Image courtesy of Victor Habbick at FreeDigitalPhotos.net |
Just because we
have access to digital images today via a database, doesn’t mean that those
same images will remain available. As
more and more materials are digitized, remember that there are contractual
agreements in place where access can either be withheld or eventually more
widespread.
Earlier
this year, some Cook
County
On the other hand, NARA makes
non-exclusive partnership arrangements with requirements for free access to
those researching at NARA and sometimes to
eventually being publicly available via the NARA NARA
I’ve also seen this with digitized newspapers. At a certain point some were available via a
subscription service encompassing many newspapers and then eventually a
newspaper creates its own interface to which you can either subscribe or
purchase articles via.
Do
you know of other instances where a genealogy-related database was freely
available and then not?
Or
vice versa – a database where you used to have to subscribe that is now free?
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21 May 2013
Preserve the Pensions [War of 1812] -- Genealogy Road Trip Contest -- Enter NOW!
NGS
encourages genealogists to partner with FGS, FamilySearch, and the National
Archives to preserve the War of 1812 pensions.
Because of this, NGS wants you to know about The Genealogy Road Trip
Contest!
Have you ever wanted to take a research
trip to one of the top genealogical libraries in the United States
The Federation of Genealogical
Societies is holding a contest to raise awareness about its Preserve the
Pensions project to preserve and digitize War of 1812 pension files at the
National Archives. To participate, simply complete the entry form below and add
your name to our email list and then wait for your name to be selected for one
of several prizes!
Prizes! Prizes! Prizes!
We’re undertaking a big project here
trying to digitize 7.2 million pages of War of 1812 pension files and we
believe in thinking BIG! This thinking carries over to our contest prizes which
include:
Choice of a Genealogy Research
Travel Package: Choose from one of the following research trips:
o
Salt Lake City
o
Fort Wayne Genealogy Research Package: A 7-night stay at the Fort Wayne Hilton
Hotel, a $200 meal gift card and a $50 Allen County
o
Flip-Pal® mobile scanner: A
genealogists’ best friend: mobile scanner for all your family photos and
genealogy documents. Total value = $150.
o
findmypast.com 1-Year Membership: A
one year membership to findmypast.com. Total value = $100.
o
And more! Prizes from Just a Joy,
The Heirloom Registry, Maia’s Books, RootsMagic and more!
o
The total value of all the prizes
for this contest is over $2,800!
Contest Format and Rules
We’ll begin drawing for prizes on
Monday, May 20, 2013 and draw prizes each day leading up to Friday, May 24,
2013, when we’ll select the winner of the Genealogy Research Travel
Package! All winners will be notified by
email.
In order to qualify for the contest,
you must be a resident of the United
States
Donate to Preserve the Pensions and
Win a War of 1812 Quilt
Besides entering the contest,
consider making a donation to the Preserve the Pensions project today. Not only will you help
preserve and digitize War of 1812 pension files, but you’ll also be entered
into a drawing to win a stunning War of 1812 commemorative quilt! Click here for more information and then look for the drawing in late August
2013.
Here’s How to Enter the Genealogy
Road Trip Contest
Only one entry per email address
please. There are two ways to enter:
o
Click here to simply sign up for our
e-newsletter and you’ll be automatically entered into the Contest!
Please spread the word about our
contest on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and other social media. And also visit
the Preserve the Pensions website to learn more about this community effort to preserve an essential
part of American history.
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copyright © National Geneal ogical
Society, 3108 Columbia Pike, Suite 300, Arlington, Virginia 22204-4370. http://www.ngsgenealogy.org.
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from NGS . Please drop us a note
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Genealogy Writing -- Do you use the popular "Historical Present" tense? Should you?
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| Image courtesy of Stuart Miles, http://www.freedigitalphotos.net |
A post by Michael
Hait, Historical writing and when to use present
tense caught my eye. In
it, he refers to an article Ben Yagoda Gets Sick of the Historical
Present (on the Chronicle for Higher Education website).
As genealogists, we do a lot of writing! Much of it might be in the form of Facebook
posts, e-mails, blog posts, entries into our genealogy software, etc, and it is
still writing. Whether we’ve written one
sentence or a 10-page footnoted article, we need to be “clear” in our
communication.
That said, I found both Michael’s post and that by Ben
Yagoda fun reads and they make a lot of sense.
Stick to the present or past depending on the context of what you are
writing. That’s neat, clean, and very
understandable.
What do you think
of the Historical Present as a tense in genealogy writing? Can it be
appropriate or should it be eliminated?
Editor's Note: Harold Henderson, Midwestern Microhistory: A genealogy blog recently post a related piece, "I" and "We" in genealogy writing. He focuses on perspective vs verb tenses.
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copyright © National Geneal ogical
Society, 3108 Columbia Pike, Suite 300, Arlington, Virginia 22204-4370. http://www.ngsgenealogy.org.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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learn more about interacting with the blog, please read Hyperlinks, Subscribing and Comments -- How to Interact with
Upfront with NGS Blog posts!
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Republication of UpFront articles is permitted
and encouraged for non-commercial purposes without express permission from NGS . Please drop us a note telling us where and
when you are using the article. Express written permission is required if you
wish to republish UpFront articles for commercial purposes.
You may send a request for express written permission to UpFront@ngsgenealogy.org. All republished articles may not be
edited or reworded and must contain the copyright statement found at the bottom
of each UpFront article.
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researchers would find this blog post interesting? If so, please let them know
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20 May 2013
A 10 Step Plan: Getting Sources & Citations Under Control
 |
| Created by Lynn Palermo, used with her permission |
Lynn Palermo (The Armchair Genealogist), recently wrote A 10 Step Plan: Getting Sources & Citations Under
Control
and created a really neat graphic to go with it! She states ...
We all were pulled into the excitement of the research, the thrill of
the hunt and discovery of our family history. Eventually we all come to realize
the importance of knowing where our information came from, and what sources we
have to support our history as fact. However, more often then you realize, this
knowledge arrives after we've been researching for some time.
So true. It is easy to
want to only do the exciting part. Ask
any genealogist if they like to write reports or similar and that booming sound
was probably most of them saying “NO!”
Well, citing sources ranks right there with report writing.
I like how Lynn
Do you agree with
her 10 steps? Would you want to add 1 or 2 more and if so, what?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
copyright © National Geneal ogical
Society, 3108 Columbia Pike, Suite 300, Arlington, Virginia 22204-4370. http://www.ngsgenealogy.org.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Want to learn more about interacting with the blog, please
read Hyperlinks, Subscribing and Comments -- How to Interact with
Upfront with NGS Blog posts!
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other vendors appearing in this blog.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Republication of UpFront articles is
permitted and encouraged for non-commercial purposes without express permission
from NGS . Please drop us a note
telling us where and when you are using the article. Express written permission
is required if you wish to republish UpFront articles for
commercial purposes. You may send a request for express written permission to UpFront@ngsgenealogy.org. All republished articles may not be
edited or reworded and must contain the copyright statement found at the bottom
of each UpFront article.
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17 May 2013
Upfront Mini Bytes
Welcome to the eighth
edition of our bi-weekly feature Upfront Mini Bytes. In Upfront Mini Bytes we provide eight tasty
bits of genealogy news that will help give you a deeper byte into your family
history research. Each item is short and sweet. We encourage you to check
out the links to articles, blog posts, resources, and anything genealogical!
We hope you found
the past editions helpful:
Do you have
questions, suggestions for future posts, or comments? Please post a comment or send an e-mail to UpFront@ngsgenealogy.org.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
When Dick Eastman
reported 1000+ Jasper
County, Missouri Family Biographies added to My Genealogy Hound I just had to check out the website.
Currently included are resources for Arkansas ,
Illinois , Iowa ,
Kansas , Kentucky ,
Missouri and Tennessee
As more and more
documents are generated, archives, courthouses, libraries and other,
repositories are running into space issues.
Or, really, lack of space issues.
This article, York County
Archives running out of room, talks about the issues for this Pennsylvania
Neat video
from the Library of Congress: Library of Congress: Preserving past
and present for the future.
Carol Highsmith is working on a decades-long project photographing all
50 states and the District of Columbia and these images are free to be used by
anyone.
Loved this
article at The DNA Discussion, And Bob’s Your
Uncle: A Guide To Defining Great Aunts, Great-Great Grandparents, First Cousins
Once-Removed, and Other Kinfolk.
It can be so challenging to help people “visualize” how they are related
to the people they research. For most of us, once we
get to great-grandparents and start going down the various branches of the
tree, it’s easy to lose “how” we are
connected. The chart and accompanying
discussion don’t cover
every possible relationship, but it’s a great
start.
Genealogy
is an endeavor marked by persistance and thoroughness. If you want to know the
wrong way to delve into your family’s history,
read this article at Archives.com, 5
Guaranteed Ways to Mess Up Your Genealogy. I will confess that #1 plagued me in the
beginning and I quickly became much more methodical about documenting sources!
If your
family had any connections to the Port
of Los Angeles you will be interested
to know that a New archivist [is] putting
Port of Los Angeles history online as reported in dailybreeze.com. As
stated in the article ... “From handwritten
employee ledgers to black-and-white photographs, the Port of Los Angeles
Looking
for an online genealogy course? Have Tennessee
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
copyright © National
Genealogical Society, 3108 Columbia Pike, Suite 300, Arlington, Virginia
22204-4370. http://www.ngsgenealogy.org.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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about interacting with the blog, please read Hyperlinks,
Subscribing and Comments -- How to Interact with Upfront with NGS Blog posts!
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endorsement of any outside advertiser or other vendors appearing in this blog.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Republication
of UpFront articles is permitted and encouraged for
non-commercial purposes without express permission from NGS. Please drop us a
note telling us where and when you are using the article. Express written
permission is required if you wish to republish UpFront articles
for commercial purposes. You may send a request for express written permission
to UpFront@ngsgenealogy.org. All republished articles may not be
edited or reworded and must contain the copyright statement found at the bottom
of each UpFront article.
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colleagues, or fellow genealogy researchers would find this blog post
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for topics for future UpFront with NGS posts are always welcome. Please
send any suggested topics to UpfrontNGS@mosaicrpm.com
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16 May 2013
Summary of NGS 2013 Family History Conference Blog Posts!
Guest Blogger Julie Miller, Vice President NGS ...
A big thank you to
Randy Seaver of Genea-Musings for putting together a list of blog posts about
the conference. There are some very informative posts from many different
perspectives.
Since we all can be in only one place at a time (which is
definitely a disadvantage during the conference), the posts are a good way to
hear about the sessions we had to miss. Also, they are very helpful for making
a list of CDs to buy from Jamb, Inc., http://www.jamb-inc.com/genealogy. The 2013 conference list will be
available for purchase in a few weeks.
Randy's list of blogs can be found at http://www.geneamusings.com/2013/05/blog-posts-from-ngs-2013-conference.html.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
copyright © National Geneal ogical
Society, 3108 Columbia Pike, Suite 300, Arlington, Virginia 22204-4370. http://www.ngsgenealogy.org.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Want to learn more about interacting with the blog, please
read Hyperlinks, Subscribing and Comments -- How to Interact with
Upfront with NGS Blog posts!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
NGS does not imply endorsement of any outside advertiser or
other vendors appearing in this blog.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Republication of UpFront articles is
permitted and encouraged for non-commercial purposes without express permission
from NGS . Please drop us a note
telling us where and when you are using the article. Express written permission
is required if you wish to republish UpFront articles for
commercial purposes. You may send a request for express written permission to UpFront@ngsgenealogy.org. All republished articles may not be
edited or reworded and must contain the copyright statement found at the bottom
of each UpFront article.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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researchers would find this blog post interesting? If so, please let them know
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NGS posts or subscribe!
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15 May 2013
Genealogy: Learning begins with a question
 |
|
used via Creative
Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 2.0 Generic, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/deed.en
|
We have to ask
questions to get answers. We have to ask
the right questions to get useful answers. Our questions are not always about
who, what, where, when and why.
Sometimes they are about how? How
were records collected? How are they organized?
Such a simple idea and yet so complex.
I was reminded of this when I read Barry Ewell’s post, Genealogy: Learning begins with a question (Deseret News, SLC , UT
Questions and answers are the foundation for exchanging
genealogical information. We have many ways to learn, but by simply asking
questions, we set the stage for learning and also for sharing what we know.
Nobody gets into family research unless
they are curious. Without curiosity we
would not be good researchers. Without
questions, there would be no answers.
How often have I been at the archives,
asked a colleague a question, received an answer, asked more questions,
thought-out-loud about other questions and eventually either received an answer
or have constructed a game plan to get an answer.
What
other questions might we ask as we do our research?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
copyright © National Geneal ogical
Society, 3108 Columbia Pike, Suite 300, Arlington, Virginia 22204-4370. http://www.ngsgenealogy.org.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Want to learn more about interacting with the blog, please
read Hyperlinks, Subscribing and Comments -- How to Interact with
Upfront with NGS Blog posts!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
NGS does not imply endorsement of any outside advertiser or
other vendors appearing in this blog.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Republication of UpFront articles is permitted
and encouraged for non-commercial purposes without express permission from NGS . Please drop us a note telling us where and
when you are using the article. Express written permission is required if you
wish to republish UpFront articles for commercial purposes.
You may send a request for express written permission to UpFront@ngsgenealogy.org. All republished articles may not be
edited or reworded and must contain the copyright statement found at the bottom
of each UpFront article.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Think your friends, colleagues, or fellow genealogy
researchers would find this blog post interesting? If so, please let them know
that anyone can read past UpFront with
NGS posts or subscribe!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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