Monday Genea-pourri, Week of November 4-10, 2024

I have completed two hundred and forty-two (242) weeks of semi-lockdown due to Covid-19. My only outside activities were trips to the History Center, Oakland FamilySearch Center, to the bank and bookstore, and to Tony’s for an ops session. 

Genealogy

Genealogy Meetings:   

I met with Jacqueline on Thursday instead of Monday, due the the AppGen class starting this week. I also met with the NGS conference committee. At the FamilySearch Center in Oakland, I was interviewed by members of the Project 2026 committee for the California Genealogical Society. The APG NorCal group also met this week. Our two field trips were included in this month’s eNews and we discussed future field trips.

Genealogy Writing/Research:

I worked on my case study adding visual effects of bullet points and a map. I met with two others separately where we gave feedback to each other on our work. I got some great feedback and we promised to meet again in the new year after working on our papers.

Blog Post Published:

Colorful in Youth; Black and White in Elder Years

For 52 Ancestors’ theme of “Colorful,” I wrote about the outfits my great-aunt Bev wore over the years. I have color slides of her posing. This post was highlighted in the 52 Ancestors’ weekly email. 

SNGF: Write a 100-Word Life Sketch of One of Your 2X Great-Grandparents

I wrote about two of my great-great-grandparents. It was not easy to write only 100 words. 200 words would be much better, so some context could be added.

Genealogy Volunteer/Work:

At the History Center, I worked most of the day on the Pleasant Hill Historical Society Collection. Our letter sized boxes arrived and I transferred the folders into some of them. I am now going through the folders looking for duplicates, thinning down the overfilled folders. I also volunteered at the Oakland FamilySearch Center this week.

I started my Probate course with Applied Genealogy Institute and have twelve students. Most of the students submitted homework for my comments. 

Webinars/Courses Viewed: 

I attended the ninth session of the SLIG course, Advanced Study of Death, coordinated by Gena Philibert-Ortega. We learned about funerary jewelry and the 1918 flu.

I also attended the fifth session of the SLIG course, Assemblage: Preparing, Writing, and Revising Case Studies. This week we discussed added visual effects and how to give and receive feedback.

I also viewed the following webinars:

• Writing for Crossroads by Eva Holmes (UGA Pro Talk)
• Locating Church Records for Genealogical Research by Ursula Krause (German Genealogy Headquarters)

Other:

I attended an operation session at Tony’s layout on Sunday. His Southern Pacific Railroad layout of a fictitious branch line near San Luis Obispo is fun to operate on, though today, my partner and I probably took the longest ever, making some errors at the beginning. Still, we had a great time.

I am reading: 

• Stories in Stone: A Field Guide to Cemetery Symbolism and Iconography by Douglas Keister
• For the Love of Summer by Susan Mallory—FINISHED!
• Yours Truly: An Obituary Writer’s Guide to Telling Your Story by James R Hagerty
• The British Booksellers by Kristy Cambron

Photos for this week. Some photos from the past:

Genealogists are great at documenting our ancestors’ lives but not so great at documenting our own. I’ll write about what I’ve been doing the past week. This idea came from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing, who started this meme.

Copyright © 2024 by Lisa S. Gorrell, My Trails into the Past. All Rights Reserved.