My Trails into the Past

One of the main goals I had accomplished by the end of 2018 was submitting my portfolio to the Board for the Certification of Genealogists and becoming certified. It was a major accomplishment and I thought would lead to more opportunities in the new year. However, during 2019, I had no new major clients and research projects, but did have many clients who needed quick record retrievals. I also did not have many speaking engagements. By looking back on what I did accomplish, I was still very active with genealogy throughout the year. I would say, except for the days when I was traveling with family, I spent at least an hour on genealogy, either researching my own family, writing about the research, or learning from blog posts and webinars given by other genealogists. Client Work: 5 document retrieval clients, one very steady 1 record transcription client 1 deed research client 1 phone consultation client Education: Attended SLIG, taking “Advanced Southern R...

This is my second year working on this year-long prompt, hosted by Amy Johnson Crow . I will write each week in one of my two blogs, either Mam-ma’s Southern Family or at My Trails Into the Past . I have enjoyed writing about my children’s ancestors in new and exciting ways. I have been a bit behind in studying DNA for genealogy. I have done some self-studying but have not taken a DNA class yet. Education The books I’ve read include: The Family Tree Guide to DNA Testing and Genetic Genealogy by Blaine T. Bettinger. This book gave me a basic understanding of the different types of DNA (Y-DNA, autosomal DNA, X-DNA, and mtDNA) and how they are used to solve genetic problems. Genetic Genealogy in Practice by Blaine T. Bettinger and Debbie Parker Wayne. This workbook allowed me to work through exercises in the use of DNA in genetic problem solving. I have also viewed several webinars on DNA. Especially helpful were these webinars from Legacy Family Tree Webinars that...

This is my second year working on this year-long prompt, hosted by Amy Johnson Crow . I will write each week in one of my two blogs, either Mam-ma’s Southern Family or at My Trails Into the Past . I have enjoyed writing about my children’s ancestors in new and exciting ways. Picking a topic for “surprise” was a matter of searching the word in my RootsMagic program. Some of the hits pertained to elopements of young people who “surprised” family and friends by getting married. Other hits pertained to deaths, where the timing was imminent so people “weren’t surprised” by the death. My grandmother, Anna Sullivan Hork I did find the newspaper article from the Napa Register discussing the Parent Teacher Association awarding Honorary Life Membership to Mrs. Ann Hork in 1957. [1] Honorary Life Membership in the Parent-Teacher Association was awarded to Mrs. Ann Hork, former Napa teacher at a recent meeting in the Williams School in Concord.  The principal of the sch...

I became a Certified Genealogist® officially on December 22, 2018 and will hold the certification for five years. I was so excited when I got the news. I submitted on October 5 and waited (not so patiently) over two and half months. What helped, was I started working on another project: looking for the father of Samuel Johnston. To become certified, I had to submit a seven-part portfolio to the Board for the Certification of Genealogists that demonstrated my ability to follow the Genealogical Proof Standard (GPS). [1] It really was the culmination of many years of research practice, several years of education, and then putting together the portfolio. This portfolio was then judged by three competent genealogists who use a rubrics to determine whether I have met the standards of the GPS. Education was a major factor in helping me prepare for certification. I had started conducting genealogy research as a self-taught researcher. I read The Source and attended presentations b...

Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing started this meme and I loved the idea. Genealogists are great at documenting our ancestors’ lives but not so great documenting our own. I’ll write about what I’ve been doing the past week. Genealogy 1. Genealogy Courses This week I atteded Rick Sayre’s Advanced Land Tools: Maps class at SLIG (Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy). We had five full days of classes and a banquet on Friday night. I learned so much about how to accessed maps online and offline, how to overlay old maps onto Google Earth, and how to plot land both on paper and in a program called DeedMapper . Check out my blog posts about my SLIG experience.     The week wasn’t just about class. I made some new friends, visited with old friends, read through several of the BCG certification portfolios, and purchased some new genealogy books. I got in some exercise each day walking back to the hotel from the library each afternoon. Some of the CGS members pre...