Genealogy notes 1 July 2011

It's the first day of the new financial year, and having spent 35 years working in government, I am used to thinking of my year from July to June. Rather than start another paper diary, I am taking the new step of doing it online via this blog. The first challenge was trying to think of a name for my daily notes to myself and I suspect future challenges will be finding the time to enter my notes.

My day usually starts with a check of my emails and this morning there was the sad news of the death of Don Grant, a well known genealogist in Victoria and former staff member at Public Record Office Victoria. I first met Don many years ago and he was always inspirational to other researchers. The Victorian Association of Family History Organisations in 1997 named their annual lecture after Don and sadly he will miss the next one in August during National Family History Week. A list of the Don Grant Family History Lectures and presenters is on their website.

I am participating in the 52 Weeks of Personal Genealogy and History blogging challenge and after an absence of a few weeks, I submitted my Week 26 blog today on Songs and what they mean to me.

Next on my to do list was to use the National Library of Australia's E-resources to look at some overseas newspapers. For some reason I didn't have any luck connecting with the Irish newspaper archives via their link but I did get to do some searching in the 19th Century British Library newspapers. However I didn't find what I was looking for but did get sidetracked into reading about what was happening in Belfast, Ireland during 1841.

Of course the day wouldn't be complete without checking out Twitter every so often - I can't believe how many good links and ideas for genealogy that I pick up via Twitter. Not to mention the contacts and conversations with friends all over the world via that social media. It's like emails now - very hard to not check them every so often.

I like to try and read e-newsletters as I receive them but that is not always possible. Just read my Professional Historians Association (Queensland) e-Bulletin - the AGM is coming up in August, along with membership renewals and there is lots of interesting news. It is one of my primary links to friends and colleagues in Queensland since I moved south in 1999.

Today has been a big day for my genealogy - I don't normally have that much time to do research. Plus I have mastered a new skill - setting up this blog!