March was a huge month travelling to the USA for my first ever in person Roots Tech conference. The rest of the month was mainly spent travelling and I would like to thank all those who followed my Facebook photos of the trip. It was fantastic and good to know that others enjoyed my experiences. The most genealogy I did was via emails - reading enews and genealogy ejournals and checking Ancestry and MyHeritage for new DNA matches.
Blogs
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| FamilySearch Library books and more books & even one on an area that I am researching in County Antrim, Ireland |
As always I kept a travel diary so I can go back and see what I did and given that RootsTech was so full on I'm glad I did that. So many experiences!
Books
Very proud of myself in that I only bought one book over there. Diahan Southard's Your DNA Guide.
To be honest there wasn't a lot of temptation as it is too expensive to ship books to a conference. So many exhibitors had order forms or referred you to Amazon. Nathan Dylan Goodwin was the only one with a pile of books around him at the start but by the end those piles had dwindled. I am an impulse buyer so his strategy worked better - the bird in the hand.
Also good to finally meet him in person.
Conferences
Although Roots Tech 2023 is over, you can still view the sessions online at home. There is enough to keep us all interested until next year. The dates for Roots Tech 2024 are 29 February to 2 March.
The next Australian genealogy conference is the NSW Association Annual Conference and this year it is hosted by the Wyong Society. The there is The Running Waters of History between 8 - 10 September 2023. Speakers include Martyn Killion, Michelle Patient, Mark Bundy, Geoffrey Potter, Michael Bell and Jeffrey Madsen. The conference is in person and virtual. This year I will be a virtual attendee, as I have conflicting dates with a talk for the Genealogical Society of Queensland that same weekend.
New Resources
Do you ever check the new additions to the British Newspaper Archive? I get their enewsletter but I usually skip over as I'm busy but then of course I never revisit the email. One of my new promises to myself is to read things as they come in. Not always practicable but worth trying for.
For example, in March they advised that they had added more to the Birmingham Mail which was first published in 1870. Almost another half million digitised pages which made me quite excited as both Max and myself have Black Country ancestors. Years covered include from 1871 to 1999 with gaps. I particularly like that newspapers post 1954 (Trove cut off) as it can lead to discovering more recent cousins.
Talks
First week home was busy with talks to Strathpine Library on genealogy for beginners and Noosaville Library on resources for women as part of International Women's History Month.
Next is my talk as part of the Legacy Webinars 24 hour genealogy marathon on 13 April. My session is Australian Indexes Online for Family History Research That You May Not Know About. The event is free but you must register to receive the link. Check out all the speakers and topics here.
What's Coming Up
Due to all my travels I have agreed to run the Irish genealogy course again at Bribie U3A. The first term missed half the lectures due to my absence so they have enrolled again.
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| Salt Lake City in person 2023 |
The rest of April will be spent sorting my notes from Roots Tech and following up on all of my action points.
Easter is next week and the school holidays are always an opportunity to catch up with my brother. Not to mention that I also have a fondness for hot cross buns which I never buy outside of March/April.
Have a great genealogy month and I hope to be back to regular reports now that all my big trips are out of the way. Until next time, stay safe and well. Shauna
