Genealogy notes 7-9 Aug 2012 - talking at Yarra Plenty

Monday had to be one of the wettest, coldest, windiest days I've ever experienced in Melbourne but when you are booked to give three genealogy talks on the other side of the city you can't stay in bed just because you don't like the weather. I was also giving myself extra driving time because every time I go on the Western Ring Road it is chockers and I wasn't disappointed. Getting up to about 30km an hour was about as exciting as it got and at one point I thought I wasn't going to make it to the first venue. But once past the airport it did get a bit faster and amazingly I found the first venue without getting lost once.

Yarra Plenty Regional Library has a number of libraries within it due to the sheer population numbers in this part of Melbourne. My first stop was Lalor Library and the talk was basically a beginners type talk on researching Australian ancestors. As usual I will be putting up PDF copies of the Yarra Plenty talks on the Resources page of my website, under Presentations (scroll down). I'll probably wait until after the last talks next Monday to do it. There are a few other priority items on my to do list today!

After the talk Liz (organiser of the talks as part of their National Family History Month, they can't fit everything they want to do in a single week so a month makes sense) wandered across the road (trying to ignore the rain and wind) to the shopping centre where we indulged ourselves with a pie and latte. I had a pepper one hoping it would warm me up from the inside.

After lunch it was off to Mill Park Library and I was very grateful to Liz for allowing me to follow her as I don't think I would have found my way on my own. Although trying to keep together without other cars coming in between or being separated at traffic lights was a bit tricky in the rain. Mill Park library is stunning and I actually thought it was some sort of convention centre and I even found myself thinking about how good it might be to go back to work in a place like that, especially their local history collection room. The talk here was on It's Not All Online, Where Else Can I Look which was well received by an enthusiastic audience.

After that Liz and I wandered across to the local La Porchetta for an early dinner and I again went for a warming type meal - calabrese tortellini with lots of hot salami and chilli in a great tomato sauce with another latte. We had a great genealogy/library discussion and the two hours went very quick. Then it was back into the cars for the drive to Watsonia Library and by this time I was well and truly lost as I have never been to that part of Melbourne before.

The evening talk was on researching Victorian ancestors and was well received despite a few technical difficulties at the beginning. By the end I was starting to feel a bit weary and after checking on the best way to get back on the Western Ring Road for the long drive home, I was on my way. Luckily that time of night it is not as busy as during the day but even so it still took just over an hour before I was unlocking the front door.

The other half was back from Bali and having slept all afternoon was keen to tell me all about his adventures which were definitely more exciting than my tales of packing up ready for the move which is now less than four weeks away.

I managed to get in some of my news as well including that I had an article published in the August issue of Irish Lives Remembered and I had spent time doing talks and publications. I still have two more talks to do for Yarra Plenty next Monday - details are here. These will be my last genealogy talks in Victoria which is a bit sad.

Yesterday I made a determined attach on starting to pack up my study and I'm trying to keep everything in the order it is currently in but of course that doesn't always suit the nature of the packing boxes. Because books and paper weigh so much, the boxes are smaller and I'm now surrounded by little towers of boxes! Whatever house we end up buying, it has to have a study as big as this one or bigger!

Today I'm doing some publication checking and indexing along with more study packing so I better get back to that. The day's already half gone but I've also done the domestic goddess type work as well, washing, cooking, cleaning, yes the other half is definitely back!

I hope others are having more genealogy fun than me at the moment. Till next time.

Genealogy notes 31 Jul - 6 Aug 2012 still talking genealogy

Well National Family History Week 2012 went very quickly!  Even though the week is officially over I still have five talks to give for Yarra Plenty Regional Libraries - Wednesday 8 August and Monday 13 August. A list of libraries I'm speaking at, the topics and when are here. Makes me wonder if we should have National Family History Month like New Zealand has. Anyone else had similar thoughts?

I've been busy putting the finishing touches to a new Unlock the Past research guide on using the National Library of Australia and in particular Trove its national discovery service. Hopefully that will be published before the Queensland Coast Roadshow along with my other new guide Finding Ancestors in Church Records (out soon).

Findmypast.com.au asked me to do a guest blog on an Olympian so I went back to the 1912 Olympics and was fascinated to learn about Cecil Patrick Healy. He is also our only Olympian to have ever been killed in action. Healy was killed in 1918 just 74 days before the end of the war.

I've also got an article in the August issue of Irish Lives Remembered on Missing Persons Down Under which I'm excited about. It should be due out this week and remember it is free to view! There are so many interesting stories just waiting to be told.

As if I'm not busy enough, this week also sees the start of a free National Institute of Genealogical Studies course that I signed up for a while back. It was part of an introductory offer to attendees at an Unlock the Past expo. I can't resist free offers and this one is on genealogy methodology. Although I've been doing my own family history for 35 years it doesn't hurt to go back to basics especially when so much is changing in the genealogy world these days.

Hazel Edwards has sent me a copy of her latest book on Authorpreneurship: the Business of Creativity for review (that's two books now I have lined up to review when I finish packing). I'm looking forward to reading this as Hazel told me a little about it while she was still finishing it. In a nutshell is is about investing in your creativity to increase your professional opportunities. The back cover states that Hazel has written over 200 books so she is probably well qualified to talk about authors building their own brand.

The other half is due back tomorrow from Bali and I don't know where those ten days went. I'm looking forward to some help with packing up the house. I've spent the last few days just packing up all my books and I've started on the study. The hard part is trying not to pack something that I might need over the next few months but then again you can only fit so much in a caravan! There seem to be lots of houses for sale on the Sunshine Coast so hopefully we won't be homeless for too long.

It's a nice, sunny, but cool day here in Melbourne so I might make the most of it and go for a walk now before the weather changes!

Genealogy Notes 30 Jul 2012 - 9th Family History Feast

Despite the heavy traffic on the freeway, I made the trek into Melbourne in good time for the 9th annual Family History Feast (previous years' podcasts are also available at that link). It doesn't really seem nine years since Anne Piggott (National Archives of Australia), Anne Burrows (State Library of Victoria) and I (then Public Record Office Victoria) sat down (over lunch) to start planning the first ever Feast. Like all events, it needed a name and Anne Burrows reminded people yesterday that I had come up with the name. So for posterity and the record, I will briefly say how Feast came about.
Some of you may have seem the 1987 Danish movie Babette's Feast which is based on an Isak Dinesen (Karen Blixen) novel. She also wrote Out of Africa another favourite book/film of mine. The movie Babette's Feast also won an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. It's a great story and if you want a plot spoiler read about it here but to me, what the two Anne's and I were trying to do back then, was to bring to our clients a 'feast of family history'. I think that we have achieved that over the years and although Anne Piggott and I have moved on, our place in organising Feast has been taken on by other NAA and PROV staff members who assist Anne Burrows.
Enough memories, on to a report of the day. As usual the presentations were included on a PROV USB given out as you registered and there was the usual goodies bag - this year a stylish blue PROV bag with brochures from Museum Victoria, PROV, Immigration Museum Victoria, Geelong Heritage Centre, Bendigo Regional Archives Centre, State Library of Victoria, National Library of Australia and TROVE, National Archives of Australia, Australian Institute of Genealogical Studies, Founders and Survivors, Victorian Association of Family History Organisations (VAFHO) and their 4-5 May 2013 conference Under the Southern Cross and the Australian Institute for the Conservation of Cultural Materials (AICCM). It was great to see so many supporters.
After a welcome from Anne, the audience were introduced to the new CEO and State Librarian Sue Roberts who spoke briefly about her background. I was the next speaker with Google Genealogy - Are You Making the Most of Google? which from verbal reports was well received. I was a bit mortified that I had the wrong title on my presentation that was included on the USB stick given out to attendees. I checked the talk endlessly but not the cover slide!! I have put the 'correct' presentation up on my website on the Resources page (scroll down to Presentations).
Next was Daniel Wilksch from Public Record Office Victoria who talked about Old Records, New Access and it was good to hear that by the end of the year they hope to start putting the digitised inquests to 1925 up on the PROV website. It will take about 12-18 months to put them all up which is a sobering reminder of just how huge that wills, probates and inquests digitisation project with FamilySearch was when it started back in 2004. Daniel also invited people to start making more use of the PROV Wiki to help make access to records more easy.
After lunch Mark Brennan from National Archives of Australia talked about Pictorial Records in their collection and although I was familiar with PhotoSearch and Faces of Australia (227 images and found under Snapshots of the Collection), I had not heard about Destination Australia. It is 20,000 images of migrants post World War 2 and it is interactive ie you can add in your own stories or comments. In fact, NAA is looking for more active online participation by users, especially with their pictorial records.
Last Feast speaker for the day was Susan Long from State Library of Victoria Pictorial Collection who talked about photo albums, their history and meanings. I liked her comment that albums hold 'the DNA of history' and she pointed out that photos within albums still have their original context where as when they are digitised, they lose that context unless there is an attempt to keep the digitised images within that context.
For the last few years the Victorian Association of Family History Organisations (VAFHO) have been holding their annual Don Grant Family History Lecture at the end of Family History Feast. This year the speaker was Professor Janet McCalman on Vandemonians in Victoria. Janet is associated with the Founders and Survivors Project which is linking Tasmanian convicts to their World War 1 descendants where applicable.
Carmen was the official SLV blogger for Feast and her reports can be found on the Library's Family Matters blog.
At the end of a long but stimulating day, the lucky seat prizes were drawn and Anne announced that 5 August 2013 would be the date for the 10th Family History Feast. Although I will be in Queensland then, I will have to make a quick trip to Melbourne as I wouldn't want to miss something that has been part of my life for so long! Roll on National Family History Week - I'm having a great time!