Exciting Irish News, Camden Conference & Other News - Genealogy Notes 3-7 Sep 2016

The Society logo

Tomorrow I head off for Canberra and my visit to AIATSIS (Australian Institute for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies) before heading to Camden in New South Wales for the Cow Pastures and Beyond genealogy conference and family history fair. It is organised by the Camden Area Family History Society and I love their logo. As well as ACT and NSW friends, I also know that some from SA and QLD will also be there. A great three days coming up and a report will follow next week.

My week has been spent catching up on some genealogy magazine reading and exploring lots of new URLs. That's probably the main reason I never catch up with the reading because an article sends me to the laptop. Of course that also happens with tweets and Facebook posts too. This was going to be written this morning when I saw Chris Paton's British Genes Blog post and it totally hijacked my day.

Why? The headline was Historic Irish BMD Records Freely Available Online and how could anyone with Irish ancestors go past that. Several hours later I have managed to find out a lot more about my GG Grandmother's sisters family in Ireland. Sarah Finn nee Fagan had a sister Mary Fagan who married Patrick McCormack and they looked after my GGG grandmother Sarah Fagan nee Cane in her old age. As it was a collateral line I have never bothered to get certificates, relying on the 1901 and 1911 census records for the family. Now thanks to these new records online, I have Mary and Patrick's marriage certificate, birth certificates for all of their children and death certificates for Patrick and Mary.

I believe my great grandmother Mary Carnegie nee Finn was named after her aunt Mary McCormack nee Fagan. They never met and I wonder if Sarah ever wrote back home to her sister Mary? No letters survive here but now that I have more information on the McCormack's, perhaps I should try and track down any descendants?

I haven't been as successful with my Finn and Beakey families - I've got some possible entries but the certificates are not online yet. Once they are there might be enough information for me to confirm a relationship. Plus I've been jumping all over the place in my excitement, looking for quick hits. A more steady approach is required, not to mention some spelling variation searches. In the past I have found Finn under Funn. Still that will have to wait until I get back home again. As will entering all the data into my genealogy program.

The other thing I get from magazines and journals are blog post ideas and now that NFHM is over for another year I want to get back to some blog writing. Also high on my priority list is a new course module for the Australian Certificate offered by the National Institute for Genealogical Studies. It is on Education Records and I am looking forward to it as education records have long been a favourite of mine. One of my popular presentations is on school records and I use lots of my own family discoveries.

I'm also half way through a new research guide for Unlock the Past which was also abandoned for NFHM. Hopefully after I reread what I have done so far, it won't take too long to finish. Perhaps I need to stop checking social media for new releases?? Those people who don't use social media for genealogy and family history are missing out but then they probably get more other things done like housework, gardening and food shopping.

Time to go and pack a suitcase and get all my travel documents together for an early start tomorrow. The Bribie shuttle is picking me up at 5am to get to the airport on time. Traffic on the highway is always the unknown and I would prefer to have breakfast in the Qantas Club than be stuck in Brisbane's early morning traffic and worrying about missing the flight. Enjoy the weekend and if you are in Camden, come up and say hello.

 Until next week, happy searching!

End of National Family History Month 2016 & Other News - Genealogy Notes 25 Aug - 2 Sep 2016

A super big week and this blog is a little late but I have been busily notifying excited winners in the National Family History Month sponsors prizes giveaway. The draw took place after I gave my 18th talk for the month at the Noosaville Library. It was my Love Sex and Damn Lies talk which generated a good deal of chat afterwards. All of my talks for August can be found on the Resources page of my website, scroll down to Presentations.

Noosaville Library generously agreed to host the drawing of the prizes and I offered two lucky door prizes - one was Jackie Moss' Me & My Family Tree which is a children's book introducing them to family history. Every time I have used one of Jackie's books as a NFHM prize, the grandparents in the audience are all keen to win one. The other prize was a copy of my own Discover Your Sporting Ancestors - so many people assume that their ancestors didn't play sport. Everyone has sporting ancestors who fished, hunted, attended gun clubs, or played local cricket or football. School sports days are another place to find ancestors involved with sport.

It takes quite a while to draw all of the individual prizes and only one lady stayed to the end, apart from the librarians so I gave her one of my Finding Ancestors in Church Records for her assistance. Since then I have put the winners names up on the website, made announcements in social media, notified winners and sponsors by email and started to write up a final report on NFHM 2016 for AFFHO.

Week 4 of Alex Daw's NFHM 2016 blogging challenge was on places and landmarks. My contribution was Family Places and I think my own research is the richer for having travelled to see some of my own ancestral places in Australia.

John D Reid from Canada's Anglo Celtic Connections is again conducting his Genealogist Rockstar awards and voting is now open. It is exciting and humbling to see my own name amongst so many great Australasian speakers and bloggers. Not to mention all those US, Canada and UK people. Everyone is worthy of an award. If some names are new to you, check out their blogs/websites or maybe even listen to one of their webinars.

It has been a long month as voluntary coordinator of NFHM and I felt I deserved a reward (considering I can't go into the prizes giveaway). I ordered a copy of Nathan Dylan Goodwin's fourth volume on the fictional adventures of his forensic genealogist, Morton Farrier in The Spyglass File. It's quicker and cheaper to get the ecopy but I have all the others as paperbacks, plus I am still one of these people that like to curl up in bed with a good book.

By the end of the this weekend I hope to get back to doing some more of my own research. With the various events I attended during the month, I have quite a list of things to follow up. My desk also needs a good tidy up as I have piled lots of things collected during the month for a closer look or read.

Next weekend is the NSW & ACT Association of Family History Organisations annual conference Cowpastures and Beyond at Camden. It will be a great opportunity to catch up with old geneafriends and learn new and exciting things. I'm hoping to visit AIATSIS in Canberra before heading off to Camden. At Noosaville the other day two of the questions were about Indigenous genealogy and it's a while since I last visited AIATSIS.

Another busy week ahead and I might try and get another Diary done before I go, otherwise it will be late again. It is just too hard trying to keep up with blogs and social media while travelling and attending events. I hope everyone had a great NFHM 2016 and make sure August is in your calendars for next year. Until next time, happy searching.

New books, blog posts, talks and NFHM 2016 update - Genealogy Notes 17-24 Aug 2016

During the week I managed to write up my review of the Auckland Family History Expo and did Week 2 Working Forebears and Week 3 Military Ancestors for the NFHM 2016 blog challenge. I rather like the blogging badge, we can use it again next year! There is still Week 4 to do, my 31 Activities for Researchers in NFHM and my blog and article for The In-Depth Genealogist. My keyboard is in danger of wearing out!

The last two times I have been to the post office there have been parcels waiting for me. First there was Jackie Moss' new book Me & My Family Tree which introduces children to family history. It's been a while since I have read a children's book but I'm looking forward to it. It looks modern, colourful and on a topic dear to my heart. There will be a review post soon. Jackie also sent a few more copies for me to use during National Family History Month.

The other parcel contained Carol Baxter's latest 'how to' guides - a new edition of Writing Interesting Family Histories and a follow on Writing and Publishing Gripping Family Histories. At first glance I'm not sure what the difference between interesting and gripping is, but I will be reviewing both books. No doubt I will be inspired to relook at my own draft family histories and perhaps even publish them. Although after last year's DNA revelation, I'm glad I didn't publish earlier.

So some nice reading to look forward to in September. For the last week of NFHM 2016 I have an all day seminar with five talks at Genealogy Sunshine Coast. It should be a great day, although I might be a little hoarse by the end. I've got some sponsor prizes for a lucky door giveaway so some attendees will be even more happy. My final talk (and it will be my 18th talk) of NFHM is at Noosaville Library where we will also be doing the NFHM prizes giveaway draw. Then the only thing to do will be write up a final report for AFFHO and thank all the sponsors after notifying the lucky winners.

If I am voluntary coordinator of NFHM again next year, I don't think I will be doing 18 talks and travelling to Perth or Auckland, New Zealand all in 31 days. I'm getting too old or I need to be a bit fitter! In 2017 the launch will be in Sydney but I will be missing it regardless, as I have already booked to be on the Unlock the Past Papua New Guinea cruise.

It's Sydney next year because the AFFHO Congress  Bridging the Past & Future is in Sydney in 2018 and this is a chance to help promote Congress during NFHM. Hopefully I will find someone to volunteer to be chair at the launch. I have been thinking about doing some sort of event at the end of NFHM 2017 in a regional area, just for something different. But anyway, that's next year and I still have to finish NFHM 2016.

The post also brought a very nice thank you letter from WAGS (Western Australian Genealogical Society) for my three talks in Perth. Usually it is an email thank you so nice to see a hand signed letter for a change. I have to share some of their kind words because it simply sums up what I had tried to do with my presentations.

Part of the enthusiastic audience at the WAGS seminar

The President wrote "The number in attendance and the enthusiasm of the audience reflects the quality of your presentations. Your first talk, Love Sex and Damn Lies demonstrating the strong link between family history and local and social history, set the scene for your later talks on demolishing brick walls and looking beyond online resources".

A thank you like that makes it all worthwhile.

As I mentioned above this coming week sees six more talks, and trips to Nambour and Noosa, both in South East Queensland but north of Brisbane for overseas readers. Travel time up and down the highway is always problematic but arriving in time is more important than the trip home. So one more busy week then a nice little rest before I head off to the NSW & ACT genealogy conference Cow Pastures and Beyond in Camden.

Enjoy the final week of NFHM 2016, get your entry in for the prizes giveaway before 28 August (see the Sponsors page and how to enter is in the terms and conditions) and happy searching until next time.