January 2, 2016

IOOF Hall,  520 Dana Street 

San Luis Obispo  

Session 1 begins at 12:15                  Session 2 begins at 1:45

Session 1: The Hidden World of Facebook Groups for Genealogists: Finding Groups to Help Your Research by Mary Adler Hansen.

Want a document translated? Have a question about Grandma’s hometown? Need someone to identify the weird object on Uncle Ron’s desk? Join a group on Facebook and find your answer! Learn how to access the hidden world of Facebook genealogy groups!

Mary Hansen is a native of San Luis Obispo who has been researching her family tree for over a decade. She enjoys connecting with family and finding cousins through Facebook. She receives notifications from several major genealogy sites on a daily basis, which helps her stay on top of what classes are offered online, and the latest news in the genealogy world. Mary is the Social Media Chair for our society.

Nancy Loe

Session 2:   Managing Your Digital Research by Nancy Loe. 

Lost in a sea of digital files and paper? Can’t find the records you know you have? Searching for a better way to organize your work? This presentation uses the techniques and principles of professional archivists to organize your genealogical research. Topics covered include using controlled vocabulary to organize and retrieve your records, file-naming conventions for scanned documents and downloads; file folder structure; and authority files. More info: http://slocgs.org/#jan2016

Nancy Loe is a professional archivist, librarian, and genealogist, with master's degrees in American History and in Library Science. She was director of special collections and archives at Cal Poly for nearly three decades. Nancy has appeared on PBS's "American Experience" and "California Gold," and at Rootstech and the SoCal Jamboree. Her website, Sassyjanegenealogy.com, was featured in the Jan-Feb 2014 of  Family Tree Magazine's “Social Media Mavericks: 40 to Follow.”

Coming up on February 6, 2016:

Session 1: Dating Photographs by Eva Ulz, Curator of the SLO History Center. 

Session 2: Hidden legacies: Rescuing the past of two San Luis Obispo’s pioneer families who ‘vanished’ from our region by Dan Krieger. 

Social Security and Original Records

Thanks to Barbara McCallum and Cheryl Storton for their presentations at the Genealogy Society General Meeting on Saturday, March 3.

Barbara talked about the Social Security Death Index and related records. If you’ve never gotten a copy of your parents’ or grandparents’ application for Social Security, perhaps you are now motivated to try. Here are a couple of good links:

• Online requests for Social Security Applications of Deceased Persons http://www.ssa.gov/foia/html/foia_guide.htm
• Does that Social Security number begin with 700-728? If yes, don't overlook the Railroad Retirement Board Records http://www.rrb.gov/mep/genealogy.asp 

Cheryl’s presentation entertainingly demonstrated the difference between original and derivative sources and the importance of obtaining the original record (or the earliest derivative, in the absence of the original), even when you have a reliable transcription. The image accompanying this article (from Cheryl's presentation) shows a California Mission original record, an 1897 baptism, with a "bonus" in the left column, a notation about the individual's marriage almost 50 years later in 1946.

It makes me wonder. Do we have all the original sources associated with our parents' and grandparents? Or are we relying on family tradition? Sometimes in our haste to get to that Mayflower ancestor, we casually skip over recent, important original documents which could change everything -- including the ease with which we eventually identify that Mayflower ancestor.   

Cool associated websites Cheryl recommended include:  

• FamilySearch Catalog Search https://familysearch.org/#form=catalog
• Linkpendium http://www.linkpendium.com

General Meeting 5 November "Family Skeletons" Program

Our main program on Saturday, November 5, 2011, consisted of members’ accounts of researching family skeletons. Thanks to Ginger Goodell for putting together the very-professional-looking Power Point and contributing the following recap of the individual presentations.   

John W. Davis

Cheryl Storton described how she discovered the truth about a family tradition claiming her grandfather, John W. Davis (see photo), went to prison for making moonshine, but walked away and never went back when he tired of being there.

Martha Crosley Graham read a family story her grandmother wrote, describing Martha’s Danish great-grandfather’s colorful background and death.  Martha’s research separated “truth from fiction.”

Greg Pisaño described his discovery of a family skeleton while going through newspaper microfilm in Arizona’s Sedona/Prescott-area public libraries. His grandfather’s name appeared in headlines as having murdered his wife’s brother at the door of a local saloon.  Greg demonstrated how additional research led to more details about this family secret.

Jan Cannon told how she’d asked her grandmother about her great-grandmother, only to be told she’d died young and that her grandmother had no memory of her. After Jan enlisted the help of a professional researcher and another family member doing genealogical research, she learned her great-grandmother’s name and that she’d died in an “insane asylum,” having lived there the last 45 years of her life.  Jan described her visit to the institution where she was able to view her great-grandmother’s file, see the grave (a numbered brick), and arrange to have a proper grave marker installed.

Carole Ann Davis began seeking clues about when and how her grandfather came from Germany to the U.S. and eventually won medals for his Spanish-American War participation. Using both Ancestry.com and the LDS Family History Center in Utah, she documented his military service, but was taken aback to discover him on the 1900 US census as an inmate at San Quentin. From there, she tracked down his offense--burglary--and even found his mug shots.

Julia George’s research into collateral ancestors led to a family skeleton who appeared to be an adulterer and a counterfeiter.  Looking at censuses and several cities’ newspapers fleshed out more information on this black sheep’s criminal activities.

Lynn Storrs stumbled across news of her father’s previous marriage when her aunt shared with her a prized possession, Lynn’s great-grandfather’s Bible. In it Lynn read a strange woman’s name, a name not found in the family Bible. After talking over her discovery with her mother, Lynn made peace with this upsetting bit of family history, as most of us have likely learned to do with the family skeletons we’ve stumbled across.  

Janet Grummit shared the booklet she recently ordered from the Mason City, Illinois Area and Family Historical Society.  In it she found a three-and-a-half-page article on a great-uncle charged as an accessory to armed robbery. This was the first she’d heard of this family skeleton.  She’s doing further research to learn what became of him.