SLIG--Internet Tools and Techniques

Barbara Renick is returning as coordinator for the Computerized Genealogy track with a course entitled "Internet Tools and Techniques." Together with Gena Philibert Ortega, Pam Sayer CG, CGL, Rick Sayer CG, CGL, and D. Josh Taylor, she will be teaching:
Internet Tools for Genealogists (A Brief Overview)
Eleven Layers of Online Searches
Online: How You Get There Does Make a Difference
Techniques for Searching Books ONline
Techniques for Searching Library Catalogs Online
Tools for Finding Manuscript Sources
Tools for Finding Historical Newspapers
Techniques for Searching Newspapers Online
LAB: Web Surfing Made Easier
Apps for Genealogy (Mobile Computing)
Finding Images to Tell the Story
Hidden Genealogy Web Sites
Google Tools & Techniques for Genealogists
Cloud Computing for Genealogists
Social Networking Tools for Genealogists
Plug-ins, Toolbars & More: Customizing Your Internet Experience
The Web, the World, and YOU! (Advanced Internet Research)
Evaluating and Documenting Online SOurces
Google Earth & Maps (two hours long)
This course is designed to sharpen your Internet search techniques and help you better utilize a wide array of online tools. It includes a two hour lab on web surfing--one hour instruction and one hour practice time with the instructor.

You can still get into this course by registering at www.ugagenalogy.org

Give Thanks to Your Ancestors

November is the time of year Americans give thanks. People give thanks for their family, jobs, health, this great country and even their ancestors.

Have you taken the time this month to think about the many things your ancestors did to make you who and where you are today? The sacrifice many of our ancestors made were incredibly difficult and extensive.

As I have researched my genealogy over the years I have found multiple ancestors that gave everything and sacrificed everything just so they could make their families lives better.

Many other bloggers out there have been expressing their thanks towards their ancestors as well. Check out these great blog posts by other genealogy bloggers!

The Thanksgiving Letter
by Thomas MacEntee

Turkey and Tradition
by Alisha Martin
Kentucky Historical Society

Thanksgiving Greeting: November 21, 1909
by TJL Genes

Thanksgiving 1942
by John Newmark

The First Thanksgiving was Held Where?
Dick Eastman

SLIG--Advanced Methodology

Thomas W. Jones, Ph.D., CG, CGL, FASG, FUGA will join us in presenting and Advanced Methodology course. Claire Bettag, CG, CGL; Rick Sayre, CG, CGL; and John Colletta, PhD., FUGA will join him as instructors.

Participants will develop genealogical research, analysis, correlation and compilation skills. Hands-on activities drawn from original sources will enhance this learning. Examples will be drawn from American States and colonies and European countries. Before the course begins, participants will complete two pre-course reading assignments. Three in course homework assignments will be optional.

Courses will include:

• Developing an Evidence Orientation


• Developing Research Questions and Hypotheses; Planning an Exhaustive Search


• Transcribing, Abstracting, Extracting, Quoting, and Documenting Sources


• Archival Research


• Census, Census-Substitute, and Name-List Strategies: Analysis, Interpretation, and Correlation


• Military and Pension Records Stategies: Analysis, Interpretation, and Correlation


• Tax Roll Strategies: Analysis, Interpretation, and Correlation


• Federal Research: Government Documents


• Rural and Urban Map Strategies: Analysis, Interpretation, and Correlation


• Locsl Land Records: Analysis, Interpretation, and Correlation


• Probate Strategies: Analysis, Interpretation, and Correlation


• Bringing Law to Bear on Complex Genealogical Problems


• Special ProblemsI: Finding Immigrant and Migrant Origins


• Special Problems II: Idnetifying Female Ancestors


• Special Problems III: Identifying Landless, Enslaved, Peasant, and Other Impoverished Ancestors


• Resolving Conflicting Evidence


• Correlating Sources, Information, and Evidence to Solve Genealolgical Problems


• Federal Land Records: Analysis, Interpretation, and Correlation


• Writing Genealogy


• Continued Advancement

Unfortunately this class is full for this year. Please contact the registrar at sligregistrar@infouga.org to be placed on a waiting list.

SLIG--Irish Family History Research

The next course of study for the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy 2011 that we are going to tell you about is Irish Family History Research. It is being Coordinated by David Ouimette, CG and taught with the help fo Evva Housley, AG, Dean J. Hunter AG, CG, Tome Hones Ph.D., CG, CGL, FASG, FUGA, and David E. Rencher AG, CG, FUGA, FIGR. They are teaching:

• Irish Immigration--North American Sources and Methodology
• Irish Emigration - Irish Sources and Methodology
• Scotch-Irish in America
• Irish Surnames and Given Names
• Irish Records and Resources on the Internet
• Identifying Irish Localities
• The Irish Collection in the Family History Library
• Tools for Irish Reference
• Catholic Church Records
• Church of Ireland Records
• Presbyterian Church Records
• Irish Civil Registration of Births, Marriages, and Deaths
• Irish Census and Census Substitutes
• Methodology for Interpreting and Evaluating Name Lists
• Land Valuation Records
• Estate, Land and Property Records
• Irish Poor Law System
• Methodology for Reconstructing Lineages from Irish Record Fragments
• Irish Probate Records and Genealogical Collections
• Preparing for a Family History Experience in Ireland

This course covers a variety of topics critical to Irish family history research. A number of classes explore the major record sources for Irish genealogy--civil registration, church, census and land valuation records--including strategies for getting the most out of these records. Other classes delve into lesser-known sources of Irish family history. Special emphasis is given to research strategies and methodologies for immigrant research, eighteenth-century Irish genealogy, and how to successfully reconstruct families with scanty evidence. This course takes advantage of the Salt Lake City venue by highlighting the Irish records and finding aids available at the Family History Library. The final class helps students prepare to take a genealogy trip to Ireland.

There are still a few openings for this class. You can register at www.ugagenealogy.org

SLIG--Research in Washington, D.C.: Without Leaving Home

We are very excited to have Pamela Sayre, CG, CGL and Rick Sayre, CG, CGL teaching a new course at SLIG this year entitled "Research in Washinton, D.C.: Without Leaving Home" Claire Bettag, CG, CGL will be helping them teach.
This course presents some of the massive resources that are available in Washington, DC-area and other federal repositories and how to access many of them through the Family History Library (FHL), websites, and published sources. Records from the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), the Library of Congress (LC), the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) Library, and many other repositories will be explored. Students will learn to use finding aids, online catalogs, websites, interlibrary loan, and the holdings of the FHL to find, analyze, and understand federal records spanning the eighteenth to twenty-first centuries. Courses include:

• Identifying and Using National Archives and Records Administration Finding Aids
• Understanding the Resources of the Library of Congress
• Finding Individuals in the American State Papers
• Using the Serial Set in Genealogical Research
• Finding Individuals in the Territorial Papers
• Treasure in the Library of Congress Manuscript Collection
• Remote Research in the Databases of the Daughters of the American Revolution Genealogical Research System
• Mining Washington Map Repositories Remotely
• National Archives Resources in the Family History Library
• Federal Records in FamilySearch
• Finding Records and Individuals Using the National Archives Website
• Finding Individuals in Military Archives
• Using Social Security Records
• Using National Archives Regional and Affiliated Archives to Find Individuals
• General Land Entry Papers: Federal Land Records at the National Archives
• Bounty Land Applications: Federal Land Records at the National Archives
• Chronicling America
• National Historical Publications and Records Commission
• Structured Excerises in the Computer Labs (FHL) (2 Sessions - 1 hour each)

There are still a few spaces available in this class. You can register at www.ugagenealogy.org

SLIG--NEHGS part 1 New England

The next course we are going to focus on is part one in what will be a three part series about New England taught in partnership with the New England Historic Genealogical Society.

This course is taught by D. Joshua Taylor with the help of Christoper C. Child and Michael Leclerc. They will be teaching:

• Sources for New England Research
• Sources for New York Research
• State Census Records and Census Substitutes
• Land Records for New England and New York
• Probate Records for New England and New York
• Church Records for New England and New York
• Migrations of the 17th and 18th Century
• Early Federal Migrations of 1780-1830
• Exploring Migrations to Western Massachusetts and New York
• Canadian Connections to New York and New England
• Trial by Community: Colonial Legal Systems in New England and New York
• NewEnglandAncestors.org Advanced Techniques
• Three Case Studies
• Consultations

Explore the resources available for researching families in New England and New York before 1850 with the New England Historic Genealogical Society. This course will include hands-on case studies, group discussions, individual one-on-one consultations and a series of lectures on records, migration patterns, understanding boundaries and other tools for researchers.

This class is currently filled but you can join the waiting list by emailing the SLIG registrar at sligregistrar@infouga.org

SLIG--American Records and Research: Focusing on Localities

Are you signed up for the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy yet? We're going to focus for the next couple of weeks on the fantastic opportunities available to you at the Institute.

The first course we are going to focus on is CG Paula Stuart-Warren's American Records and Research: focusing on Localities class. Her team of Karen Mauer Green, Michael J Leclerc, Kory Meyerink MLS, AG FUGA, D. Joshua Taylor, and Cath Madden Trindle will be teaching the following courses:

• Intro & General Class Information:Strategies and Organizational Tips and Tools for Busy Researchers at the FHL and Elsewhere.
• Delving into County Courthouse and Town Hall Records
• Land Records: Digging Deeper Online and Off
• Building a House History from a Variety of Records
• Dissecting a Document: Getting from Point A to Point Z
• Lawyers, Judges and Trials: Using the Law in Genealogy
• Locality Resources: Using Maps, Gazetteers, Atlases and More
• The WPA Era: What is Created for Genealogists
• Records Related to Ancestral Arrivals in the United States
• Greater Success through Source Citation
• Vanity Sketches: Sources and Truths Behind Mugbook Entries
• The U.S. National Archives: The Nation's Attic
• Finding Ancestral Places of Origin in U.S. Records
• Opportunity to have lunch together as a class with discussion
• Family History Library Labs with Hands-on Help.

This intermediate level course covers 19th -21st century U.S. records and strategies with seventeen classroom hours that assist researchers in learning about and using varied sources and methods. Learn more about unusual records, count, state and federal records, manuscripts, finding aids, specialized indexes, case studies, and websites. Additionally, seven hours of one-on-one assistance and consultations at the Family History Library are provided by instructors.
This course helps you extend your research skills with suggested homework assignments to immediately apply the classroom information to research on your own families. Class work is in the morning on all five days, one afternoon and with hands-on library assistance on three afternoons. There is ample time for open research in the afternoon and evening or for SLIG evening classes.

You can still sign up for this course at www.ugagenealogy.org

Cedar City Chapter Visit.--Pictures

I have a few more pictures of our new Cedar City Utah Chapter meeting last weekend for you.
We met Friday night at the Family History Center. We were so impressed with how well run the center is. Here at the meeting we have, left to right: Julia Corry, Chapter President, Catherine Sorensen FHC director, and Ruth Scovill.
Then Saturday morning we met at the Sherratt Library on the SUU campus for a tour of their Special Collections library.

Left to Right back: Catherine Sorensen, Sandie Nagy, LaKay Weber, Julia Crates, Julia Corry, Sary Bitsoie, Bottom Row, Christy Fillerup, Janet Hovorka, Pam Chatfield.

Janet Seegmiller took us on a tour of the beautiful Special Collections library. She is a wealth of knowledge about the area, having written the book A History of Iron County: Community Above Self, and having been an archivist here at the library for many years. We were so lucky to be able listen as she shared her knowledge about the area and about the library.

LaKay Weber is here with the picture of one of her ancestors that is on display in the library. She is the current curator for the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers museum in Cedar City, and was able to see the Iron Company Register that her mother had donated to special collections.

Janet introduced us to all the oral histories and other collections in the back room. We had a wonderful time. Thank you so much to Janet and to Julia and her chapter for hosting such a wonderful event. We look forward to many more in the future.

Two New Virtual Initiatives Launched for UGA

The Utah Genealogical Association is pleased to announce the launch of two virtual education initiatives for genealogists of all kinds--the UGA Genealogy Training and Tutorial Library (UGaTT) and the UGA Virtual Chapter. An introductory overview of both virtual projects can be found at http://bit.ly/ckL4db. This video overview is a summary recording of Barry Ewell's presentation from the UGA membership meeting on October 19th. This recording covers the designs and plans for each project as well as the dates and stages of roll-out. The introductory video is a great way to understand the sweep of the plans and get excited about the progress that is coming as we take UGA into its 40th anniversary year.

First, we are pleased to present the first tutorials of the UGA Genealogy Training and Tutorial Library (UGaTT). The topics covered so far are:

• Series: Top U.S. Research Records

1. Series Overview and Objectives for the Top Four U. S. Research Records-Episode 1
2. Introduction to the Top United States Records that Genealogists Use for Research-Episode 2

• Series: Organization for Genealogists

1. Series Overview and Objectives for Organization for Genealogists-Episode 1
2. What Does Being Organized Mean to the Genealogist?-Episode 2

• Series : Fives-step Genealogy Research Process

1. Series Overview and Objectives for the Five-step Genealogy Research Process-Episode 1
2. Five Easy Steps to Getting Started: Genealogy is a Repeatable Process-Episode 2
3. Step 1: Identify What You Know About Your Family-Episode 3
4. Step 2: Decide What You Want to Learn About Your Family-Episode 4
5. Step 3: Select Records to Search-Episode 5
6. Step 4: Obtain and Search the Record-Episode 6
7. Step 5: Evaluate and Use the Information-Episode 7

These first tutorials are the first three pieces of the "Bronze Level" of the program. As the program continues to roll-out there will be over 100 topics covered with a self-evaluation program in place to to test your comprehension and track your improvement. The UGaTT is arranged in three levels, Bronze, Silver, and Gold. The first level allows the beginning genealogist to improve their skills and prepare for the more advanced Silver and Gold levels. Participants earn pins and certificates for program completion. Parts of the Bronze level will always be free to the general public, with the more advanced Bronze, Silver and Gold Levels available to UGA members as they are completed. Please fill out the 5 question survey at http://bit.ly/a7y2La to give us your feedback on this initial release.

Second, the first beta version of our Virtual Chapter has been released for your review at http://bit.ly/bhoiIa. The meeting is one hour long and includes an introduction and a presentation by Barry Ewell. The presentation is on "How to Effectively Conduct Genealogy Research on the Internet." We are collecting your comments and feedback in a short 6 question survey at http://bit.ly/aKH9aR. Please participate in the survey so that we can refine the program. A second beta will be released on November 23rd with Janet Hovorka presenting "Archiving Your Genealogy Work Using the Library of Alexandria Rule" These two beta videos will be released to the general public and regular live sessions of the virtual chapter will commence in January with access to all UGA members.

New Chapter--CEDAR CITY

Christy Fillerup, Sue Maxwell and I (Janet Hovorka) are having a wonderful time in Cedar city this weekend. We have been meeting with our newest UGA Chapter and our newfound fast friends. Julia Corry (President) and Pam Chatfield (secretary) arranged for us to come down and talk to them about UGA and get the communications set up between Salt Lake and their Cedar City Chapter. We met last night and discussed with them the new UGA initiatives that will be rolling out over the next year and what they want to do with their chapter. They got to be the first group to see the new UGA Training and Tutorial Videos and the beta video of our Virtual Chapter, and we were treated to a tour of the Southern Utah University Archives. They had a wonderful luncheon for us and we set them up with our publicity avenues and communications abilities.

They have been meeting for about a year now as friends and a genealogical support group and have now decided to become a UGA chapter. And we are of course thrilled to have them. Several of them are working to become accredited through ICAPGEN. They have also working with a local photographer to build a database of the tombstones and cemeteries throughout southern Utah, and are planning to have a Cedar City conference sometime in the future. We are excited to help them with those goals and further the genealogy education and networking opportunities in Cedar City. Watch the blog, or contact Pam Chatfield for more information about their activities.