Genealogy - Page 6 of 15

I hope you don't have anything planned for this weekend, because we've got a genealogy bonanza on our hands. No less than three membership databases are opening their records for free, for a limited time only: AmericanAncestors, run by the New England Historic and Genealogical Society, is offering free access to 1.4 billion names from…

On the first Thursday night of October our intrepid group of genealogy networkers met again in the meeting room of Cook Park Library to share ideas and have some fun. We looked through a few databases on TryIt! Illinois, and we attempted to decipher a mystery photo. Then we shared some stories. A challenge had…

Our genealogists always look forward to fall, and not just because October is Family History Month. No, October and November are all about "Try-It! Illinois," an opportunity to try out all kinds of databases that our library doesn't subscribe to. Thanks to the Illinois State Library, you temporarily have free access to hundreds of subscription…

September brought another fine gathering of our Genealogy Networking Group. We started out by sharing brick walls and breakthroughs. One of the biggest brick walls we all face is "jumping the pond" and researching our immigrant ancestors in their home country. The tried but true rule is, in almost every case, you need to know…

At our last Genealogy Networking Group meeting, we did a lot of sharing. Never Too Late. We always share brick walls or breakthroughs. One of our members found information in a book printed in 1929 that completely changed the research that she's been doing since 1984. Remember you can look for books at Internet Archive,…

Back in January I set a genealogy goal for myself: see what I can find out about my ancestor Verner Hedin who served in World War I. As I mentioned in a recent genealogy newsletter, "Procrastination" is my middle name. Exhibit A: Here we are at the end of July and I have done nothing…

I do not claim to be an expert in the application of DNA analysis to genealogy research, which is why I always turn to the experts when questions come up. (See previous post on genetic genealogy resources.) More than once I have been approached by someone who asks, "My brother (or sister) and I both…

Genealogy networking nights are always a good time, because even when I plan something, I never know what’s going to come up. This month I asked people to share stories of weddings and marriages. I thought we might get some good tales of interesting wedding customs or wedding mishaps. Instead, we wandered into the topic…

Last week I celebrated 30 years working at Cook Memorial Public Library. Wow, where did the time go? I spent some time thinking about all the changes that have taken place in those years, one of which was my becoming interested in genealogy and taking responsibility for the genealogy collection and programs at the library—alongside…

This second week in April is National Library Week - a time to celebrate the contributions of our nation's libraries and librarians and to promote library use and support. For a special National Library Week podcast episode we interviewed some of our own librarians about what a day on the job looks like and also…