Using Fold3.com Webinar for Download

Today's webinar on "Using Fold3" went fairly well--there were lots of good comments and emails afterwards indicated that several got new ideas for searching on the site.

This webinar provided a broad overview of what was on the site and provided some actual live demo of searching and interacting with the information. The image interface is different from some and the searching is slightly different so both those things were demonstrated for some representative databases on the site.

This presentation is geared towards those who have not used Fold3 or have limited experience with it.

You can download the webinar now at the introductory rate of $6.

Overview of the Probate Process Webinar for Download

My webinar on the probate process (focusing on American records) was recorded today. Geared towards the advanced beginner or intermediate researcher, it covered an overview of the process and looked at selected documents from two probate settlements with a discussion of the pitfalls to watch out for along the way. 

Probate records are an excellent genealogical source--regardless of the time period in which you are researching and may contain clues about your ancestor, where he lived, his occupation, etc. 

The recording (and handout) are available at an introductory rate of $6.

My Own Little Version of WDYTYA--For RHL3

I bet NBC and Ancestry.com won't touch him with a ten-foot pole, but we'll do our own episode of "Who Do You Think You Are" on Rootdig. I've written before about Sarah Turberville of Orange County, Virginia. She's my ancestor--and also that of radio personality Rush Limbaugh.

The study of your genealogy brings us history lessons on a regular basis. Our ancestors often bring us face to face with realities we never expected and knock holes in our preconceptions of how our forebears lived. The history we learn in books, on television, in print, and on the radio was not the reality most of our ancestors lived. They didn't live in pages of a history book--they lived in their own reality show, sans script, and sans camera. Many today would have us believe our ancestors lived in black and white terms and that a return to the "Good Ol' Days" is what is needed, when people were married only once and children didn't know what "his, hers and ours" families were.  What life was actually like centuries ago is somewhat different than what some actually think it was.

Such is the case with Sarah Turberville who died in Orange County, Virginia, in the 1760s.

She had a "his, hers, and ours" family, having children with three husbands...some of whom had children of their own from previous marriages. Step-children and step-siblings were the norm in Sarah's family and hers was not unusual for that time and place. Colonial Virginia had many families structured in a similar fashion to Sarah's.

There were ways though in which Sarah was not typical.

Women in Colonial Virginia didn't often write wills--Sarah did. Women could not own or bequeath real property, but Sarah mentioned a variety of personal items in her will. The inventory of her estate includes a slave, several books, some cattle, and other items. The owning of a slave was not unusual for the time and location.

Sarah was literate--also probably atypical for a woman of her time. A woman who cannot read is unlikely to bequeath books to her children as Sarah did. Sarah made her mark on her will, but making a mark is not necessarily a sign of illiteracy--particularly for someone who may be ill or physically incapacitated.

Sarah survived four husbands--and had children with the first three. She frequently married before her deceased husband's estate had even been settled. A quick remarriage is not cause for judgment, but rather an opportunity for us to realize that Sarah was pragmatic, and with land to manage and children to raise, another husband was a necessity.

Sarah can't speak for herself. She's dead. I'm a genealogist and not a psychic, so I can't say whether she was a liberal, a feminist, or a radical conservative--and historians and politicians can't either. Those political terms in the modern meaning didn't even exist in Colonial Virginia and, like any attempts to define the past by the present, such classifications say more about the classifier than the person being classified.

 It would be well over a century before women could own and bequeath real property in their own name. It would be longer before it was easier (and not always easy) to raise children as a single widow. And it would not be until the early twentieth century before women had the right to vote. Sarah was living in mid-18th century Virginia and that is the time period in which we must analyze her. In some ways she was like her peers and in others she was significantly different.

Sarah has thousands of descendants--including me. She's been an interesting person to research.She's my 8th great-grandmother.

Sarah has a more well-known descendant than me--radio personality Rush Limbaugh. She's Mr. Limbaugh's 7th great-grandmother.


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Sarah's will and an estate inventory follow. Funny, there's not a radio listed.

From Orange County, Virginia, Will book 2, pages 310-311:
In the Name of God Amen I Sarah Turbervile of Orange County in the Colony of Virginia . . . do make & Ordain this my last Will . . .

I give to my Son John Willis one Shilling sterling . . . 
I give to my son William Willis Ten Shillings . . . 
I give to my son Henry Wood Two pounds . . . 
I give to my son David Hudson one Shilling sterling . . . 
I give to my son Joshua Hudson one Shilling Sterling 

I give to my Daughter Sarah Hawkins all my wearing cloths with a book Called William Beverage Sermons

I give to Rush Hudsons Daughter Mary one chest and his Daughter Elizabeth one Trunk

I give to son Rush Hudson one Negro Woman named Winny during his life & afterwards I give the said Winny & her increase to Rush Hudson Junr Except the first born I give to Elizabeth Hudson and the next to Mary Hudson. I give to my Son Rush all the rest of my goods . . . ordain my son Rush Hudson . . . Executor of this my last Will and Testament . . . this 18 day of June in the Year of our Lord God 1760

Sarah (x) Turberville 

Witnesses: Benjamin Hawkins Junr. 
Moses Harwood (signed with an "x") 
Kezia Roper (signed with her "x")

Sarah signed an addition to the will indicating that her estate not be appraised.
Sarah's will was proven in Orange County Court on 28 May 1761, presented by Rush Hudson and proved by the oaths of the three witnesses. Probate was granted to Hudson and his probate bond in the sum of twenty pounds lists Joshua Hudson and John Morton as securities. 


Sarah's inventory (p. 319, Will book 2) is relatively short. It includes the slave mentioned in her will, one bed and furniture, three head of cattle, one trunk and chest, one small table, one pair of [Stillards?], some old books, some old puter[sic], one cutting knife, some bottles, one stone cup, one Earthan pott, and one Small Chair. 
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Researching Female Ancestors Webinar Available

My webinar "Researching Female Ancestors" was recorded today. In giving the presentation live, a few ideas for my own research crossed my mind as well.

This presentation discusses approaches and techniques for determining an ancestor's maiden name and locating "missing" females. Geared towards the advanced beginner or intermediate researcher, it focuses on American records and sources. The content is not specific to any one time period and many of the approaches can be refined for different locations or types of records.

If you are stymied on your female ancestors--and half your ancestors are female--consider purchasing the webinar (and handout) at the introductory price of $6.

Female Ancestors: After the Marriage

Female Ancestors: After the Marriage

[This is a slightly edited version of this article which appeared in the Ancestry Daily News, on 13 October 2004]. It is a "basic" article, but there's some good food for thought here.

Female ancestors present special research problems for two main reasons. A significant part of the difficulty stems from the fact that at the time of their marriage most American females changed their last name to that of their husband. Not knowing the last name makes for significant research difficulties.

Another significant problem in locating women is that for much of American history, women have not had the same legal rights as men. The result is that women are generally listed less often than men in many of the records utilized by genealogists.

Determining what happened to a woman after her marriage requires the genealogist to do more than simply look up names in indexes hoping something magically appears. It requires that the researcher learn about:

- Records of the time period.
- Common legal practices of the time, particularly those involving women's rights and inheritances.
- History of the region during the time period.
- Factors effecting migration during the time period.

Research outlines from the Family History Library for the appropriate state and Ancestry's Red Book: American State, County, and Town Sources are two great ways to learn about records for the state and time period. Reading county, state, and regional histories are excellent sources of additional background information.

It may be possible that someone else has already worked on your problem. Online databases such as the GEDCOM files at WorldConnect, the International Genealogical Index at the Family Search Website (www.familysearch.org), appropriate state and regional mailing lists at Rootsweb (lists.rootsweb.com), and other sources available through Rootsweb (www.rootsweb.com) and the USGenWeb (www.usgenweb.org) may prove successful.

It is important to keep in mind that if the problem is a difficult one, the answer may not be available online, and the problem may be unsolved as of yet. Clues and finding aids to off-line records may be online, but the actual answer may lie in an un-microfilmed box of county court records deep in the mountains of Virginia or in an isolated courthouse on the Kansas prairie.

Women Were Treated Differently

For much of American history, women have had significantly fewer legal rights than men. Consequently the number of records mentioning women dwindles as a family history is researched into earlier and earlier time periods.
For much of American history, under a concept called coverture, a woman's separate legal status ended upon her marriage. The married female typically could not own real property and derived her citizenship from that of her husband.
Today this is no longer true, but during the period where most of us have genealogical brick walls, it was. Keep in mind that most laws regarding a woman's right to own property are governed by state statute and have changed over time, sometimes gradually over a period of years. Consequently what is true in one state at one point in time might not be true in another state at another time.

Half of our ancestors are women, and like everyone else, I have encountered these problems before.

Determining Where She Went After Her Marriage

It can be challenging enough to find a mobile person whose name is known, let alone a married relative whose husband's name is not known. Of course a thorough search of marriage records should be conducted in those areas where the missing female's family is known to have lived using all reasonable spelling variants.
Let's take a look at some examples of situations where records beyond the marriage record might contain the desired name:
- The missing female's sibling died and the missing female survived. Does the sibling's death notice or obituary provide the name of siblings? Does the funeral home have this information?
- The missing female was an informant on a relative's death certificate after the missing female married. This long shot may pay off, particularly if the missing female remained near relatives.
- Did the missing female inherit from any estate (not just her parents) after her last name changed? If so, she should be listed with the new last name on those records.
- Was the estate of the missing female's parents settled up after the name change? If so, later (or final) records in the probate may provide the new married last name.

What Is the Key Here?

The key is that we are not searching for the missing female when trying to locate these records. All the examples discussed can be located by searching for someone other than the missing female--someone whose surname is known. Ask yourself, Is there a record for someone else that will list the missing female with her new last name--possibly as an heir, a sibling, or an informant? Are there events that might have spurred the creation of a record naming the missing female? Are there records of these events that you can locate without knowing the missing female's name?
In some records it will be clear who the missing female is (listed as a sister in an obituary, or as a niece in an estate settlement). In other records the relationship might not be given (an informant on a death certificate, a witness to a marriage, etc.). In these latter cases a hunch that the individual is the missing female will have to be confirmed with other records.

Is Your Missing Female Hiding near Other Relatives?

Locate your missing female's parents and siblings in census records. Is there a married female in a nearby household with the same first name as your missing female? Is that female born in the same place as your missing female? If other sources fail, this neighbor is a candidate for your missing female and this neighbor should be researched to determine if she is the missing female or not.

Also look at all the gravestones near your missing female's parents and siblings. Is there a grave with a burial whose first name is that of your missing female? Family members were frequently buried near each other and there is a chance that you have walked right by your missing female relative while looking at her parents' or sibling's stones.

Did She go With a Sibling or Another Family Member?

Thomas Chaney died in Bedford County, Pennsylvania in 1856 leaving a large family. Two children left Pennsylvania. Son Abraham was easy to track to Ohio, his last name never changed. What of daughter Elizabeth who vanished in Bedford County, Pennsylvania? She reappeared in Coshocton County, Ohio, the very same county where her brother settled.
In most cases, a female who heads west in the early nineteenth century didn't strike out entirely on her own. Chances are she has a brother, uncle, or other relative or neighbor who has gone west before her or at the same time. The problem is finding out who that relative is and where they went. For this reason another approach to locating missing females is to completely research their other family members in hopes that this will also locate the missing female relative.

Sum It Up
Locating missing female relatives is not always easy. Some useful approaches are:
- Consider all the records that might list the female with her new last name.
- Consider that the female might have moved to live near other family members or former neighbors.
- Consider that the missing female might be hiding right under your nose near her family--only with a different last name.

Two of My 19th Century Female Ancestors/Relatives

One of my favorite lectures is "Barbaras Beaus and Gesche's Girls." Barbara is a German immigrant who arrived in Illinois in 1850, was married 3 or 4 times, widowed once, and divorced twice. She figures in quite a few local records in the area and was fun to research. A discussion of Barbara makes for an interesting study in Midwest records during this time period--just about every record that can be found on a woman during this time includes Barbara, including:

• Probate records
• Land records-as grantor, grantee, and quitclaim deeds after her death
• Court records--divorce and criminal records
• Newspaper
• Church
• Cemetery
• Vital

Her marriage records are atypical as are the records of her first husband's estate settlement in the 1850s.

Gesche Fecht Weerts Grass Heyen was my step-ancestor who married in Germany in the 1880s and disappeared after my ancestor's death. This part of the lecture discusses how she was located when her "new" married name was initially unknown. A good example of detective work when one does not have all the clues. 

I've given this lecture several times and sometimes people call the second part of it "Geisha Girls." I'll be honest...that irritates me on two levels. One, I'm half-Ostfriesen by ancestry and I love the sound of the traditional low-German names. Two, making fun of people's names is something I find very offensive. 

This lecture, "Barbara's Beaus and Gesche's Girls" is available as a webinar for download--handout included.

My Children's Boring Ancestors

I've been thinking about "boring ancestors" lately and the feeling by some that it's necessary to add extraneous "stuff" to your family history in order to liven them up. To that I say "balderdash." There's nothing like good ol' exhaustive research to discover that your ancestors are not all that boring. My children have no famous ancestors, no bluebloods, and no wealthy or elite forebears hiding in their tree. Most of their ancestors were farmers, artisans, laborers, factory workers and the like--with an occasional English merchant of modest means thrown in.

Yet here are quick summaries of just a few stories:

• Pension applications indicate that in 1902 my great-grandfather was working as the hired man for his future mother-in-law, complete with his salary, what parts of the work he did and what his regular work was. 
• Probate records on my third great-grandmother indicated that her one grandson borrowed $1800 from her about 1899, never paid her back, never drew up the mortgage that was supposed to have been drawn up to secure the loan, and was almost sued by his uncle after his grandmother's death.
• My great-great-grandfather was arrested for illegal distribution of beer around the turn of the 20th century.
• My great-grandmother's brother was shot (and probably murdered) in a hotel in Kansas City in 1921.
• My 3rd great-grandfather accidentally shot himself while hitting a cow with the butt of a gun.
• I had an aunt who, while suffering from cancer in the 1930s, "cut her stomach" out because of the pain and died.
• My great-great-grandparents were step-siblings.
• My ancestor at the age of nearly 70, returned to his native Germany leaving his wife and grown children in the United States.
• My wife's ancestors lived with 7 children in a 14 foot square cabin in Missouri in the 1850s.
• My ancestor went to Nebraska, started a homestead in the 1870s and returned.
• My aunt's third husband killed a man in Nebraska after a bar fight in the 1870s.
• An ancestor was censured by the Virginia House of Burgesses in the 1740s for interfering with an election.
• A cousin was involved in mining speculation in Columbia in the 1890s.

And that's just scratching the surface. 

There aren't boring ancestors, just research that's not done. And virtually none of these stories were discovered on Ancestry.com. While I like and use it every day, the bulk of these items were located in original, offline records. 

Need to Register for my 2012 Trip to Salt Lake?

We've had some additional inquiries about my Family History Library trip between 23 and 30 May 2012 in Salt Lake.

Additional trip details are here http://rootdig.blogspot.com/2012/01/early-registration-deadline-for-family.html


To pay your complete registration click here for secure credit card registration ($175) payment. Email me if you need other payment options. A registration document will be emailed to you upon payment.

March 2012 Fundamental Genealogy Webinars

March 2012 Fundamental Webinars

Our fundamental webinars are each approximately 20 minutes in length. These short session are geared for beginner or somewhat experienced beginners who would like to learn more about the following topics. Each presentation includes the 20 minute or so presentation and the handouts. Downloads of previous fundamental webinars can be ordered here.

•   Quick Google Ideas—this is geared towards the advanced beginner to intermediate genealogist as all the fundamental webinars. Our focus will be on searching, what to search for and how to search for it. Runs on 9 March 2012 at 2:30 PM Central. Register for $2.
  ·         Organizing Census Searches---querying census databases to locate hard-to-find ancestors is necessary. Organizing the search is necessary as well. Through three quick examples, get ideas for how to organize your online census searching for those ancestors you cannot find in five quick minutes. Runs on 16 March 2012 at 12 PM Central. Register for $2.
  ·         Comparison Shopping (Part 1)—We will see some elementary ways to determine whether the person/family you have found on a passenger manifest or census is the same family you’ve located on a census elsewhere. Runs on 16 March 2012 at 1:30 PM Central. Register for $2.
  ·         Proving Florence—how I found the father of an 1870 Iowa bride when there’s no direct proof. Not a really difficult to understand problem, but one that many researchers encounter. The solution is not too difficult but we’ll see how the search and the “proof” was organized. Runs on 16 March 2012 at 2:30 PM Central. Register for $2.

Ancestry.com and Fold3 Webinars

We are excited about our upcoming webinars in March on Ancestry.com and Fold3.

This Ancestry.com webinar will focus on sourcing in the trees. This is an area that creates confusion and our webinar will be the first in a series on this topic. There's more details on it and the Fold3 webinar on our webinar page.The Fold3 webinar will be about searching the site with a really quick overview of content.

Our webinars are not sponsored by anyone and I'm not a contractual employee of the sites discussed--there's no agenda other than giving the attendees tips and suggestions. We will warn you of pitfalls and problems...not just the "good stuff."

Suggestions for future webinars are welcomed and can be sent to me at mjnrootdig@gmail.com.

Boring Ancestors?

I read a post by a well-known author that opined about ways to write about "boring ancestors." How one could inject interest, humor, etc. into dead people who are apparently banal as all get out.

Funny, I don't have any boring ancestors. I don't have any famous or well-known ones either. They all have stories.

Oh, I know that people say farmers are boring ancestors or that factory worker or day laborers are boring ancestors. My children both have plenty of those--ancestors who never left the farm, who lived a hardscrabble existence their entire life, etc.

And not any of them are boring. If you research them completely and learn about the location in which they lived, the kinds of work they did, and document them in every record you can there is a story there. Even if they left few records, there's likely a story and I've never found one to be boring.

Personally I don't think there's any such thing as boring ancestors.

Only boring descendants.

Our Family History Library Trip Saves You Money

I've been comparing the prices for group trips to Salt Lake City's Family History Library to see how we compare to others--gas prices are a concern and it never hurts to see if there's a little wiggle room in our fees.

Few trips include airfare or transportation, so those are not included in our analysis. Most "trip fees" include hotel and registration together and are average around $1100. Our groups registers for the hotel separately and registrants can stay elsewhere if they wish. The Plaza is right next door and very convenient.

Our trip doesn't include any "group" meals, but our fees and hotel charges are are:

• registration of $175
• hotel 7 nights at $82 plus tax--$647.25.
• TOTAL of $822.25

Most groups include one or two group meals--but the difference between $822 and $1100 is significant and would go quite a ways towards paying airfare or travel costs or for those meals.

That's an easy $250 savings. 

To find out more about my trip at the end of May 2012, check out our site http://rootdig.blogspot.com/2011/08/reserve-your-space-in-my-may-2012.html

How Blue Should It Be?

There's been much media attention as of late to the Fugate family of Kentucky and their blue-hued skin. The genealogy and the genetics are interesting, but I'm not really interested in that at this point.

The question I have is how "accurate" are the colors in the photograph on the site.

Image and article.

This is the image from the ABC News site:

Was the image colorized? And if so, how accurate is the coloring?

New Webinar-Sourcing Your Ancestry.com Tree-Part I

We've blogged about the "trees" at Ancestry.com before and we'll continue to do so, providing directions and suggestions as best we can in that format.

We've added 1 last webinar to our March 2012 schedule (9 March 2012-11 AM Central)--Sourcing In Your Ancestry.com Tree-Part I

This presentation will discuss how to accurately and adequately “source” census, passenger list, and other data from actual images at Ancestry.com. We will be starting “from scratch” with a new database seeing how to import information accurately from census and other actual records. We will NOT be using information from compiled online trees in this presentation. Later presentations will focus on additional and more advanced topics.


You can register for this webinar for only $5 here. Please read the system requirements before registering. Most people have no problem attending the session live, but if you've never joined me for a webinar before, please make certain you system can interact with the webinar.

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Requirements:

On a PC

·         Internet Explorer^® 7.0 or newer, Mozilla^® Firefox^® 3.0 or newer or Google^™ Chrome^™ 5.0 or newer (JavaScript^™ and Java^™ enabled)

·         Windows^® 7, Vista, XP or 2003 Server

·         Cable modem, DSL or better Internet connection

·         Minimum of Pentium^® class 1GHz CPU with 512 MB of RAM (recommended) (2 GB of RAM for Windows^® Vista)

Participants wishing to connect to audio using VoIP will need a fast Internet connection, a microphone and speakers. (A USB headset is recommended.)

On a Mac^®

·         Safari^™ 3.0 or newer, Firefox^® 3.0 or newer or Google^™ Chrome^™ 5.0 or newer (JavaScript^™ and Java^™ enabled)

·         Mac OS^® X 10.5 – Leopard^® or newer

·         Intel processor (512 MB of RAM or better recommended)

·         Cable modem, DSL, or better Internet connection

Participants wishing to connect to audio using VoIP will need a fast Internet connection, a microphone and speakers (A USB headset is recommended).

Tying Those Sources to the Correct Information

This is in response to my recent post on the citing of sources in Ancestry.com trees (Citing What It Does Not Say) and how frequently sources are indicated as implying more precision than they actually do.

As a quick experiment, I created a new person in a new file. This new person was entered in as a female named Nancy Newman with a year of birth of 1846 in Indiana and a year of death of 1923 in Illinois. Her husband of Riley Rampley was entered. That was it. 

There were several "leaves" that came up for Nancy in my tree. One was the 1900 census. This year was chosen because it included a month and year of birth for her. I already knew where Nancy would be in 1900, so that wasn't the problem. 

The 1900 census enumeration extraction is shown on the left and my file information is shown on the right. 

Before I did anything, I chose the "advanced options" at the bottom of the screen. (click on the image to view larger)

 Doing so brought up the boxes as shown below. I decided that I did not need the alternate for Nancy from 1900 as I always use maiden names and the 1900 enumeration uses her married name. I do wish that the name could be separated into the last name and the "rest" so that alternate first names could easily be recorded.

The 1900 residence information was completely new for my file, so adding it and the source was not really a big deal.

The birth was more problematic.

If I simply add the 1900 as a source for the 1846 year of birth then I will be implying that the 1900 census indicated Nancy was born in 1846 in Indiana. That's not what the census says. Ancestry.com easily allows me to do this. In this case, I want an alternate fact and add the source. That's NOT how the screen below is set up.(click on the image to view larger)

To get it correct, I should click on "Add as an Alternate Fact" which is done in the image below. Unfortunately I LEFT THE "ADD SOURCE" clicked under Nancy's name so the 1900 census is linked to her name as a source, although I did not check the "Add as an Alternate Fact." (click on the image to view larger)

We'll discuss additional issues in future blog posts on this topic.

Citing What It Does Not Say

This is part of one of the online trees for a relative of mine. I've eliminated the name and the precise date of birth because I'm more interested in how Ancestry.com handles citing sources than who this specific individual is whose birth is being cited. I've also seen problems like this countless times so I don't want to appear to be picking on this entry only.

I've see all six "sources" used in this instance. The Ancestry.com tree indicates that all six are sources for the fact that this person was born on a certain date in a certain place. The problem is that all six sources do not say that. Tying these sources to a precise date and place of birth is indicating that they are more accurate than they really are.

• The 1900 census provides a month and year of birth along with the state. 
• The 1920 and 1930 census provides an age and a place of birth. The age does not necessarily suggest a specific date--which this citation seems to indicate that it does. 
• The death index does provide the date and place of birth.
• The U. S. National Home for the Disabled Volunteer Soldiers provides an approximate year of birth and a state of birth. 
• The World War I draft card provides a county and state of birth along with a date of birth.

Why not just link them all to the precise date and place? After all, that's a heck of a lot easier. It may be, but it's a heck of a lot less accurate.

There's only 1 of the six records that provide the specific location and date--so really only one should be listed as a source with that precise information. 

Indicating a record says something it does not is confusing and in this case it looks like there are more sources with that level of detail than there are.

The date and place for an event when tied to a source for that should only be as precise as that source indicates.

Sure it takes a little more work, but it makes our work more accurate and makes analysis easier. 

• Month and year in Illinois should be tied to 1900 census.
• Approximate year and location of Illinois should be tied to the 1930 census and Soldier's Home information.
• Specific date and specific place should be tied to the death index.
• The approximate year and county and  state should be tied to the draft card.

We've got an initial followup here. 

Spring 2012 Genealogy Seminars

I'll be on the road in April/May/June of 2012 giving several workshops or seminars (please mark your calendars):

• 25 April 2012--Santa Barbara, California--all day seminar.
• 19 May 2012-BigWill--Richmond, Illinois.(details coming)--all day seminar.
• 23-30 May 2012-Family History Library Research Trip-Salt Lake--Join Us!
• 2 June 2012-Northland Genealogical Society-North Kansas City, Missouri. (details coming)-all day seminar.
• 8-10 June 2012-Southern California Genealogy Jamboree, Burbank, California.
• 14-16 June 2012--Palatines to American Conference--Indianapolis, Indiana. 

If you've got questions about any of these, email me at mjnrootdig@gmail.com and I'll forward your request to the appropriate person.

If you'd like to bring me to your group, email me and we can discuss details. 

Using Fold3 Webinar

We've added one new webinar to our March 2012 series--and we're really excited about it.

Searching on Fold3.com. This website (fee-based) offers a variety of military records from the United States. Fold3 has a large amount of material from the Revolutionary War and also includes digital images of National Archives microfilmed material from later United States conflicts as well. You can check out the information on Fold3 by browsing their website.

Our Fold3 webinar is on 6 March 2012 at 1:30 PM central time. Visit our webinar registration page for more details and registration links.

Villages Seminar

Yesterday I had a great experience presenting the annual seminar for The Villages Genealogical Society in Florida. It was a great group, a packed house, and a really nice group of people.

We're giving 10% of our sales of webinars by the end of the day to the society--those in attendance should have received the coupon code at the seminar. Email me if you need it. It also gives attendees a 10% discount on their purchase at http://www.casefileclues.com/webinars.htm

My Blogs

For our new fans and as a reminder to ones who have been around a little bit longer, I have the following blogs--all are free. Posting frequency varies

:

• Daily Genealogy Transcriber--can you read the handwriting?
• Casefile Clues--updates on research for my newsletter
• Genealogy Tip of the Day--one daily how-to tip or suggestion
• Search Tip of the Day-tips for internet sites and search ideas
• Rootdig-opinion, attitude, and anything else that crosses my path