Congratulations to Diane Clemmons, Outstanding Volunteer Genealogist

We extend our congratulations to former PGS member Diane Clemmons was honored recently by the Florida State Society of Daughters of the American Revolution as its Outstanding Volunteer Genealogist. See the article below.

Village of Liberty Park resident named Outstanding Volunteer Genealogist | Villages-News.com:

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Suncoast Genealogy Society Fall Mini Seminar on 24 October 2015

The Suncoast Genealogy Society announces the Suncoast Fall Mini Seminar featuring Jack Butler as speaker.  It will be held on October 24, 2015, 1: pm to 4: pm, at the Palm Harbor Library, 2330 Nebraska Ave, Palm Harbor Fl.  Registration begins at 12:30 pm. 

 

   Jack Butler is a professional genealogist, lecturer and author. Active in serious genealogical research for more than 20 years, Jack is also active in the genealogy community. He is a member of the Association of Professional Genealogists and former President of the Florida Chapter of the APG. He is also a member and former President of the Florida State Genealogical Society. In addition to FSGS, Jack is a member of the NEHGS, and the National Genealogical Society, as well as the Genealogical Speakers Guild and the International Society of Family History Writers and Editors.  His topics will be The Tombstone Just Said "wife of..." - Finding the Women in Your Family History, and A Dozen Resources That You Should be Using - But Which You Probably Aren't. 

 

 Early bird registration for non members is $30 prior to October 14.  After that it will be $35.  This includes handouts, refreshments and a used genealogy book sale.  For additional information, or to register, contact Ann James, (727) 791-1983 or email jamesamsj@aol.com.

PGS Events for the Week of 27 Sep. to 3 Oct. 2015

Tuesday, 29-Sep-2015 at 6:00 PM--Property Research Basics--This is a general treatment of property research in the United States. It will explore ownership documents from land grants to land patents to deeds; it will explain the difference in land descriptions in state land states and public land states; it will examine the historical context of military bounty land, the Homestead Act, and the cash purchase of public land. We will also survey where to find the records generated during the ownership and transfer of property. Summers, Local History Room, Largo Library

Thursday, 1-Oct-2015 at 1:00 PM--Gathering Facts for German Genealogy-part 3.The class is comprised of samples of German documents using the alphabets of Latin, Old German (Kurrent, Fraktur or Schwabacher) script or French. Commons, Local History Room, Largo Library.     

Saturday, 3-Oct-2015 at 10:00 AM--Family Tree Maker User Group--Questions & Answers and Demonstration of how to use the Family Tree Maker genealogical database software. Hosmer, Jenkins C, Largo Library.

The Ancestor Hunt is Great for Newspaper Research

If you are looking to do some newspaper research on your ancestors, The Ancestor Hunt Blog is worth checking out. It give you a list (recently updated) of free online newspapers organized by state. Once you select a state, you will see an categorical list of papers from that state and the dates of publication of the newspapers. Another hot link then takes you eventually to a page where you can view the paper itself.

Many of the links take you to the Library of Congress "Chronicling America" newspaper collection, but there are many other categories and links as well.

Check it out at:
Blog - The Ancestor Hunt: " 12,564 FREE U.S. Historical Newspaper Links - Big June 2015 Update"

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Lots of Information at Missouri Digital Heritage Web Site

If you are doing research on your ancestors from Missouri, this site might be just what you are looking for. Click on the "Advanced Search" tab under the search bar on the landing page to get a better idea of what is available at the site.

You will see that you can narrow your search to specific data collections (death certificates, coroner's inquests, soldier's database, etc.) or do a global search.

Check it out at:  MDH Default:

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PGS Events for the Week of 20-26 September 2015

Special Note—The PGS Class schedule must be made out 2-3 months in advance—the schedule is now completed through Jan 2016. It is available in the Largo Library Genealogy Center in print format and is maintained on our website at http://www.flpgs.org/classes.aspx.  Occasionally, a class date must be changed for various reasons. So…if you depend only on the printed schedule, there is a slight possibility that the class may have been changed from the time printed.

Therefore, you are strongly urged to check the class schedule on our website and/or be sure to read the email sent out each weekend with information on the classes upcoming for the next week.

Classes/events for the week of 20-26 Sep 2015:

Sunday, 20-Sep-2015 at 1:30 PM--Brick Wall Solutions, Bryan, Jewish Gen Society, 14041 Icot Blvd, Clearwater.

Monday, 21-Sep-2015 at 10:00 AM, Ancestry.com--search techniques for getting the most from this huge collection of databases. Bryan. Local History Room, Largo Library.

Wednesday, 23-Sep 2015 at 10:00 AM, Internet Site Exploration - a fun-filled look at some lesser known genealogy websites, bring your favorites.  Summers, Local History Room, Largo Library. NOTE: the internet connection at Largo Library is being updated on 23-25 September so there is a chance that the internet will not be available at this time, but the class will meet.

Saturday, 26-Sep-2015 at 10:00 AM, RootsMagic User Group--Questions and answers and demonstrations of how to use the RootsMagic genealogy database software program. Summers, Local History Room, Largo Library.

Saturday, 26-Sep-2015 at 2:00 PM--Facebook for Genealogy, Summers, Suncoast Genealogy Society--Palm Harbor Library.

St. Lawrence County, NY Records Online

The St. Lawrence County Historical Association website offers several types of digitized records and links for additional research. The records include cemetery indexes, digitized newspapers, vital record indexes, and more.

If you have ancestors from the New York area, check out this site at:  Genealogy - SLCHA:

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War of 1812 Tennessee Regimental Histories Online

The Tennessee State Library and Archives provides a brief history of Tennessee units during the War of 1812. We can see the commanding officer, the unit captains, where the volunteers came from by county, the dates the unit was active, and several paragraphs of history. In all, about 37 units are listed.

If you have Tennessee ancestors who fought in this war, the site will be a benefit for general background.

Tennessee Department of State: Tennessee State Library and Archives:

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Jewish Genealogical Society of Tampa Bay Features Bob Bryan

Here is an announcement from the JGSTB concerning their meeting on Sunday, 20 September:

Jewish Genealogical Society of Tampa Bay Meeting
BRICK WALL SOLUTIONS
Ideas and suggestions for overcoming dead ends in family history research
By Bob Bryan, Past President, Pinellas Genealogy Society
Sunday September 20, 2015

There is no charge to attend this meeting. It takes place at Gulf Coast Jewish Family Services, 14041 Icot Blvd., Clearwater, Florida.  A social with refreshments and library access begins at 1:30 PM.  The program starts at 2:00 PM.

National Library of Ireland Puts Catholic Parish Registers Online

This website provides images from Irish parish register microfilms. They contain records of baptisms and marriages from most Catholic parishes in both Ireland and Northern Ireland up to 1880. A total of 550 microfilm reels containing over 3500 registers were converted into about 373,000 images that are searchable by parish name.

You can get to the records by entering the name of the parish in the search box, or scrolling down and interactively locating the parish on a map. Once you zero in on a parish, you will be led to the digital images of the microfilm roll. Once you get to the images, you can further filter them by event (eg. marriages) and by year.

The images can be printed or downloaded and some basic quality adjustment tools are provided.

Check it out at:  Catholic Parish Registers at the NLI:

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PGS Events for the Week of 13-19 September 2015

Monday, 14-Sep-2015 at 1:00 PM--Italian Genealogy Interest Group, Bedore, Local History Room, Largo Library

Wednesday, 16-Sep-2015 at 2:00 PM--Genealogy Research on the Internet, Bryan, Pinellas Park Library. This is a part of "Digital Learning Day" at the library.

Wednesday, 16-Sep-2015 at 1:00 PM--England-Wales Interest Group,Pearson, Local History Room, Largo Library

Friday, 18-Sep-2015 at 10:30 AM--German Genealogy Interest Group, Dietz, Local History Room, Largo Library

Saturday, 19-Sep-2015 at 10:00 AM--Computers in Genealogy--Question and answer session on the use of computers in genealogy research and record keeping. Bryan, Jenkins B, Largo Library

Saturday, 19 Sep 2015 at 11:00 AM—Program Meeting—Tracing your family history through land ownership maps using HistoryGeo, the new subscription website available free at Largo Library. 

Using "Date Range" in Google Search

Thanks to Dick Eastman, writing in his Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter, for this tip. He shows in detail how to limit Google Search results based on when the search target was published on the web. That is, you can search for an ancestor and opt to show only news articles that were published on the web in the past month, past week, etc.

This can be used in a sequence of searches: first search for an ancestor exhaustively, then each month search again with the date limitation to see only the new things that have been added to the web. This obviously saves you from having to sift through repeated information.

Dick's article contains a good explanation of how to use the feature and contains plenty of pictures to demonstrate the mouse clicks.

Check it out at:
Google Power Search: How to Search by a Date Range and Why You Might Want To | Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter:

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Birth, Adoption, Death, Marriage & Divorce in the Province of British Columbia

This site tells you all you need to know about how to understand and order key documents from the government offices of British Columbia. There are no online records that I found on the site, but the information is extensive and helpful should you be needing to order records.

Birth, Adoption, Death, Marriage & Divorce - Province of British Columbia:

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PGS Events for the Week of 6-12 September 2015

Wednesday, 9-Sep-2015 at 10:00 AM--Female ancestors--locating and tracing the maternal line; tips and methods to find maiden names. Bryan, Local History Room, Largo Library.

Thursday, 10-Sep-2015 at 1:00 PM--Irish Genealogy Interest Group--The initial meeting of all those interested in finding their Irish roots. The format will be basically Q & A plus some structured sharing of techniques, resources, etc. as the group determines. The meeting room is large enough to accommodate all who come. Bob Bryan will be the moderator for this initial meeting but someone from the group must be selected to carry on. Jenkins C, Largo Library.

Deceased Veterans Profiles Online

The website HonorStates.org is undertaking the ambitious project of posting profiles for veterans who fought and died from WWI through the Vietnam War. So far they have about 240,000 entries from a population of over half a million.

The site allows you to search by branch of service, conflict, state, or name.

Here is what the site has to say for itself: "Honor States" is an online memorial and archive that presents vital achievements, recognition, affiliations, awards, and images that honor those who gave their lives in the service of their country and home states. This is an extensive and ambitious project. Currently we have about 240,000 profiles. Each day we research and add more names of honor.

Check it out at:  Honor States:

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