Organize Your Family History

Stay focused and happy while exploring your roots

Time for a 30 x 30 check in!

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It’s the middle of the month…how’s your June 30 x 30 going? I have to admit that I have not been as successful as I’d like (or as I was in April). I was doing pretty well until my husband was hospitalized for a heart ailment and that took priority over everything. So I didn’t research June 5 to 9. He’s home now and doing very well and I’ve gotten back into the swing of daily research. I just love how easy it is for me to research when it’s all so fresh in my memory. And I’m grateful for the challenge because I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have jumped back in without it.

How about you? If you’re participating in the challenge, how is it going? Have you found daily research to be helpful? And has the challenge helped you stick with it? Please share in the comments!

Quick Tip #21: Ignore nothing

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Here’s the next in my occasional series of bite-size Quick Tips. Click on the Quick Tips tag for my other Quick Tips. Because I tend to write longer posts, I wanted to provide a quick-to-read (and quick-to-write) post every couple of weeks on a small topic that pops into my head. I often find myself glad that I’ve paid attention to a small detail!

Ignore nothing

I’ve been doing my share of newspaper research lately. (I treated myself to a six-month subscription to Publisher Extra on newspapers.com recently.) When I do a newspaper search on my relatives I often unearth tiny mentions of them that seem unimportant and not worth the time to download and process.

I’ve learned that these small mentions can be important additions my research and that I shouldn’t ignore them. Case in point: I downloaded an article from the Owensburg Owensboro (Kentucky) Messenger-Inquirer from 16 Jun 1903 that offered a single sentence about my great grandfather: “Mr. Elmer Adams’ horse ran off Sunday morning and tore his buggy all to pieces.” (It was part of a larger article full of single-sentence updates about residents of Sacramento, McLean, Kentucky including a mention of Elmer’s mother’s funeral.)

I’m so glad I downloaded it because later, when I was trying to figure out when Elmer moved his family from Kentucky to Oregon where my grandfather was born in 1904, this became a data point on my timeline. It helped me narrow down when he might have left Kentucky.

Now I remind myself to go ahead and take a few minutes to download each piece of information I find (in a newspaper or elsewhere), no matter how trivial it may seem at that moment. It just might come in handy later!

Genealogy Jamboree is virtual this year!

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The Southern California Genealogical Society Genealogy Jamboree starts this week! (I don’t know why I haven’t blogged about this year’s Jamboree, but I appreciate a comment from reader Rebecca Stanley mentioning it.) This is always such a robust conference and this year it’s even more so: There are two days for DNA topics and two days for the Genealogy Jamboree, which focuses on traditional genealogy. And it’s virtual this year, so you don’t have to travel to southern California to attend.

The Genetic Genealogy conference will be held June 4 & 5. The Genealogy Jamboree will be held June 11 & 12. Each conference consists of six live lectures that you can attend live or access the recording later. In addition, there will be 20 Genetic Genealogy and 50 Genealogy Jamboree recorded sessions. That’s a lot of learning opportunities Here’s the schedule for both conferences.

There are two levels of registration. If you purchase the Standard Registration for Genetic Genealogy ($190), you have access to 10 recordings. The Standard Registration for the Genealogy Jamboree ($175 for non-members) gives you access to 30 recordings. You can watch recordings until October 2021.

Alternatively, you can purchase the Plus Registration for each conference and have access to the live presentations plus all the recorded sessions for that conference. The Plus Registration for the Genetic Genealogy conference is $260 for non-members and gives you access to 20 recorded sessions. The Plus Registration for the Genealogy Jamboree is $275 for non-members and gives you access to 50 recorded sessions. You’ll get a $20 discount for registering for both conferences and SCGS members receive a $20 to $30 discount, depending on the package.

Again, you can access the entire schedule here.

And here’s an exciting addition: On Monday, June 7 and Wednesday, June 9 several live presentations are being offered free of charge in a program called JamboFree. (These sessions are not recorded.) You simply have to complete a free registration (or log in with your SCGS login) to get access.

There’s lots of information available on the website. This page is a good place to start if you’d like to learn more.

I attended the Jamboree in person back in 2015 and was really impressed by the professionalism of the whole event. I’m confident the virtual event will be equally well done!

 

Who wants to join me for a June 30 x 30?

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I am so ready for a new 30 x 30 challenge in which I commit to doing 30 minutes of genealogy research for the 30 days of June. Ordinarily, I would declare a 30 x 30 challenge closer to the first of the month, but since it’s the start of Memorial Day weekend, I thought you might want to plan ahead. Let me know in the comments if you’d like to join in on the challenge!

I had a really successful 30 x 30 in April and I had a great start in May, but once I started traveling on May 11 (I went to Walla Walla, Washington, to visit my dad), I fell off the wagon and I haven’t researched since. Having a challenge going is enough for me to elevate genealogy research on my daily task list.

I find that when I research daily–even if only for a few minutes–I stay in touch with my research and researching is easier. (I wrote a post about the value of daily research a few years ago.) Because my time is limited, I tend to set a timer for 30 minutes to keep me from getting lost in the research. (I dream of the day I’m retired and can research all day if I want!)

I’m looking forward to getting back to daily research. I hope you’ll join me!

 

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When you first join the list, I’ll send you a few emails to help you organize your family history. After that you’ll hear from me at the end of every month when I send an email with links to that month’s posts. And every now and then, I’ll let you know when I have something special to promote.