GenealogyClassBlog

Berwangen, Baden, Germany

I have been teaching myself to research using German genealogy resources for a while now. I have also been trying to learn to speak a little German and have learned to read some of the old Gothic print that was used in pre-World War II records. I have located and studied parish registers for Berwangen, the small town in Baden where my great-great-grandfather, John George (or Johan Georg) Mayer was christened in 1826. The parish registers were microfilmed by the Genealogical Society of Utah in 1978 and 1982, and so I have accessed them through the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah, by way of the New Haven Family History Center.

There are three Family History Centers in Tulsa now — two in churches of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and a new one at the Genealogy Center. While anyone can order genealogical records on microfilm for a reasonable price through any of the three, the Genealogy Center has also been collecting German resources in print which anyone can use to help locate small towns like Berwangen. The location of the records is closely tied to the place where your ancestor lived. I have learned to use both the multi-volume resource, Map Guide to German Parish Registers, a great new resource, and Meyers Orts- und Verkehrs-Lexikon des Deutschen Reichs, an important resource written in German, which was first published in 1913, and I’d like to explain the process of using both of these to anyone else who is interested.

Last spring I visited Berwangen. Although I didn’t actually do any genealogy research while in Germany, we met some wonderful people. The day that my daughter and I spent in Berwangen was the best day of our two-week trip around Europe. Before the trip, I learned to use maps on Google and while there we took pictures and video. Now that I have been there, I am anxious to learn more about the history of my ancestors in this town.

The Genealogy Center is located at 2910 S. Harvard in Tulsa. The free program will be in the Harmon Foundation Meeting Room from 2:00 – 3:30. I hope to see you there.

Christine Rose, CG, CGL, FASG

When a snow storm on the morning of 28 March caused the Tulsa City-County Library to close all of its locations, the genealogy workshop being held at Hardesty Library had to be cancelled after the lunch break. Christine Rose, CG, CGL, FASG had presented two of four planned lectures and those of us in attendance were sorry to have to miss the remaining two. Christine is an excellent speaker and has extensive experience with courthouses and with teaching and lecturing.

Kathy Huber, Genealogy Librarian, arranged to have Christine return this Saturday, 17 October, to present those two lectures plus two more. The day’s topics will be:

• “County Land Records”
• “Using Little-Known Sources”
• “Leaping to Erroneous Conclusions” and
• “Solving Problems in 25 Hours or Less.”

The day’s workshop begins at 9:30 am, at Hardesty Library in the Redbud Auditorium, with two morning lectures and two more after a lunch break. After time for questions, the workshop will conclude at 4:00 pm.

When she was here in March, attendees had the opportunity to purchase some of the books she has written. Possibly this will be true again on Saturday. TCCL has some in its collection, including some that may be checked out. Check the Catalog.

From all that I’ve heard, the Family History Month programming at the Tulsa City-County Library’s Genealogy Center was a great success! I had three large groups for my three presentations, including faces both familiar and new.

There were many interested in Oklahoma’s settlement July 23, when we explored a little history of Oklahoma and her two territories, Indian allotment records, and homestead records. I described the history of the settlement of the different areas of the state, then I explained how to locate land entry case files, which contain documentation of purchases of land from the federal government, as well as how to access Indian allotment files.

I had an even larger group on the morning of July 25, to learn about the resources of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We spent two hours and some would have stayed longer, I think. The Genealogy Center is now a Family History Center lending library, and therefore a new place to access microfilms and microfiche of original records from all over the world. I described using Family History Centers, ordering microfilm listed on the Family History Library Catalog, and visiting the Family History Library in Salt Lake City. I described the various databases on FamilySearch, the website of the LDS Church, and the new Record Search feature, which allows study of digital images of original records that have been indexed by volunteers. I showed a video of an interview with David Rencher, the Chief Genealogical Officer of the Family History Library. The link to the RootsTelevision interview is available at Dick Eastman’s recent blogpost.

On Saturday afternoon, about 80 attendees came (or in many cases, stayed) to hear my presentation on organizing genealogy records. I described several different considerations to trying to get control of the piles of paper that we collect as we learn more about our ancestors. Because there is no one organization scheme that will work for everyone, each person needs to determine his or her own best system. I had some recommendations about a variety of different techniques and resources.

I hope to post the slides from one or more of these three presentations, but it may be a few weeks before I have them ready, so check back for a later posting. The Genealogy Center has my extra handouts for those who may be interested.

If you have found yourself in the mood to get into your family history work this summer, or even if you are not, July offers some great genealogy programming in Tulsa. The Tulsa City-County Library celebrates its own “Family History Month” in July again this year, with over twenty scheduled programs. I will present three of the programs, and members of the Genealogy Center staff will present nine programs, some of which will involve a mobile computer lab set up right in the Harmon Foundation Meeting Room at the Genealogy Center. In addition Kathy Huber, genealogy librarian, has arranged for several interesting guest speakers, including the return of J. Mark Lowe, a very popular and talented, nationally-recognized Certified Genealogist, who will present five programs during the weekend of July 18 & 19.

I will be presenting:

• Thursday, July 23, 4:00 – 5:00 pm — Oklahoma Settlement: Territorial Homestead and Allotment Records
• Saturday, July 25, 10:30 am – 12:30 pm — Genealogical Resources of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and
• Saturday, July 25, 1:30 – 2:30 pm — Information Overload: Organizing Your Genealogy Records

Here is a link to the flyer: Family History Month July 2009.

On Monday, 27 April 2009, I will be presenting a mini workshop for the Tulsa Genealogical Society. The topic will be “How To Be a Power Hitter,” which is all about how to be successful in online or database searching. I will explain the basic problem of trying to find what is in the record when an initial search doesn’t work.

If you cannot find your ancestor’s name, does that mean that your ancestor didn’t appear in the record? Maybe the name wasn’t entered correctly. I will describe many possible reasons and several possible solutions.

I will present the same topic as a one-hour lecture at the Federation of Genealogical Societies’ National Conference in Little Rock, Arkansas, on Wednesday, 2 Sep 2009. The conference will last from Wednesday through Saturday, 2 – 5 September, and will be a great opportunity for attending high-quality lectures (with as many as nine offered each time slot), doing some serious genealogy shopping, and meeting new genealogy friends with only a short drive for those of us in the Tulsa area.

For the TGS mini workshop, I will be expanding the basic lecture into a workshop the second hour, for the attendees to have the opportunity to try some of the methods introduced during the first hour.

To attend, come to the Tulsa Genealogical Society’s facility in the Briar Village Shopping Center, on 31st Street west of Mingo. The Society suggests a donation of $7.50 for this mini-workshop. I hope to see you there.