GenealogyClassBlog

On Wednesday I introduced the class to the Atlas of Historical County Boundaries, which is a free resource offered online by the Newberry Library in Chicago. In trying to research your ancestor’s experience with the local court, especially the county court, you will need to determine which county would have recorded your ancestor’s business. Even if your ancestor was living in one place for several decades, if the time period was during the formation of the state’s county boundaries, it is possible that he or she lived in different counties. Add that to the possibility that your ancestor may have done business in the closest courthouse rather than his or her county seat, and things may not be as simple as you’d expect. The Atlas of Historical County Boundaries shows the county boundaries as of any date you select in the Interactive Map. The URL for this resource is http://publications.newberry.org/ahcbp/index.html. Enjoy exploring!

On Wednesday I mentioned a class which will be offered by the Tulsa City County Library on 15 October. The teacher will be Kathy Huber, the Genealogy Librarian and the class will meet at the Harmon Foundation Meeting Room at the Genealogy Center, 2901 S. Harvard, from 10:30 am to 1:00 pm. You can download a PDF version of TCCL’s October Event Guide here and read more about the class on page 4. You will need to have Adobe Reader installed on your computer (and you can access Adobe Reader for free here). You can return later to check on future classes by visiting the Events page of the TCCL website, http://www.tulsalibrary.org/eventguide/.

I also mentioned that the Tulsa Genealogical Society will be meeting on 17 October for their regular meeting held the third Monday of each month (September – May). You’ll want to attend the free beginners class at 6:00 before the meeting and the program by Janice Meredith – “Get Prepared for the 1940 U.S. Census.” Visitors are welcome to attend their meetings, but you may want to consider becoming a member. Learn more about the society, their library, and additional events at their website, www.tulsagenealogy.org.

I think that we are going to have a great class this year. I enjoyed getting to know you during class, and then reading your student profiles after class. It was interesting to see what your interests are. I will be using the information to help develop the direction of the rest of the course.

I have located the details about the webinar scheduled for this Monday at 6:00 CDT. The Friends of the National Archives-Southeast Region is making this available for free. They describe webinars as “a Web-based seminar, lecture, or presentation delivered via the Internet. Audience my register and attend (using their computer) from the comfort of their home.”

The speaker will be Meg Hacker, Archival Operations Director at the Southwest Region in Fort Worth. There is a link to register on this website:  http://friendsnas.org/webinarSch.htm. Her topic will be “Researching Records Relating to the Five Tribes of Oklahoma… made a little bit easier.” A large portion of the federal records for the Cherokee, Muscogee/Creek, Choctaw, Chickasaw, and Seminole tribes may be found in the National Archives – Southwest in Fort Worth, Texas, and trying to use them can be confusing. Some have been microfilmed and are available at various libraries and archives; some have been digitized and are available online; others have not been filmed, digitized, or indexed and can only be used in person.

Meg is a fun and engaging speaker and is an expert on this topic. I encourage you to register and check out the technical details at the site, where I found the following system requirements:

PC-based attendees
Required: Windows® 7, Vista, XP or 2003 Server

Macintosh®-based attendees
Required: Mac OS® X 10.5 or newer

Attendees will be able to ask questions, but will need to have a microphone (and they recommend a headset) to do so. It has been my experience with other webinars that you will not need to have a voice in their forum – you can simply listen. There are more webinars scheduled for the months ahead. If you aren’t interested in this topic, you might make a note of their later webinars.

I have updated the Genealogy Bibliography – the one that I told you to bring back each week – and you can download the updated file here – Bibliography11, and then print yourself a new one (but the one you picked up on Wednesday will be fine). I added Marsha Hoffman Rising’s book, The Family Tree Problem Solver, which is one of the books I mentioned in class available at the Tulsa City County Library.

I also added links to the Association of Professional Genealogists (www.apgen.org) and the Board for Certification of Genealogists (www.bcgcertification.org). And I replaced the URL for this blog with the new one – www.genealogyclassblog.com.

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See you next Wednesday!

I am putting the final touches on today’s talk. I hear that we have 18 registered and that we will be in room J228.

After today’s class, and some time before next week’s class, be sure to comment on this post. Give your classmates an idea about what interests you by posting your first research objective.

“Genealogy: Beyond the Basics” is the title of the upcoming class at Boston Avenue United Methodist Church’s School of Continuing Education this time. Over the years that I been teaching genealogy classes at Boston Avenue (since 1994) I have changed up the format maybe five times. This time I would like to help the students explore, with an “experienced guide,” what they might find, “beyond the basics.” Here is the course description:

“After a quick review of how to begin the search for your family history, we will earn together how to build your skills and how to locate some of the newest and best resources. We will also explore genealogy software, online resources, and DNA testing; all while communicating outside of class on the Genealogy Class Blog. Basic understanding of your computer and the Internet is a must.”

The school will begin on Wednesday, 5 October and last five weeks through 3 November. See more information about other classes offered in a downloadable booklet at Boston Avenue’s website. The $15 fee covers a whole day of interesting classes, but the Genealogy: Beyond the Basics class itself will be from 2:30 to 3:30 pm every Wednesday. To register, call 918-583-5181.