A little more from Thursday at FGS

Well, hanging out with other Geneabloggers is certainly much more entertaining than sitting around in my hotel room writing the next post.  I said there would be more from Thursday, so here is a bit more before I head out again to attend FGS today.  Also there’s a time-sensitive promo code in this post…

FGS day 2 (for me)

Okay, so I’ve got an hour or so before the blogger reception across the street from the conference location, which should be enough time for today’s recap.  I didn’t get any photos yet; there may be a few later tonight at the blogger reception, so watch tomorrow.  I was able to talk to the FamilySearch rep about what I missed on Tuesday, so there’ll be some of that in here too….

Can you guess where I am?

I got up early and drove for five hours this morning.  Just before lunch, I arrived here….

WTF is Fold3?

So I logged in to my various news readers and social networks today getting ready to write about something I noticed in the 1865 New York state census (which I still plan to post, just not today), and I saw a news release announcing a “new” site called Fold3.  Actually, it’s not a new site, but a rebranding of a site that many genealogists have come to know well, Footnote.

Project advice from a veteran researcher

In my current work assignment, I have the opportunity to listen to quite a lot of audio as I edit photographs for an online retailer.  One of the podcast episodes I listened to this week, although not specifically about family history or genealogy research, should be required listening for every genealogist that is working to create a narrative document for future generations.  The show was Stuff You Missed In History Class and the episode (get the mp3) was the second part of an interview with multiple Pulitzer Prize winning history author David McCullough.

A little more on today’s Mystery Monday…

So I did a little more digging around to see what other records I could find on Francis Lamb and Anne Quinn and family today.  I came across the family listed in the 1850 U.S. census as well, without any Thorntons in the same household.  However, there were Thorntons elsewhere in the building in 1850…

Mystery Monday–Who was Mary Thornton?

So I know that my Lamb ancestry traces through New York City, specifically Harlem, back to Ireland.  The family legend is that my ancestors emigrated during the great potato famine.  The 1860 U.S. census for New York supports all of this, but adds a mystery that I have yet to solve.

Another record set of note

Yeah, it’s been a while since my last post.  As usual, life got in the way, but things are settling a little again (just in time for another disaster, but more on that later), so it’s time to update the blog.  I was listening to Genealogy Gems episode 114 this week and heard about all the new record sets available to search.  In the discussion on the British Library digitizing a massive amount of public domain materials (news: Reuters, Engadget, Guardian, HuffPost), I was reminded of another project that was mentioned recently on the BBC History Magazine podcast this month - the fine rolls from King Henry III's reign.

The fallacy of patronymics

Yes, I've missed a couple Saturday posts, this was mostly due to serving as the model contest chairman for the National Model Railroad Association's Midwest Region at the recent Badgerland Express region convention.  The delay is also due to some last minute findings on the surname that I was going to post about next.  I'm still digesting the information that I've found for it and will post it at a later date, but in the meantime, I've made another observation that is important to remember when researching family history.

D minus 365 days

Today is April Fool's Day, or as I saw it on another site early this morning, Lirpa Sloof Yad.  There are plenty of pranks going around like the story about Minnesota DOT tunneling under Wisconsin to implement high-speed rail service or the attack on an Improv Everywhere actor on the New York Subway (and there are a number of lists of this year's pranks online to help alleviate your boredom).  But one story that is not a joke is that we are now officially one year away from the public release of the 1940 U.S. census enumeration.  There is quite a lot of interesting information at the U.S. Census Bureau's official website, but I don't see anything obvious about how the original 1940 documents will be released yet.  One site making the rounds today among my genealogy friends on Facebook is 1940census.net; they've got a bit of information and seem to be a gathering place of sorts for links to more information about the enumeration and the era in which it was made.

It will probably be a little while after the release next year before the entire 1940 enumeration is online as scans of the original pages, but there again, based on the explosive growth in indexing at FamilySearch (which is one project where I participate), I don't think we'll have to wait too long.  I guess the best task for me to do right now to prepare for the release would be to look through my databases to find out who was alive and would have been counted in 1940 so I know where to concentrate my searches.