When I attended the Clark County Genealogical Society seminar in May, we also enjoyed a World War I display and entertainment. I took these two photos, one of a local lady and author of the book she’s holding and one was the daughter of another reenactor there. I show these today just to highlight the fashion. So relatively modest, so grown-up-style even for the girl, and so really girlish and feminine. So different from today, eh?
Pend Oreille County Trivia comes from Faith McClenny’s Museum News of the Pend Oreille County Historical Museum.
This fall we will commemorate 100 years since World War I ended in 1918. An interesting tidbit of little-known history is that a number of men from Pend Oreille County served for one year in the U.S. Army Spruce Production Division located at different places in Washington and Oregon. Over a million men, experienced lumberjacks and private sawmill owners, working in the cutting and milling of spruce lumber which was used in the manufacturing of wing spars and other parts for light weight military airplanes. The strong spruce wood did not splinter when hit by bullets. From the beginning of the war, the U.S. sawmills had been supplying the allies with spruce wood but when the U.S. joined the conflict, the demand jumped and the Army stepped in and created the Spruce Production Division. Soon after, production when from over 2 million board feet monthly to 22 million. And men from Pend Oreille County helped! (Paraphrased a bit.)
I know that spruce wood was also cut from land west of Port Angeles.
Interesting trivia history.
Do you want to broadcast information about your local society, workshop, genealogical tip, or a research query? Just send it to the WSGS Blog and WSGS Meetings and Events! You can reach hundreds of genealogists from around the state. Just email a Word document, text file, PDF or graphic to WSGSBlog@wasgs.org and WebManager@wasgs.org and we’ll do the rest!
We’re always looking to publicize local events and workshops, feature stories, updates from your society, and other genealogical information that might be of interest to our many subscribers and viewers.
We hope to hear from you soon! And don’t forget to encourage your Society members to subscribe to the Blog for the most up-to-date information from around the state.
You may manage your subscription options from your profile.
Why did she do it???
Within the last month, this bit was in our paper: “Authorities say a 30-year-old woman from Everett died after she drove her Jeep Cherokee through a barrier and off a dock at the Washington State Ferries terminal at Anacortes. A preliminary investigation found that Nicole Barney arrived at the ferry about 7:50 am, paid the ferry fare, then drove into the vehicle parking area. About 9:45 she drove off quickly and went off the end of the dock.”
Poor, poor dear soul. So sorry for her family. Why did she do it?
In an announcement made at the WSGS Annual Meeting on 26 May 2018 in Vancouver, five local societies were awarded Innovative Grants for special projects and purchases. The grants, up to $100, are designed to support the inventive and creative efforts of WSGS-member societies and organizations. Each society’s proposal was scored and ranked by a review team.
2018 Innovative Grants were awarded to:
The Innovative Grant program was started in 2015 to support the inventive and creative efforts of local societies and organizations. When created, Recognition Chair Roxanne Lowe explained, “We know that local societies can do a lot with very little, so we’re hoping the Innovative Grant Program will be what you need to jump-start a project that has been dreamed about for some time.”
The Olympia Genealogical Society and Clark County Genealogical Society earned outstanding society awards at the WSGS Annual Meeting and Awards Ceremony on May 26 in Vancouver.
WSGS President Virginia Majewski presented the Outstanding Project Award to CCGS President Brian Runyan and member Lois Bosland.
The Clark County Genealogical Society, in addition to being the excellent hosts of the Awards Ceremony, were the recipients of the Outstanding Project Award for their Tax Ledger Project which included digitizing, transcribing and indexing original 1886 and 1891 tax ledgers for the City of Vancouver. As we all know, those are critical years for any family history researcher in lieu of the 1890 census disaster. The tax records included who owned property in Vancouver and how much tax was owed and paid (or not). The Clark County Society consulted with the State Archives, Clark County Historical Museum, History Department at WSU Vancouver and the WSU Library – a true collaborative effort. This treasure trove of information is now available to the public and the original records are being turned over to the State Archives.
OGS members Dee Dee Simpson, Dick Moody, Nancy Cordell, seminar speaker David Allen Lambert, and Roger Newman celebrating their accomplishments
Olympia Gen Soc earned the Outstanding Communication Award for their new website. For 20 years, they used a popular web host that is currently unavailable. Understanding the importance and urgency of getting information out to their members and the public in this web-based world, they created a new website, using a web development company that specializes in genealogical societies (EasyNetSites — same as WSGS). Olympia’s site is attractive – and even better, it’s full of current information. Check out their website here. They also use their Facebook page to regularly post informational tidbits, newsy articles and promote their meetings and seminar.
Besides the Outstanding Communication Award, Olympia’s Ann Olsen was awarded the President’s Award for Outstanding Achievement while Rebel Romero received an Outstanding Volunteer award.
TIP OF THE WEEK – TAKE ANOTHER LOOK AT FAMILYSEARCH.ORG
FamilySearch recently announced a milestone. Their online databases of digitized historical documents now contain more than 2 billion images! These are historical records from all over the world – including Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America, Middle East, North America, the Pacific, as well as other regions.
And more images are being added weekly. In the quest to to become fully digitize, their microfilms are being scanned at a rate of 1,000 films per business day. If you haven’t used FamilySearch.org for research recently, it might be time to take another look.
One way to stay abreast of record collections that have recently been digitized or indexed at FamilySearch is by reading their online blog. Scroll down through the articles posted looking for articles titled similar to this, “New Records on FamilySearch: Week of June 4, 2018”. Read the full story and it will contain a list of new digitized collections or new indexed collections.
Here are some recent additions Washingtonians may be interested in :
WA, Western District, Naturalizations Records, 1853-1957 – newly indexed
WA, Pierce County Marriage Returns, 1891-1938 – newly indexed
WA, Soldier Home Records, 1891-1945 – newly digitized images-no index
The URL to get to the blog is :
https://www.familysearch.org/blog/en/
SGS MEMBERSHIP RENEWAL – IT’S NOT TOO LATE!
Join or renew your SGS membership for 2018-19. The fastest way is to use our new onine form and pay with a credit/debit card here: Online SGS Membership form
Or, print out a copy of our membership form and send it with your check to Seattle Genealogical Society, P.O. Box 15329, Seattle WA 98115-0329. Here’s the link: Printable SGS Membership form
Thanks for supporting SGS!
JANICE LOVELACE,
VOLUNTEER OF SPRING QUARTER
Each quarter, the Seattle Genealogical Society recognizes one volunteer as our Volunteer of the Quarter. Our Spring Volunteer of the Quarter is Janice Lovelace, current Director of Education at SGS.
Janice has been an SGS member for over five years and a volunteer for most of that time. Janice brings a strong academic and teaching background to her volunteer work at SGS. She taught college-level social sciences for more than 30 years. Most of her teaching experience focused on Psychology and she also taught American Cultural Studies.
In 2012, Janice completed the Certificate in Genealogy and Family History at University of Washington (Professional and Continuing Education) and in 2013, she completed the Certificate in Genealogical Research at Boston University. Since 2013, Janice has been lecturing nationally at Genealogical conferences on a wide variety of topics and she is known as an expert on African-American genealogy. She authored National Genealogical Society’s course CGS: African American Roots: A Historical Perspective. Janice is also an instructor for Midwest African American Genealogical Institute. Janice’s presentations for SGS have been on the subjects of Beginning Genealogy, African-American Genealogy, How to Use Newspapers, and Using the Census, as well as many others.
Janice served as Vice President of the SGS Board of Directors for two years, then served on the Education Committee last year. She helped implement and plan the Second Saturday Speaker Series which launched in September 2017. One goal of the Speaker Series is to bring people to the library to learn about and use our space, increase member participation, reach out to the wider community and provide a variety of educational experiences on a consistent basis. The series has been popular, with an audience of 20 – 40 people at each presentation. Janice was recently elected Director of Education and hopes to continue building a consistent educational program for SGS. The Speaker Series will be on hiatus this summer but watch for upcoming presentations on the SGS website:
http://www.seattlegenealogicalsociety.org
In addition to her work as a teacher, lecturer, and volunteer for SGS, Janice has been on a variety of boards focusing on women’s and health issues. In her spare time, Janice enjoys gardening, growing and using herbs, cooking, spending time with grandkids, traveling, reading and writing. Two of her favorite and more recent trips were to New Zealand and Ireland. Janice enjoys photographing the natural beauty she observes on her travels.
If you have not been to one of our Second Saturday Speaker Series, join us at the SGS Library when the series resumes in September. Thank you Janice for your contributions to the continued excellence in our educational programs.
SEATTLE CENTRAL SCHOOL
INDEXING PROJECT
Many years ago, members of Seattle Genealogical Society made copies of pages of lists of students of the Seattle Central School in 1906-1907 and 1907-1908 school years. In most cases, each page contains the students in a particular class, for instance, Mrs. Tomas’s 1st grade class in 1906-1907.
We would like to make these handwritten lists available to researchers, which requires indexing of names to establish a searchable database. Our indexing project is to capture the names of all the students in a given class. Only the names of the students are to be indexed, so it will go very fast. The other information (parent name, address) will be viewable by researchers by viewing the page image. Since these lists cover years between census this data can be valuable to researchers.
We invite all who wish to participate in indexing from the comfort of your own home to join us in indexing this valuable set of records.
The project is available on the Crowd Source Indexing website and can be found by “Viewing All Projects” and selecting Seattle Geographical Location. For those new to indexing, simply register on the website, join the SGS group, find the available projects and you are ready to index. Please be sure to read the projects instructions before starting the project.
‘ASK THE EXPERTS’ EVENT AT SGS ON AUGUST 12
Seattle Genealogical Society (SGS) is partnering with the Puget Sound Chapter of the Association of Professional Genealogists (PS-APG) to host an “Ask the Experts” event!
This event will take place at the SGS library (6200 Sand Point Way NE) on Sunday, August 12, 2018 from 10 am – 2 pm.
Participants can sign up for a free 20-minute consultation with a professional genealogist. The professional will offer guidance on how to move forward with a research question, which might be just what you need to get past a brick wall!
Space is limited, and consultations will be assigned in the order received.
Please sign up by Sunday, July 29 using this link: https://goo.gl/forms/voi5DqEZQLFzcjI13
Maureen Taylor, the nationally known “Photo Detective”,
is coming to Bellevue on September 15, 2018.
“Finding Family History in Your Picture Mysteries”
Her Three Presentations:
This event will be held on September 15, 2018 at the Vasa Park Ballroom, 3560 W Lake Sammamish Road SE, Bellevue, WA 98008. Doors open at 9 am with presentations from 9:30 am to 2 pm.
Private consultations with her are available afterwards.
This event is part of the Eastside Genealogical Society’s 40th Anniversary celebration. Thus, members, who register before September 1st, will have free admission.
Boxed lunches are available for $15, if ordered by September 1st.
Non-EGS Members and everyone after September 1st will be charged $25.
For more details about the presentations and lunch, see our website (Also, there are links to the digital files for the Color Poster and the Registration Flyer.) Of course, you can register for the event using our website.
Come and bring your friends for a fun day!
The Yakima Valley Genealogical Society will hold its July general meeting at 10:00 am. July 7th at the library at 1901 S. 12th Avenue. The public is welcome. The program will feature Richard Kyle speaking about Passport Records. Call 509-248-1328 for further information.