Whether you haven’t taken a DNA test or you did but got discouraged and abandoned the effort, it’s time to take another look. In 2024, DNA can answer family history questions so much more powerfully than it could even five years ago. More people have tested, and more tools and strategies have been developed to help you find answers. More accurate and precise ethnicity results point more meaningfully to ancestral places and populations. Come learn what’s possible and how to set a good DNA goal (like identifying an unknown ancestor, finding or verifying birth roots, connecting with distant relatives or figuring out where an ancestor was from). Learn about picking the right test(s) for your goal and how to turn test results into meaningful family history answers. The best news is that you don’t have to be a scientist to make DNA discoveries. You can do the DNA – yes, ever YOU!
May 18, 2024 10:00am Pacific Time is our Annual Membership Meeting held online via Zoom. During the business portion of the meeting, SKCGS will hold its annual election for the positions of Vice-President and Secretary. The proposed 2024-2025 budget will also be recommended for approval. Guests are welcome to attend, but only SKCGS members in good standing may vote. After the short business meeting, our guest speaker Paula Stuart-Warren will present “Superb Seven: Fabulous Avenues for Finding Family in Manuscript Collections.”
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PROGRAM UPDATES
All meetings are online except the in-person Research Group and Genealogy Help at the Auburn and Federal Way Libraries
Live transcription (captioning) is available during our Zoom meetings by request
Online meeting participants need to register for SKCGS Zoom meetings. Register at our website skcgs.org. Upon registration, Zoom will send a confirmation email with instructions on joining the meeting.
Register at https://www.skcgs.org After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting. Subscribe to the free SKCGS Genetic-Genealogy email list for announcements and discussion: https://skcgs.groups.io/g/Genetic-Genealogy Wednesday, May 15, 2024 ⋅ 6:30pm – 7:30pm PT
Genealogy with SKCGS and KCLS (online) Immigration, Emigration, Naturalization and Passports
Join professional genealogist, Winona Laird, from South King County Genealogical Society for a series of programs to help you along on your genealogical journey. King County Library will email a Zoom link no later than 24 hours before the program start time. If you do not see an email, check your Junk or Spam folder. If you need assistance, please contact Jennifer at jwooten@kcls.org. Register at KCLS: https://kcls.bibliocommons.com/events/65565be7b036662f00807fdd
Friday, May 17, 2024, 1:00pm – 3:00pm PT Research Workshop (in-person) For SKCGS members Kent FamilySearch Center 12817 SE 256th St., Kent, WA Seating is limited RSVP REQUIRED to Winona at w.laird@skcgs.org
Saturday, May 18, 2024, 9:30am PT social time; 10am – 11:30am PT program (online) SKCGS Annual Membership Meeting (Online) Election of officers and budget approval followed by Paula Stuart-Warren, Certified Genealogist®, FMGS, FUGA presenting “Superb Seven: Fabulous Avenues for Finding Family in Manuscript Collections” We have at least seven easily accessible finding aids to locate old family letters, photos, business records, church records, diaries, membership records, and other original records that we may not know still exist. These items could be in a repository anywhere and luckily, we have the Superb Seven that will help us locate them. Examples will have you itching to search for your own scattered family documents and most searches of these FREE finding aids can be done online from home. Researchers should review all the information on the websites of the finding aids to fully understand all details, including the origins and limitations of the descriptions and contributors. This presentation includes an extensive handout detailing the Superb Seven, examples of what can be found, and ways to learn more.
Paula is an internationally recognized genealogical educator, researcher, and consultant focusing on unusual resources, manuscripts, methodology, and analyzing records. She also specializes in Native American research, the WPA, and railroad records. She has spent extensive research time at libraries, courthouses, libraries, state archives, historical societies, and at various locations of the U.S. National Archives. She is currently a coordinator and instructor for the Genealogical Research Institute of Pittsburgh. She has presented courses for Research Write Connect Academy, Ancestry Academy, Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy, Texas Institute of Genealogical Research, Family Tree University, and continues to present virtual seminars and webinars across the U.S. and in Canada. She is a former member of the Board of Directors of the Federation of Genealogical Societies, of the Minnesota Genealogical Society, a former officer of the Association of Professional Genealogists, and has been a Board-Certified Genealogist since 1988. She is descended from eight ancestral countries and has researched family connections across the U.S. and Canada, including many connections to her German ancestors. She currently has her own educational website and blog at http://genealogybypaula.com and is enthusiastic about sharing knowledge and continuing education. The program will be recorded for playback by SKCGS Members. Guests welcome! Register at https://www.skcgs.org
Thursday, May 23, 2024 ⋅ 2:00pm – 4:00pm PT Genealogy Help with SKCGS at the Federal Way Library (in-person) Genealogy questions? SKCGS offers one-on-one help with a volunteer 34200 1st Way S Federal Way, WA 98003 Registration not required. In-person event. Safety guidelines and current protocols followed. More information at King County Library, https://kcls.org/locations/federal-way, or phone: (253) 838-3668
Monday, May 27, 2024 ⋅ 1:00pm – 3:00pm PT Genealogy Chat (online) Meet up and chat about genealogy subjects and topics. We have no agenda; we just like one another! Register at https://www.skcgs.org After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting. Subscribe to the free SKCGS email list for announcements and discussion: https://skcgs.groups.io/g/Society
Saturday, June 1, 2024, 10:00am – 12:00pm PT Family Tree Maker Users Group (online) Question & Answer. Each month, we will learn about using the features of FTM. Register at https://www.skcgs.org After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting. Subscribe to the free SKCGS FTM email list for announcements and discussion: https://skcgs.groups.io/g/FTMUG
Tuesday, June 4, 2024, 6:30pm PT SKCGS Board of Directors Meeting (online) All SKCGS members are invited to attend; only Officers and Directors may vote. Write to Board@skcgs.org for the meeting link.
Friday, June 7, 2024 ⋅ 12:30pm PT EGS German Interest Group (online) Topic: Is this the End? Taking Your German Brick Walls Down Piece by Piece by Luana M. Darby, AG® For meeting registration, visit https://egsgermangroup.wordpress.com/
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MEMBERSHIP: We welcome guests to our meetings and special interest groups, which are free. Naturally we hope that visitors will want to become members. Support like yours helps us to educate and engage with our community to foster interest in family and local history. Regarding our programs, even if and when we can meet again in person, we will continue with some virtual programs. You can find more information about membership at our website at https://www.skcgs.org/support-skcgs/membership.
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Tacoma Pierce County Genealogical Society Monthly Educational Meeting
Tuesday, May 14, 2024, starting at 6:00 pm
Our speaker this month is Larae Liddle. Grave Concerns’ President Laurel Lemke says: Larae Liddle, our amazing volunteer genealogist, will present on behalf of Grave Concerns. She will be able to describe our grave grooming process and bring a bucket with suggested tools. Also, she will let us know about an upcoming date when we will have the opportunity to help with grave grooming.
“Larae volunteers at the Family Search Center, has written a book documenting McNeil Island burials and she is writing a book about the patient cemetery burials. “
Our meetings are held monthly except for July and August starting at 6:00 PM, Zoom comes live about 6:15 PM.
Attend in person at:
Parkland/Spanaway Branch of Pierce County Library
13718 Pacific Ave S.
Tacoma, WA 98444
Attend virtually via Zoom:
Tacoma-Pierce County Genealogical Society is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.
Please download and import the following iCalendar (.ics) files to your calendar system.
Do you know the names of all 8 of your great-grandparents? WAGS is here to help! The Wenatchee Area Genealogical Society (WAGS) invites you to a hybrid meeting: Not Who He Once Was: Tips For Finding Your Name-Changing Ancestor by Mary Kircher Roddy Do you have someone in your tree who just disappeared? Or one who seems to have no background at all? Perhaps their story involved a complete change of name. With case studies of identity shifts, Mary will give us strategies to discover who they became in later life, or who they were before you thought you knew them! Monday afternoon, May 13, 2024 2:00-3:30 p.m. Via Zoom and in person at the FamilySearch Center, 667 10th Street NE, East Wenatchee Watch our website (www.wags-web.org ) and click on “Latest News and Events” for Zoom address. —For more information call 509-782-4046—
Wenatchee Area Genealogical Society’s library is located at 127 South Mission, Museum Annex Building. The library is open Tuesdays and Saturdays, 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. Visit our website: www.wags-web.org WAGS connects, collects and protects family historie
Last February the EWGS program featured Cyndi Ingle. Her (too-short) time with us was fact-and-tip filled and her 8-page handout was a thorough reminder of what she taught us that day.
Some quick-and-always-good-to-review points to keep in mind:
Records were and are created by humans.
Humans make mistakes.
Humans misspell things.
Humans are inconsistent.
Humans miscommunicate things.
Just because many more things are digitized now doesn’t mean that searching is really any easier than it was before.
We MUST think about ow and why humans created any set of records and the circumstances of their times and methods in doing so.
We must consider how archivists and librarians catalogued their records’ collections.
We must consider HOW those records made their way into the digitized world.
Cyndi also explained that mysterious word database. What is a database? A database is a container filled with records. Think of a phonebook; it’s a database filled with records, no? So Ancestry is a database of records, right? Then to be worthwhile, a database must be indexed for the words, fields and records to be searchable.
With a big smile Cyndi said that “every database is unique depending on the data it contains and depending on the software used to create it. Everybody did it their own way!”
Then search engines. These are tools we use to search databases. And as with databases, every search engine is unique depending on the software and hardware used to make it.
Learn how Y-DNA testing of suitable males can trace and confirm paternal lines in your family tree. See how to choose the right test and how to work with your genetic matches. Examples cover STRs, SNPs, genetic distance, match thresholds, Tip reports, the Y-DNA tree, haplogroups, group projects, account settings, and more.
Richard Hill, the first adoptee to identify his birth family through DNA testing and genetic genealogy, created the DNA Testing Adviser website in 2008. Over the next 13 years, he educated thousands of readers and answered a regular flood of individual questions. Selling that website in 2021, he launched his “DNA Favorites” website, self-published “Finding Family: My Search for Roots” and the “Secrets in My DNA” and became an in-demand genealogical speaker on all topics DNA.
This is Part 3; parts 1 and 2 were in the immediately-previous posts.
The travelers remarked on the lovely larkspur flowers but quickly learned that wild larkspur was very bad for horses but okay for oxen and that chockcherry was bad for oxen. Animals, being animals, too often just munched away but were too important and valuable not to be watchful of.
The Oregon Trail travelers eventually learned about other plants:
Western Buttercup – Indians used it to poison arrows
Snakeweed – toxic to kidneys and liver
Death Camas – white ones WERE deadly but BLUE ones were okay; only way to tell was when they flowered in spring, a luxury the immigrants did not have.
Selenium – an element in the soil taken up into the plume grasses which cause digestive problems for the animals.
Greaseweed – they started seeing these plants about Chimney Rock and quickly learned that it was good/safe for animals to eat in early spring but poisonous in summer.
Horsebrush – this was toxic in many ways to animals
Locoweed – there were many kinds of “loco weed”
Texas Blue Bonnets – very toxic, producing birth defects in both men and animals
Water Hemlock – growing vigorously along rivers but toxic
Wild Parsnips – ditto
Wild Milkweed – ditto
By the time they reached Owyhee County, Idaho, “there was scarcely a train without sick oxen on it” due to the many bad plants in the alkali areas which they couldn’t keep the animals from eating. In the Blue Mountains of Oregon, the journal entries were pretty routine by this point. Little mention is made of plants except poison ivy. “They must have encountered this all along the way but only here is it often mentioned,” Ms. Packard said. Following Grandma’s advice that “if you don’t know it don’t eat it,” was sound advice but to hungry people, they had to learn on their own. Children helped show the way!
TIP OF THE WEEK – DIAGRAM YOUR TREE IN DIFFERENT WAYSTry visualizing your tree in new ways. Diagram what state or country each person was born in, or what church or religious community they joined. You may find trends. Did one line of your families move more often than others? Did one line of your family have more people die young? Did your ancestors in one line gravitate to similar jobs? What does that tell you about your family today? Get as broad or as granular as needed. For example, this circle tree chart shows the birth state of each ancestor, not just the country. May 1, 2024
SGS eNews! comes out the first of every month. contact eNews!
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Try visualizing your tree in new ways. Diagram what state or country each person was born in, or what church or religious community they joined. You may find trends. Did one line of your families move more often than others? Did one line of your family have more people die young? Did your ancestors in one line gravitate to similar jobs? What does that tell you about your family today? Get as broad or as granular as needed. For example, this circle tree chart shows the birth state of each ancestor, not just the country. May 1, 2024