Sunday, October 19, 2008

Best of the Genea-blogs - October 12-18, 2008

Several hundred genealogy and family history bloggers write thousands of posts every week about their research, their families, and their interests. I appreciate each one of them and their efforts.

My criteria for "Best of ..." are pretty simple - I pick posts that advance knowledge about genealogy and family history, address current genealogy issues, provide personal family history, are funny or are poignant. I don't list posts destined for the genealogy carnivals, or other meme submissions (but I do include summaries of them), or my own posts.

Here are my picks for great reads from the genealogy blogs for this past week:

* Godfrey Library - Online Resources by Schelly Talalay Dardashti on the MyHeritage Genealogy Blog. This post summarizes the online resources at the Godfrey Library in Middletown CT.

* Live Image Search (Quick Tip) by Jennifer on Rainy Day Genealogy Readings. Jennifer found that www.live.com provides some useful search results.

* Peruse our Virtual Album and Tickle Your Funny Bone by Becky Wiseman on the Kinexxions blog. Becky compiled the 6th edition of Smile for the Camera - A Carnival of Images carnival. The topic was Funny Bone - pictures that bring a smile to your face. There were 29 posts by 28 contributors.

* Fractions and DNA by John Newmark on the TransylvanianDutch blog. John explores personal testimonies to the Dawes Commission about his ancestors Native-American ancestry. He then figures that he is 3/64 Native-American, if the numbers are correct.

* Sorting Things Out by Pat Richley on the DearMYRTLE Genealogy Blog. Pat describes her genealogy paper filing system and some of her computer filing system too. There is lots of great advice here based on many years of experience.

* How to share your family history with your family - Take them with you and - post 2 by Janet Hovorka on The Chart Chick blog. Janet continues her marathon of sharing posts with great advice about getting kids involved in genealogy activities.

* Nursery Lore by footnoteMaven on the footnoteMaven blog. fM describes the nursery rhyme variations, the origin of the names of the days of the week, and asks genea-bloggers to determine the day of the week they were born and if their personality matches the nursery rhyme characteristic.

* Blog Action Day: THE GREAT DEPRESSION and THOUGHTS..., Blog Action Day: POVERTY: Some Observations, Blog Action Day: One of the greatest dangers of poverty, Blog Action Day: Hard Times, Just Getting By, and ..., Blog Action Day: A Lesson Learned in Arkansas, Blog Action Day: Hard Times In Hill Country by Terry Thornton and a number of guest authors on the Hill Country of Monroe County, Mississippi blog. Terry spearheaded this effort for genea-bloggers to participate in Bog Action Day on 15 October 2008.

* Capturing the Reader by Emily Aulicino on the Writing Your Memories blog. Emily discusses different writing techniques for capturing the reader. I can really use this advice, I think.

* Welcome to Ancestry.com's new and improved publishing service by Stefanie Condie on the Ancestry.com blog. Stefanie describes using MyCanvas, the replacement for AncestryPress. This looks better, but will it be for users like me?

* Using old maps, Google Earth, deeds and census records to find your ancestral home place by Kevin Lett on the Virginia Family Tree Genealogy blog. Kevin shows his process to find an ancestral home site using an umber of online mapping tools. This is a really great post.

* Look to the Land: Understanding Land Records by Carolyn L. Barkley on the GenealogyandFamilyHistory.com blog. This an excellent article about land records, and covers both state land states and federal land states.

* Negatives, Slides - Now What? and Slide and Negative Converter by Cheryl Rothwell on the Ancestor Hunting blog. Cheryl found some old slides and negatives, and then found a useful product. She will post about her experiences with it in the near future.

* Abstract Indexes to Deeds - An Explanation by Genealogy blogger at Olive Tree Genealogy Blog. Lorine wrote an article about these Ontario land records, but they are not online. Nevertheless, researchers with Ontario roots, like me, should know about these records and how to find them.

Thank you to all genealogy bloggers for an interesting and informative week. Did you notice some new blogs on this list? I hope so!

I encourage you to go to the blogs listed above and read their articles, and add their blog to your Favorites, Bloglines, reader, feed or email if you like what you read. Please make a comment to them also - we all appreciate feedback on what we write.

Did I miss a great genealogy blog post? Tell me!

NOTE: Due to my impending vacation, the Best of the Genea-Blogs will be on hiatus for the next two weeks. To my favorite bloggers - please hold your really good posts until I get back? Thanks. Or, post them and somebody else can step in to do a "Best of ..." post. Any takers? I should have planned this better, I guess!

3 comments:

Terry Thornton said...

RANDY, Thanks for the mention --- but credit must be given to Lori Thornton (Smoky Mountain Family Historian) and Jasia (Creative Gene) for calling attention to Blog Action Day 2008. Without their heads-up, I'd have missed it completely.

Thank you for listing the articles in the series. I enjoyed participating in the event although it did address a sad and major problem in both our past and in our present ---- poverty.

Terry

DearMYRTLE said...

DearRANDY,
Thanks for the shout out, though I admit that every few months it seems I am once again "powerless over paperwork". When Ol' Myrt here takes her own advice, things work out a lot more smoothly.

M

SCHELLY TALALAY DARDASHTI said...

Hi, Randy,

Thank you for the pointer to the MyHeritage Genealogy Blog! This was a very nice surprise.

Schelly