Saturday, November 1, 2008

Saturday on the TMG cruise

The one day I didn't summarize on my laptop was Saturday. The day started in St. Thomas (US Virgin Islands) harbor with breakfast in the Horizon Court restaurant (usually scrambled eggs, bacon, English muffin or roll, banana, pear halves, and a Danish - hey, we had to get our money's worth! I am not unfat...).

Then we were off before 9 a.m. for our Bumpy fast ride on the top of the waves to Buck Island where we snorkeled in Turtle Cove (there were two turtles there - they spent most of their time on the bottom hiding from snorkelers) and Shipwreck Cove (where I didn't see the shipwreck, but others apparently did). Getting there was a lot of fun - two young ladies driving a 30-foot Zodiac boat (500 hp to twin outboards) - we got a little wet crashing through the tops of the waves at 30 mph or so. The water was fine, but it was rough in Shipwreck Cove. Linda had a hard time climbing back onboard the boat. We were back by 12:30 p.m. and I went up to lunch (cheeseburger, fries, cookie) and ate with Lee and Gene. I was grungy and sunburned, so went to the room and took a shower and put some coolant on my head and shoulders. I took a nap, read my book, and walked around the ship taking pictures of St. Thomas.

We packed our suitcases, and got dressed for the TMG hosted cocktail party at 5:30 pm. I shared some time with Cyndi Howells, Tony Burroughs and David Lambert, and several of the other attendees. I have some pictures of "notables" that I'll post later on when I have Internet access to my files (The Business Center computer doesn't have a USB port available). This was the first time I saw all of the speakers together, and we got pictures to prove it! The highlight was everybody in the room singing "'m My Own Grandpa"with bass John Titford leading us on the microphone and the words on the computer screens. It was fun. This, of course, gives me ideas for my own society... of course someone else would have to lead it - I sing in J-Sharp.

Then it was dinner time (Beef Wellington), and we ate with non-genealogists (we had the Anytime Dinner plan all week in the Palm Dining Room - great flexibility!) with 10 at our table. We talked a bit about genealogy and family history. I had to skip dessert (poor, poor not unfat Randy...) in order to run up to the room and put the suitcases in the hallway, and I grabbed my laptop case with my "elusive ancestor" summaries in them.

My first "One-on-One" was at 8:30 p.m. with David Lambert of NEHGS. I decided to ask for help on my elusive Thomas J. Newton of ME, MA and VT. Dave had some great suggestions for records I don't normally think of - unpublished church records, War of 1812 veterans, 1798 Direct Tax for MA/ME, and divorce records which might be in the Massachusetts State Archives. He even took my writeup to see if he could think of more things to look up. We had a little more time, so he looked over my Elizabeth Horton Dill (1794?-1869) birth parents problem too.

My second "One-on-One" was with Elizabeth Shown Mills, one of the most skilled genealogists on the planet. Elizabeth dissected my Elizabeth Horton Dill problem several ways, and didn't even comment on my poor source citations for several records. She gave me several excellent ideas for further research in original records - not transcripts or abstracts - like the later Barnstable County Deeds and probates, and probates for the sons of Thomas and Hannah (Horton) Dill. We discussed my hypotheses about the conflicts in the evidence I already have - and agreed they might be correct, but that I need much more data to build a solid case. I wish I had a steel-trap mind like she does! Impressive.

My third "One-on-One" was with Sandra Hewlett, who lives in Pennsylvania. I chose her so that I could discuss my elusive Mary Hoax (ca 1768-1850), wife of Martin Carringer. Sandy noted that I didn't really know where Hempfield township was in Westmoreland County, and that I need to consider deeds and probates for the Hoax/Hokes/etc. families in Westmoreland from 1773, and in Bedford County from 1771-1773, and in Cumberland County PA before that. She had a great book called Pennsylvania Line which had a complete listing of all towns, townships and counties, including maps showing how county boundaries changed. She also suggested checking records such as the 1773 and 1783 tax/census lists, Pennsylvania state RevWar muster rolls online at the PA State Archives site, and obtaining Martin Carringer's Bounty Land Warrant from NARA.

The evening ended with the David Lambert round-table - I joined it late and they were discussing tri-racial isolates in NC/VA/KY/TN area - and the Roanoke Colony members that might have left strands of Y-DNA in the area. Megan Smolenyak and Craig Scott were making suggestions and comments too - there apparently is an effort to find ancestral families of the Roanoke Colony adventurers and then find male descendants from those families to establish a Y-DNA database that might match the tri-racial isolates. Fascinating stuff!

All I can say about this conference's "top-notch faculty" is WOW - they are excellent speakers and have a wealth of genealogy research knowledge. The depth and breadth of these folks is tremendous. I really appreciate their sharing with us, especially in the "one-on-ones." That was challenging and fun.

My Genealogy Plan for Saturday, 1 November

We will dock today at 7 am in St. Thomas in the Virgin Islands in the eastern Caribbean. The Wholly Genes Conference on the Caribbean Princess is almost over - how did it go so fast! Here are my plans for the day:

7:00 am - there are hosted breakfasts with several of the conference speakers in Cafe Fusion - I didn't sign up for any of them. Maybe I'll try to crash one of them, or meet with newly made friends.

7:00 am - the ship docks in St. Thomas. We signed up for a tour and beach visit.

5:30 pm - Farewell Cocktail Party (open bar) in Club Fusion.

6:00 pm - the ship leaves St. Thomas.

8:30 pm - One-on-ones for 30 minutes with conference speakers. I am signed up for 30 minutes with David Allen Lambert, Elizabeth Shown Mills and Sandra Hewlett.

9:30 pm - Group Discussion on "Genealogical Free for All (A potpourri of topics)" by David Allen Lambert in Club Caribe.

I'll have to miss at least the first half of the Group Discussion with David because of my one-on-one with Sandra.

This is the last day of the cruise - on Sunday morning, we will be docked in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Linda and I are staying until Wednesday morning, when we fly home to San Diego. We hope to do a lot of sightseeing in San Juan. The hotel is supposed to have wireless Internet access, so I hope to be able to do some blogging and post some photographs from the cruise and conference week.

Friday, October 31, 2008

Friday on the TMG Cruise

If it's Friday, it must be Antigua!! (It's pronounced ahn-teeg-ah"). This island is a little bigger than St. Kitts:

After breakfast, we went off on the Stingrays and Snorkel tour on the north side of the island, passing through the small town of St. Johns and into the countryside, arriving at a beach where we boarded small flat bottom outboard motor boats. The boats took us about a mile out to a fenced in pen with a smooth bottom and sting rays swimming within the pen. We used snorkels to swim along with them. Some of the staff handled the rays and let everyone touch them. We took some underwater pictures. This was 3 hours for about 45 minutes in the water. The drive to and from was pretty quiet – there was no tour guide, just a driver. I talked with several folks about genealogy on the way back. This is a photo of the boats we used:


When we returned, Linda went shopping, and I had lunch, then I came back for a nap. Later, I walked around the deck taking pictures and talked to several genealogy folks. At 5:45, I got dressed in my suit and went off to the Princess Theater for the last lecture of the conference.

“Virtual Cousin Research Project” was presented by Cyndi Howells. She had major troubles with the projector hookup – it would skew sideways frequently – but not on the laptop she was using, so it had to be the theater setup. This was one of the best lectures on the conference. Cyndi suggested that the Internet can be used very effectively to conduct a research project among a cousin network by using blogs, web sites, wikis, Google Tools, instant messaging, etc. A project requires a scope definition, a project administrator, a To-Do list, and cousins willing to contribute to and support the efforts. She suggested the project concentrate on a surname, or descendants of a person, or a locality. A blog, either open to everyone or open to only the cousins, can be used as a newsletter and coordination for the project. A web site can be used as a publication site for the project. Google Tools can be used for email to the project members, a home page for coordination and news, saving online documents in Google docs, etc. Cyndi used Terry Thornton’s Hill Country of Monroe County, Mississippi as an example of a locality blog. Everything she mentioned is free to the users and can be organized to include all of the project members – whether two or a hundred people.

Then it was off for the formal dinner in the Palm Dining Room. We ate with a couple from Pennsylvania and genea-cruiser Alice from Minnesota. Afterward, I came back to the room and ditched my coat and tie and went off for the 9:30 p.m. meeting in Café Caribe.

David Lambert hosted the discussion group on the topic of DNA testing and research. He has had Y-DNA, mtDNA and genomic testing done, and told stories about each of them. Several attendees described their experiences – Hal W. has run a surname project that found no links between three colonial New England immigrants with variants of his surname. I spoke briefly about my mtDNA test and finding exact matches, but have had no contact yet with them. David would like to have a project that collects Y-DNA or mtDNA sequences for specific colonial New England ancestors. He encouraged all to get tested, and to find near or distant cousins that can help fill out a genetic signature family tree. This was a very spirited discussion with many good experiences and ideas. David is very irreverent and humorous, which I appreciate and enjoy.

My Genealogy Plan for Friday, 31 October

Happy Hallowe'en, readers! Boo from the eastern Caribbean on the Wholly Genes Conference aboard the Caribbean Princess. We are on our way to Antigua. Here is my genealogy plan for today:

7:00 am - there are hosted breakfasts with several of the conference speakers in Cafe Fusion - I didn't sign up for any of them. Maybe I'll try to crash one of them, or meet with newly made friends.

8:00 am - the ship docks in Antigua. We signed up for a tour and beach visit.

6:00 pm - the ship leaves Antigua.

6:15 pm - "Virtual Cousin Research Project" by Cyndi Howells in Club Fusion.

9:30 pm - Group Discussion on "DNA Research and Suggestions" by David Allen Lambert in Club Caribe.

10:30 pm - go to my room and try to figure out what I want to discuss on my one-on-ones tomorrow night!

Thursday, October 30, 2008

Thursday on the TMG Cruise

Here is the view of the dock on St. Kitts that greeted us this morning.

We were up early because we had a hosted breakfast with Barbara Vines Little at 7 a.m. and an on-dock time of 8:20 a.m. for a tour to the St. Kitts Scenic Railway. There were eight of us at the breakfast in the Coral Dining Room but we had little time to talk about genealogy. We went off on our three-hour tour on an 8 mile-per-hour rocking narrow gauge sugar cane train, traveling mainly past the back yards of St. Kittians, many of whom waved as the train passed, especially the school children. Here is a picture of Linda and the choir onboard the train:


We were back to the dock by 12 noon, and Linda stayed in town to shop a bit while I came back to the boat for lunch. I ate lunch with Joanne from Oregon and Lorna from New Zealand, who are both TMG devotees. They extolled the virtues of TMG and I am truly convinced that it’s a very powerful program that the user can bend to his or her will, but is it worth that effort? We shared research experiences and Linda joined us a bit later. Linda went off to swim and I went to the room for a nap, the better to stay awake for the one genealogy lecture tonight. After my hour-long nap, I walked around the ship looking for genie folks to talk to, and found Lee and Charlie in the restaurant. The ship departed St. Kitts before 6 p.m., and we left the restaurant at 6 p.m. to go to Club Fusion.

The only speaker of the day was Cyndi Howells on “Plotting, Scheming and Mapping Online.” Cyndi is an excellent speaker, and covered her Ten Quick Tips about maps in 30 minutes, using many examples to illustrate her points. She also discussed finding maps on Migration Trails in detail, and showed some online map creation tools like Google Earth and Earth Point. Her syllabus has many URLs to explore. This was a great lecture – very helpful and informative.

We went to dinner at 7:15 p.m., and ate with three other genea-cruisers – Susan, Sharon and Truman. We shared our adventures of the day and our research experiences before we left after 9 p.m. Dessert was good, too!

David Allen Lambert had another Group Discussion at 9:30 p.m. on “Atlantic Canada.” There were about 30 of us around a table in Café Caribe and David described the records available for Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland. He has ancestry in most of those provinces, and has done extensive research at NEHGS and other repositories. Later, he answered questions from the audience. Even at the late hour, the conversation was lively, and David really knows his material. He passed around a book titled “Atlantic Canada Research” by Terrence Punch and George Sanborn published by NEHGS in 1997 that looks like a good one to have. Off to bed – we go snorkeling on Friday!

My Genealogy Plan for Thursday, 30 October

We will dock today at 8 am in St. Kitts in the eastern Caribbean. But the Wholly Genes Conference on the Caribbean Princess is not over - the tourist part begins! Here are my plans for the day:

7:00 am - there are hosted breakfasts with several of the conference speakers in Cafe Fusion - I didn't sign up for any of them. Maybe I'll try to crash one of them, or meet with newly made friends.

8:00 am - the ship docks in St. Kitts, and everybody really wants to get off. We signed up for a tour and beach visit.

6:00 pm - the ship leaves St. Kitts.

6:15 pm - "Plotting, Scheming and Mapping Online" by Cyndi Howells in Club Fusion.

9:30 pm - Group Discussion on "Atlantic Canadian Records" by David Allen Lambert in Club Caribe.

I hope I'm not too tired or sunburned from the day in the tropical sun to attend the lecture and the group discussion.

Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Wednesday on the TMG Cruise

The first program today was TMG’s Bob Velke presenting “Advanced TMG: Customizing Reports” and “Customizing Charts.” These were very useful for this novice TMG user. I followed along for awhile, and finally was able to make an ahnentafel list (just names, dates and places in ahnentafel order) from my database. Bob went over my head fairly quickly with setting flags, and manipulating text reports for public consumption by controlling narrative output. He didn’t get around to the Book Manager. There are sample TMG report outputs at www.whollygenes.com/samplereports.htm.

In the second hour on TMG Charts, Bob demonstrated chart elements, filtering charts and other chart options. Again, I concentrated on making a chart I want – a descendant or ancestor chart for a number of generations. The key is using the options to control chart content and formatting – boxes, lines, fonts, colors, etc. The Charts use the Visual Chartform program which is included in TMG. The TMG program is very powerful and flexible – the user can add boxes, frames, colors, etc. to create a custom chart.

I missed the third program – John Cardinal’s “Second Site for Advanced Users.”

The 12 noon lecture was “Femme Covert or Femme Sole: Women and the Law” by Barbara Vines Little. Barbara covered how the English Common Law concerning women and property was applied in the colonial times. She had many examples that demonstrated how single and married females fared in property transactions, and discussed many of the intricate details involved. I must have missed a bit of this talk while reading the syllabus (or zzzzz, I don't know...), because it seemed to go pretty fast.

After lunch, John Grenham presented ”Irish Genealogy on the Internet.” John noted that the major sources of Irish genealogy information are census records, the civil BMD records, Church records and property records. There are other records, such as wills, estates, newspapers, and directories. He discussed the online information available for each of these record types. The 1901 and 1911 census records are partially available on several web sites, some commercial and some free. General Register Office records for some years are online, as are some church records. Property records online are Griffith’s Valuation and the Tithe Applotment records from the 1830’s. More records have come online in the past year, but several repositories are slow in adding record images due to their worry about losing walk-in customers – they are putting indexes online, but to obtain the images you have to either pay a significant fee or go to the repository. This was a very useful talk for me – I have not done any Irish research, but have wondered about it.

Next up was Craig Scott on “Beyond Pension Research: You Stopped Too Soon.” Craig really knows this military and NARA stuff well. He said that it is important to know and understand the federal pension laws over time – from 1818 to 1873 and beyond. He also said that there is more to pension research than just finding and obtaining the pension application. The additional records available for Revolutionary War pensions are found at National Archives branches. They include the Pension Office Ledgers and Payment Cards, and the Final Payment vouchers and Settled Accounts records. Craig had many examples of these records and the information they hold. He said that copies of pension applications on www.Footnote.com are of better quality than the original paper copies available on microfilm at NARA. I missed quite a bit of this talk due to an irresistible urge to nap – I’m just glad I didn’t snore.

The last lecture of the day was Tony Burroughs on “Finding Your Ancestors in City Directories.” Tony discussed the information that can be found in City Directories, and displayed many excellent examples from his own family research in Chicago and Chattanooga. He focused on finding information in between census years to find residences, occupations, spouse’s names, etc. He said that locating houses may be hampered by changes in street names, changes in house numbering systems, etc. One of the most useful parts of city directories is the reverse directory – listed by street address rather than by name. Tony listed some online resources for city directories and repositories that have significant collections. He suggested using www.Worldcat.org to find specific city and year publications held by repositories.

We ate dinner with several other genealogists tonight. After dinner, I came back to the room and worked on my daily journal notes.

This was our last day at sea heading for the Caribbean - we dock in St. Kitts in the morning. The genealogy conference schedule is lighter from now on.

My Genealogy Plans for Wednesday, 29 October

This is our last full day at sea on the Wholly Genes Cruise aboard the Caribbean Princess. Here are the planned conference events:

8:15 am - "Advanced TMG: Customizing Reports" by Bob Velke in Club Fusion.
9:30 am - "Advanced TMG: Customizing Charts" by Bob Velke in club Fusion.
10:45 am - "Second Site for Advanced Users" by John Cardinal in the Palm Dining Room
12 noon - "Femme Covert or Femme Sole: Women and the Law" by Barbara Vines Little in the Princess Theater.
3:00 pm - "Irish Genealogy Online" by John Grenham in the Princess Theater.
4:15 pm - "Beyond Pension Research: You stopped too soon!!" by Craig Scott in the Princess Theater.
5:30 - "Finding Your Ancestors on City Directories" by Tony Burroughs in the Princess Theater.

Sounds like another great day of lectures, doesn't it?

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Tuesday on the TMG Cruise

Tuesday morning had two lectures by John Cardinal on “TMG Utility” (a stand-alone modification tool that fixes TMG database problems using rules and filters – it’s useful for fixing problems that affect many persons) and “Second site” (a stand-alone program that creates web pages from a TMG database). These appear to be powerful tools, especially the Second Site software if a TMG user wants to create a web site with linked pages between people and events in a project database.

Megan Smolenyak presented “Right Annie, Wrong Annie” about the search for Annie Moore and the ensuing family reunion, NYGBS presentation, the plays in DC and Ireland, and the dedication of the monument in Calvary Cemetery in Queens. Megan showed the research performed to prove the wrong Annie wasn’t the right one, and the research done by several contributors to find Annie Schayer in Manhattan, and her unmarked cemetery plot. This talk was the SCGS Jamboree dinner talk that I missed, so I was happy to hear it. Linda came to this talk and was moved by it. This talk really brings out the best in genealogy, I think. This was in the Palm Dining Room, so everyone was gathered in close to the small screen. Here is a photo of Megan discussing the Annie Moore statue at Ellis Island:


Megan wore her Annie Moore T-shirt and I got a picture with her:


John Titford was next up with “Migrants on the Move: “Bounce Backers.” This title refers to English ancestors of John’s that traveled within England, but always came back to the Bratton, Wiltshire and Frome, Somerset ancestral homes. John used five examples from his own research from 1547 to 1757. The lesson here, for me, was that people were not always static – they moved about, up to 100 miles or more sometimes. In addition to the standard parish registers and wills, he showed that there are other resources that can be used to find information about persons in this time frame. Here is Bob Velke introducing John in the Princess Theater:


After lunch, Elizabeth Shown Mills was back for “The Identity Crisis: Right Name, Wrong Man? Wrong Name, Right Man?” She used seven case studies to illustrate her points that names can change for a number of reasons – including step-fathers and liaisons, patriarchal reasons, borrowed or alias names, taking a father or husband’s given name as a surname, patronymics, “dit” names, and translated or transliterated names. The case studies are fascinating – many of them are from NGSQ or TAG articles.

Craig R. Scott presented “Researching Your Revolutionary War Ancestors.” Craig is an expert in military records, and it shines through in this talk. His counsel was to check all of the papers in Compiled Military Service Records and Pension Applications – including those of other members of the soldier’s company and regiment. He noted that not all soldiers have a Compiled Military Service Record, and that there may be records in State Archives, the Library of Congress and the National Archives. Craig noted that http://www.footnote.com/ has the compiled military service records, Continental Congress papers, RevWar rolls, and RevWar Pension files online. Indexed and searchable. He warned that HeritageQuestOnline has only selected pension papers online – not the complete pension file.

The last presentation today was by Tony Burroughs on “Did Your Ancestor Serve in the Civil War?” He started out with an excellent summary of how to find if you have a Civil War ancestor – to use interviews with relatives, family papers and records, cemetery records, birth, death and marriage records, and census records to work your way back to 1870 in order to determine which males might have served in the Civil War (essentially those aged 23 to 53 in 1870). Then check the 1910 census (Column 30), the 1890 Union veterans census and the online NPS Civil War Soldiers and Sailors System at www.nps.gove/cwss/soldiers.htm to determine if they were Union soldiers. The Compiled Military Service Record and Civil War Pension applications index can then be used to find records for the soldier. The records will have to be found on National Archives microfilms or at Archives centers and copied for a fee. Tony mentioned that State Adjutant General Reports can also be used. Tony covered records available for Union soldiers and seamen, Confederate soldiers, and African-American soldiers. He provided an excellent bibliography.

We went to dinner and sat with several TMG Conference attendees, and then went to a forgettable comedy and singing show in the Princess Theater. I felt better today.

My Genealogy Plan for Tuesday, 28 October

We are still at sea, about midway between New York City and St. Kitts in the eastern Caribbean.

My genealogy day at the Wholly Genes Conference looks like this:

8:15 - "TMG Utility" by John Cardinal in Club Fusion.
9:30 - "Second Site" by John Cardinal in Club Fusion.
10:45 am - "Right Annie, Wrong Annie" by Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak in the Palm Dining Room.
12 noon - "Genealogical sources for migrants on the move within the UK" by John Titford in the Princess Theater.
3:00 pm - "The Identity Crisis: Right Name, Wrong Man? Wrong Name, Right Man?" by Elizabeth Shown Mills in the Princess Theater.
4:15 pm - "Researching Your Revolutionary War Ancestor" by Craig Scott in the Princess Theater.
5:30 pm - "Did Your Ancestors Serve in the Civil War?" by Tony Burroughs in the Princess Theater.

I am really looking forward to all of these lectures. I will report on my day in a later post.

Monday, October 27, 2008

Monday on the TMG Cruise - Part 2

The first Monday afternoon presentation was “Genealogical Problem Solving” by Elizabeth Shown Mills. Elizabeth used real life and imaginary (humorous) case studies to illustrate her 13 research tips. Basically, she said follow the trail of people and paper work – what records exist, who did the people associate with, and do research in original records, not just gather names, dates and places. Research is not looking up the answer in books or databases, research is tracking down the answer, since nobody else has solved the problem. This was a fun and informative presentation – she’s the expert, of course! Here is Elizabeth with her opening slide - I sat in the middle of the first section for this talk:



Next up was Barbara Vines Little, with “Working the Land: Tracing Land Ownership.” She also used case studies to illustrate the methods. Barbara covered deed terminology and some inheritance laws and noted that the researcher needs to know what laws apply when. She suggested using an in-out chart to track land transactions by a person, paying attention to parcels that are not bought but are sold by the person, and using platting techniques to find parcel locations and neighbors. She noted that indexes may have only names that affect land titles, and some property exchanges, or leases or mortgages, may be in the deed books but not in the indexes. A good lecture.
I missed the last lecture of the day – John Grenham presented “The Naming of the Green: Irish Place Names and Surnames.” The syllabus has an excellent text for this lecture.
I was fried by this time; the jittering of the boat made me nauseous in the morning, and I was sleepy in the afternoon. We went to dinner at 6 pm on formal night. We didn't ask for a table with others, so we stared at each other eating for two hours. Dinner was good, though! We went to the "Do You Wanna Dance" show in the Princess Theater after dinner.

Monday on the TMG Cruise - Part 1

We were up early for breakfast, and I went off to the 8:15 a.m. presentation by Bob Velke on “Introduction to TMG.” I had downloaded the trial TMG before we left home, and had uploaded my database into TMG in New York. Bob led us through TMG terminology, screen layouts, Tags, searching for people, and didn’t have time for basic data entry and sources.

The second talk was “Filtering with TMG” and Bob showed us how to use filters to create groups of people (e.g., all those born before 1800, or all those born between 1800 and 1900, all those with a certain source, all those with an event in a certain location, etc.). I learned a lot from these presentations, and can see how TMG can be used effectively using Tags and Filters.

At 10:45 a.m., John Titford presented “How to Write Your Family History.” He covered the different excuses we use to avoid writing the book (e.g., I’m not finished…; I’m a poor writer; My family story is so ordinary; etc.) He noted that writing a book requires you to make decisions on content and format, to organize your work so that you can focus on writing the book, and writing the book, which will be essentially a series of biographies in a logical order. John recommended using geographical, social and historical context to place each family in a place and time experiencing local or national events. John is a funny and enthusiastic presenter.

The 12 noon presentation was “Beyond Y-DNA: Your Genetic Genealogy Options” by Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak. This was the first presentation I’ve heard from Megan. She described the basics of mitochondrial DNA, Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms (SNP), Ethnic DNA tests, BioGeographical/ Admixture (DNAPrint), the Genographic Project, SMGF tests and studies, and Multi-Purpose DNA Tests (deCODEme and 23andme). Megan is an excellent speaker and presenter. Here is a photo of Bob Velke introducing Megan - I sat at the front of the second section for this talk - you can see the first section of the Princess Theater in this photo (there were about 100 attending this talk):




I’ll put the Monday afternoon events in a separate post.

My Genealogy Plan for Monday, 27 October

If all has gone well, we are "at sea" heading from New York City to St. Kitts in the eastern Caribbean. The genealogy highlights of the day include the start of the Wholly Genes Conference, including:

8:15 am - "Introduction to TMG" by Bob Velkje in Club Fusion.
9:30 am - "Filtering with TMG" by Bob Velke in Club Fusion.
10:45 am - "How to write your family history" by John Titford in Palm Dining Room.
12:00 noon - "Beyond Y-DNA: Your Genetic Genealogy Options" by Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak in Princess Theater.
3:00 pm - "Genealogical Problem Solving: Professional Tips for Everyday Success" by Elizabeth Shown Mills in the Princess Theater.
4:15 pm - "Tracing Land Ownership" by Barbara Vines Little in the Princess Theater.
5:30 pm - "The Naming of the Green: Irish placenames and surnames" by John Grenham in the Princess Theater.

This is going to be such a great conference day! Fortunately, they give us from 1 pm to 3 pm to have lunch, kiss our spouses, and maybe take a walk or take a nap.

Sunday, October 26, 2008

Sunday on the TMG Cruise

We took a car to the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal at noon, arriving at the terminal by 12:30. We quickly checked the luggage and registered for the cruise, then waited in the entry hall. Since Linda had her walker, we were the first ones up the gangplank and had our pictures taken in our Geneaholic shirts. We went up to our room on the 14th deck, freshened up, and went up to the Lido deck and had lunch. Conference registration was between 2 and 4, and we met a number of conferees there. I talked to Bob Velke and he said there were about 200 for the conference (which includes non-genealogy spouses, I think). Here's the only picture I got of the Sunday TMG events - it's the registration table:


I went down to the room and watched some of the Chargers game, while Linda checked out the pool area. We met for the emergency briefing at 4:15, then came back to the room, and went to an early dinner. We have the Anytime plan, where we can go to several dining rooms and eat when we want to. We met some interesting people and had a good discussion at dinner.

We were late to the TMG Welcome Cocktail Party but we spent some time talking to Dick Eastman, who shared some of the TMG cruise history. We stayed late talking to some folks from Tucson. We went back to the room to watch the baseball game, and at 9:30 I went up to Café Caribe for David Lambert’s round table talk about military records. Craig Scott shared quite a bit also, and between the two of them answered many questions from the floor. I talked to Claire afterward about Philadelphia records that my colleague Joan is seeking – Claire had some good suggestions. Then it was bedtime on our rockin’ ship – we’re in the top aft portion, and the motion is disconcerting – some side-to-side and some up-and-down – no pitching or rolling, though.

"Images of America: Chula Vista" is CVGS Program on 29 October

The October Program Meeting of the Chula Vista Genealogical Society will be on Wednesday, October 29th at 12 noon in the Chula Vista Civic Center Branch Library (365 F Street) in the auditorium. The meeting is Free for all attendees, and guests are welcome. After a short business meeting hosted by Gary Brock, the program "Images of America: Chula Vista" will be presented by Peter Watry.

Peter Watry was born and raised in the Los Angeles area, and came to Chula Vista in 1961 as one of the original teachers at the new Southwestern College. He taught accounting and economics at Southwestern College from 1961 until 1996.

Peter has been active in the Heritage Museum, founded by Frank Roseman in 1993, for about ten years. He wrote the "Save Our Heritage" newsletter for the Heritage Museum for six years. He created and has presented the "History of Chula Vista" to third-graders in Chula Vista schools for the past four years.

Peter has been involved in each of the six "Historic Home Tours" of Chula Vista, and was primarily responsible for the twelve historic pedestals located along downtown Third Avenue, and for obtaining the Rohr drop hammer mounted next to the Heritage Museum. Most of these have been accomplished with Frank's help.

Peter Watry and Frank Roseman co-authored "Images of America - Chula Vista" a pictorial history of Chula Vista just published by Arcadia Publishing Company.

Please join us for this free meeting. Guests and visitors are welcome at all CVGS meetings. We request that you enter via the Conference Room door near the East entrance of the library in order to register, gather handouts, buy an opportunity drawing ticket and have a snack. We will start the meeting in the auditorium at 12:20 p.m.

Playing tourist in New York City

Sheri in a comment asked for more pictures...so enjoy Randy's visit to New York City:

From the Empire State Building observation deck - looking south down Broadway toward the Financial district:

At Ellis Island, a "word river" of ethnic Americanisms. It looked like a family tree to me!



Here is the view from Ellis Island back toward the tip of Manhattan.




The Ground Zero construction site. I was surprised that there was only one view spot to see this - you walk about 100 yards down a slope to a break in the fence:




At the Statue of Liberty, Jonathan Livingston Seagull showed up in more than one picture.



The skating rink at Rockefeller Plaza:



I have lots more, but we are leaving in an hour for the cruise terminal. I doubt that I will have any more posts until next Sunday, except for the daily schedule on the cruise ship.

My Genealogy Plan for Sunday, 26 October

Finally, the first day of our genealogy cruise from New York City to the eastern Caribbean. Here is the agenda for the day:

12 noon - check out of our hotel and take a cab to the Cruise Dock in Brooklyn.

1 pm - board the Caribbean Princess and register, check out our room.

2 pm - register for the Genealogy Conference, see if I can meet someone I know or many people I don't know.

5 pm - the ship leaves the dock - stand on the rail and take pictures of everything I can. Eat dinner sometime.

7 pm - welcome cocktail party for the conference attendees in Club Fusion.

9:30 pm - Group discussion with David Allen Lambert on "Military Records (colonial to 21st Century)" in Cafe Caribe.

I will have reports for every day of our genealogy cruise, but they may be posted after the cruise, due to limitations on Internet access while on the cruise.