Sunday, October 24, 2010

Best of the Genea-Blogs - 17-23 October 2010

Hundreds of 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:

AFHS Family Roots Event a Success by Joan Miller on the Alberta Family History Society Blog.  Joan sums up the one-day event featuring Dick Eastman, Thomas MacEntee and Lyn Meehan. 

Canvassing a Town for Historical Resources by Marian Pierre-Louis on the Roots and Rambles blog.  I really like what Marian wrote here - it applies to fairly small towns, but is a great summary of how to do it.  This would be useful information for any of the genealogy wikis currently being developed.

Insider Ketchup for 19 October 2010 by the writer of The Ancestry Insider blog.  Mr. AI sums up recent events concerning FamilySearch and Ancestry.com, and other sites, in his own unique and pithy style.

What I Did Over Summer Vacation: Part 1 - Independence Day and the DAR by Elizabeth O'Neal on the Little Bytes of Life blog.  Elizabeth had a good genealogical summer and she's telling us all about it.  Stay tuned for more!

In Which I Piss Off Pretty Much The Entire Genealogy Establishment by Kerry Scott on the Clue Wagon blog.  Kerry invented a new Genealogy Drinking Game, then played it all by herself.  Funny stuff...title's probably right, too.  The comments are great.  This goes right into my Genealogy Blog Hall of Fame in the Humor category.

Once upon a time or why Uncle Vasil firebombed the church by the writer of the Nolichucky Roots blog.  This family story told over several generations was probably true. 

Preserving Your Family History Digitally by Dick Eastman on Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter.  This post provides a link to Gary Wright's White Paper on this subject - available for free to read and download.  It's important for all of us.

Home Sweet Homestead by Carolyn L. Barkley on the GenealogyAndFamilyHistory.com blog.  This is an excellent article, with examples, of searching for pre-1908 homestead claims in Federal Land States.

Blogging for Beginners webinar - recording now available to view by Geoff Rasmussen on the Legacy News blog.  DearMYRTLE taught this 90 minute webinar last week - you can view and hear it through www.LegacyFamilyTree.com/webinars.asp.

3 Strategies to Work Around Missing Deeds and 3 Tips for Determining if Your House Was Moved by Marian Pierre-Louis on The New England House Historian blog.  Two more excellent articles about historic houses from Marian.

Review: Flip-Pal Mobile Scanner - Miracles in Minutes - Part 1 and Review: Flip-Pal Mobile Scanner - Part 2 by Susan Petersen on the LongLostRelatives.net  blog.  Susan provides her user-experience on this new handheld scanning tool.  Well done!

*  Latest News from the Family Search Bloggers Day by Thomas MacEntee on the Geneabloggers blog.  This post rolls up all of the reports from the FamilySearch Bloggers Day on Thursday, 21 October.  There may be more posts from the attendees, so check this out occasionally.

 Other "Best of..." genealogy blog posts this week include:

* Follow Friday: 22 October 2010 by Greta Koehl on the Greta's Genealogy Bog blog.  Oh no, Greta's weekly list is going to be more sporadic.  I counted on her to find new genea-blogs for me!

Best Bytes for the Week of October 22, 2010 by Elizabeth O'Neal on the Little Bytes of Life blog.

I know that there were several other bloggers that wrote about their favorite posts in the past week, but I didn't write them all down while I was in Salt Lake City.  If you did one, and wanted it listed here, please email me at rjseaver@cox.net or post a comment to this post and I'll add you to the list above.

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

Did I miss a great genealogy blog post? Tell me! I am currently reading posts from over 690 genealogy bloggers using Google Reader, but I still miss quite a few it seems.

Read past Best of the Genea-Blogs posts here.

5 comments:

Susan Petersen said...

Thanks for the shout out, Randy! I really appreciate it!

Elizabeth O'Neal said...

Thanks so much for including my posts, Randy. Hope you had a wonderful time in SLC!

Susan Clark said...

Thank you for the mention. I'm grateful for the efforts you put into these posts. I always find something new. It's a treat to be included.

Kerry Scott said...

Thank you for the mention!

Greta Koehl said...

Aw, Randy, thanks for your kind comment. I have made some tremendous discoveries from your best of lists (including a couple that led me to some important records for my research). But don't worry, looks like some of the mentions will simply migrate to my weekly newsletter.