Southern California Jamboree - last day

Up again for an early breakfast.....  met Kathleen. And at the same time saying good bye to Kim who is leaving for Alabama and more genealogical classes with who else but Elizabeth Shown Mills. WOW, can you imagine spending several days together. What a great treat that would be.

Here is the Virtual Surname Board.......... sorry for the poor quality of the photo... just too many lights. I have my 5 cards up, no matches yet. I think the names go up in their publication. Good Deal!!

I think I told you about the APP that Jamboree developed for this year. It is great and keeps you right on schedule and on time. It keeps you updated too….. alerts come through during the day letting participants know right away if there is a room change, adding a session on to the schedule, buy raffle tickets, and other great information. Thank you Southern California Genealogical Society for all the goodies from Jamboree. You have made the Jamboree a very high class event that is note worthy of a National Convention.

Breakfast was ok. The Breakfast event is being sponsored by New England Historic and Genealogical Society (NEHGS) with speaker Rhonda McClure " The Strange and Unexpected, Dealing with Research Surprises".........Rhonda spoke about finding the unexpected, having a surprise when you do research and find something…..  an ancestor in jail, insane, committing suicide, family lines that show the same type of death going 2 or 3 generations back. Unfortunately this unusual, the unexpected, the surprises do create more paper trails.

I did not know what to expect when I choose this session but it turned out to be very interesting. "GenDetective" So interesting in fact that I went into the exhibit hall later and purchased the software “GenDetective”. I know, I know, just what I need is another piece of software but I am willing to try it  and see if I can get a little more organized and be more organized with my research…….  this is what the software suggests. I will let you know.

Next session was with Melissa Shimkus "Before Crossing the Ocean: America Records of our Immigrant Ancestors" ...........nothing new for me but I need to do more focused or methodical work. Passenger lists- 1820-1891 passenger lists were finally mandated but no forms were developed so no uniformity. Pre 1820 lists are far and few between. After 1891 the bureau was developed and forms and documents were created. There are lots of other forms that may show immigration:  naturalization papers, passport, land records, voters registration, alien records, census records, wills/probate packets, military records, church records, & yes vital records. Look in local histories, check out family lore, read the newspapers. Check out ethnic records, fraternal organizations, PERSI from Heritage Quest online.  Last screen said “Exhaustive Record Search” “Search those records for ALL details” “Search with Family and Friends”

Signed up for a half hour consult. My consultant was Denise Spurlock, a member of Association of Professional Genealogists (APG) ……      I am still on the search for George A Dietz from Bavaria Germany immigrating around early to mid 1860’s. Wanted fresh eyes on my research and that is what I got. I found that there were several conflicting dates and information that I had not seen before. You know when you look at something you do, you usually see what you think it should your eyes skipping over any problems or errors. How right that is!!  Big Thank You to Denise. I sure appreciate the time you took with me. So when I get home I will go back to basics with this line and get a better handle on it and then go forward.

After lunch (hot dogs……lovvvvvvvve hot dogs just like Matlock!!)

AND speaking of 1812 soldiers look who I found. He is a member of the local chapter of the Sons of the American Revolution.

Forgot to let you know that I ran into Marian Kile from Family History Center/Sacramento. She is teaching the 10 week or so classes “Learn to Write your Family History Stories”. Anyone signed up for the classes?

A fun session after consult and lunch was Tom Underhill/Creative Continum  "Making a Quality Family History Video with Your Cell Phone" I was very curious about this and was looking forward to the session. It was a little disappointing.  I got a couple of ideas of what to do and not to do, but I am not a film maker so I don’t understand a lot of terms he was using…… he was basically doing another how to interview session rather than concentrating on a Family History Video with your cell phone.

Last session of the day and for the Jamboree too was Family Search Margo McKinstry with England and Wales, Civil Registration and Census Records..............Interesting session. A couple of my lines I think I am ready to make the leap across the pond. A lot of great resources given, including websites. We looked at examples of British census from 1841 through 1911. Their census are released only after 100 years, not 72 like ours. Margo was telling us about an organization has popped up that calls itself Unwanted Certificates. Ok let’ say you order a certificate and you get it and it is not your person, your first thought is to throw it away because there is not returning it and getting your money back. So now you can send it to this organization and they resell them for very little…….. someplace else to check to see if someone else ordered an ancestor of yours. Who knows what you will find!

OK classes are over, the exhibit hall is closed, and we are all waiting for the final raffle drawings. There is nearly $17,000 value in door prizes. For instance, one of the grand prizes was a 7 night stay at the Salt Lake Plaza Hotel – a second is a stay at the Salt Lake Plaza Hotel , along with a research trip conducted by Ancestor Seekers.  Another is a stay at the Crystal Inn in Salt Lake City, another is a weekend at Strawberry Creek Inn at Idyllwild CA. Three annual Ancestry.com World Explorer memberships, three gift certificates for 9 courses of your selection at the National Institute of Technology (University of Toronto) and the list goes on and on……….. AND if I had won you would know by now. However, one of my tickets was drawn and I picked a 2 book series of Branching Out from Jennifer Holik. These are workbooks written for Genealogy for High School Students. While in Cincinnati at NGS I met Jennifer (she is a blogger and an author). I got to see the unveiling of her newest book "Enjoying the Next Generation: A Guide for Genealogy Societies and Libraries" And I bought. It really looked good, some great ideas.  Maybe they will be helpful in our campaign to bring in younger members……. (hint hint Jack)

 

Introducing you to Paula Hinkel, the brave soul that takes on the responsibility(with lots of help from Leo and hundreds of volunteers) for the Southern California Jamboree. As usual she and her millions did a wonderful job. They all should be very proud. But I think she is very tired and ready to go home, put her feet up and relax   Big Big Thanks Paula

Mark your calendars for next year - June 7,8,9, 2013 

OK it is now officially over, it was been a wonderful 4 days for me,  I hope you got something out of my ramblings. 

 I am ready to come home.