Society Saturday - "Preserve the Pensions War of 1812" Project

I suppose you heard Root Cellar SGS (RC) is participating with the Federation of Genealogical Societies (FGS),  Ancestry.com,  fold3, FamilySearch and many other societies and individuals around the country and the world to financially help support the
"Preserve the Pensions War of 1812 "Project

We announced our participation in this project through our blog, and then spoke directly to you about it at our April Meeting. You have embraced it and made your donations. Thank You So Much.


 ........  want to know how we are doing already? 

As you can see  from the graphic below we have ALREADY reached our goal.......
 

$300 in donations from our membership

this will be matched dollar for dollar from Root Cellar SGS organization....

 giving us $600 total donation, but WAIT

with additional matching funds from Ancestry.com

Root Cellar members now will be donating $1200

  

WOW!! I am so impressed and you should be just as impressed with your generosity and support. 

Maybe we should continue to collect and see how much more we can collect. What do you say? We were going to collect through the June Meeting and that is still almost two months. Let's do it!!!

Root Cellar Sacramento Genealogical Society would like to challenge all the societies in Northern California to get involved with the "Preserve the Pensions War of 1812" digitizing project. Let the country know that Northern California cares and wants to support and be a part of this huge effort.

special thank you for the wonderful graphic created by Rick Hanson
...............and posted by Sandra Gardner Benward on behalf of our membership - Thank You!

Military Monday- Digitizing of the Pension Records of 1812? What???

Root Cellar Sacramento Genealogical Society has decided to participate in

            "Preserve the Pensions-  War of 1812" Project.

The Federation of Genealogical Societies (FGS) is spearheading this project.   There is a $3.7 million nationwide fundraising initiative going on to digitize the long-neglected War of 1812 pension records.

These orginal documents are extremely fragile and they need to be digitized quickly to preserve the best possible image of each page. This is the first time in history that the entire genealogical community is coming together to see a project of this magnitude to completion... from the National Archives to fold3 to individual states and local genealogical societies (Root Cellar SGS).

This IS where Root Cellar SGS fits in............ We are going to have our own "money raiser" in support of this project.  Root Cellar SGS will match donations up to $300. We will be collecting from now through the June Meeting. So in the end we hope to be donating $600 (your money plus RC matched funds) to the project. In June our donation of $600 will be sent to FGS.

But wait it gets so much better....... FGS reports the donation to Ancestry.com and Ancestry.com will match our donation.  So now we have acutally donated $1200. Isn't that amazing.

If you would like to help and donate any amount please send your checks to:

Root Cellar SGS
P O Box 265
Citrus Heights, CA 95611

(make checks payable to Root Cellar & indicate on the check it is for War of 1812)

......we will also be collecting at each general meeting through the June Meeting.

Thank you so much for your support .......  we will keep you informed.

Interesting Facts: (taken from FGS flyer and website)
* Ancestry.com has generously stepped up and agreed to cover costs to digitize HALF of the War of 1812 pension records. So every dollar donated will actually go twice as far.
  example: at a cost of $.45 per digitized page, your tax-deductible gift of $45 would normally digitize 100 pages. But with the help of Ancestry.com it will digitize 200 pages.

* All of the War of 1812 Pension Records digitized with your donation will be made available to the public on  fold3

* The Federation of Genealogical Societies is pleased to partner with Ancestry.com, fold3, and FamilySearch, as well as numerous individual state and local genealogical societies (that's us -Root Cellar SGS) and leaders in the genealogical community.

* There are 180,000 pension records from the War of 1812 housed at the National Archives, a total of 7,200,000 pages.  From 2012-2015 we commomorate the 200th anniversaries of the War of 1812 battles - batttle of a war some hail as our second Revolutionary War.

posted with excitment and anticipation by Sandra Gardner Benward

Footnote is now Fold3

The following announcement was released today:

August 18, 2011 by Peter
Today we announced our intention to create the finest and most comprehensive collection of U.S. Military records available on the internet and changed the name of the site from Footnote to Fold3.

Footnote Gets Focused
This announcement isn’t a complete change from what we’ve been doing.  Some of our best and most popular work has been on military titles like the Revolutionary War Pension files, the Civil War Service Records and “Widows’ Pensions,” WWII Missing Air Crew Reports and the Interactive Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall.

This new focus will direct our content plans and allow us to organize the site around military records.  In the future we’ll make other changes that will help us build the best online source for records related to the U.S. military, the men and women who have served and the families who support them.

You will still be able to access the great non-military records previously found on Footnote, but we’ll be adding millions of U.S. military records, like these that we’ve already begun work on:

■Word War II “Old Man’s Draft” Cards
■War of 1812 Pension Files
■Mexican War Service Records
■World War I Officer Experience Reports
■Confederate Casualty Reports

Footnote Becomes Fold3
One change that won’t impact how things work, but is significant and will probably get a lot of attention, is the site’s new name.  Footnote has been a great name, but it doesn’t relate to military records and can carry a connotation of insignificance which doesn’t seem appropriate for a site focused on records related to the great sacrifices associated with military service.

We wanted a name that would show respect for the records we are working on and for the people who have served in the armed forces.  The name Fold3 comes from a traditional flag-folding ceremony in which the third fold is made in honor and remembrance of veterans for their sacrifice in defending their country and promoting peace in the world.

We are excited for this new focus and name because it will help us continue to improve the site and bring you records that will help in your research.

The new web address is http://www.fold3.com/.

Posted by Denise Hibsch Richmond