Housed in an old prison, the Archivo General de la Nación (or AGN, General Archive of the Nation), is home for the historical memory of Mexico. Its origins date back to the late eighteenth century when a royal decree ordered the creation of an archive to preserve documentation from the Viceroyalty. Today, the documents at AGN are a genealogical treasure waiting to be discovered by a wider audience of researchers. In this presentation you will learn about how to navigate the archive, and some of the information you could find there.

Genealogists write. Their written narratives include stories of ancestral families, biographies of individual ancestors, and explanations supporting genealogical proofs. For their writing to succeed, genealogists—like all effective writers—repeatedly self-edit everything they write. The process results in polished products that the genealogist’s readers will understand, enjoy, and cherish. Emphasizing genealogical narrative, these two webinars will addresses the self-editing process. Part 1 will focus on “big-picture” editing, including stages of self-editing; focus; keeping the writer out of the narrative; editing the writing’s overall structure, organization, and flow; and improving major and minor subdivisions of written genealogical narratives, including paragraphing. Part 2 will focus on “nitty-gritty” editing, including capitalization, punctuation, sentence structure, spelling, word choice, and reducing word count.

Come see a variety of tools available in genealogy research software Goldie May. Organize your research into projects, keep an automatic research log (seriously!), write citations easily, analyze your research, quickly navigate to relevant record collections, and untangle knots in your family tree. Keep the family tree software you already have and see how Goldie May can help you with organization, visualization, and quick navigation.

What do we do with ancestors whose names don’t “match” from one record to the next? Or those who pose the opposite problem: too many men or women of the same name? This session examines a litany of social customs and naming patterns that cause ancestors to be known by different names—then offers techniques and strategies by which we can establish that any two records do or do not apply to the same person. A variety of case studies demonstrate the problems and the methods we can use to overcome them.

Cette session, présentée par Elisabeth Zetland, membre de l’équipe de Recherche, vous montrera comment MyHeritage peut vous aider à trouver vos ancêtres et des parents à l’étranger grâce aux fonctionnalités et outils de l’arbre et de la recherche. Une sélection de collections internationales disponibles sera également fournie.

You’ve recorded that video or audio interview, now what? This presentations builds on the best practices covered in Colleen’s part one webinar. We will explore ideas and tools for trimming out mistakes or sensitive content, and for adding a title screen and ending credits screen before sharing with others. We will also look at ways to enhance your recordings by weaving in relevant supporting visual imagery like photos, maps, and historical documents. Finally we will review options for generating full text transcriptions of your interviews.

Explore your New Zealand family history a little further and add to your family story.

Family historians researching in Poland and Ukraine have to deal with gaps in records that could make progress next to impossible. Thanks to genetic genealogy, we can bridge those gaps. Geographic clues from your matches might get you looking in the right direction. This session includes some DNA success stories, based on geography and backed by documented research. It also offers pointers on how to get more value from your tests.

You may have heard family stories about a relative who was “different” or perhaps you’ve discovered someone who simply “disappeared.” Have you considered the possibility that you could have a gay or lesbian relative in your family tree? LGBT (lesbian, gay, bi-sexual and transgendered) people can be found when researching genealogy, but the search syntax, keywords and strategies are very different. By understanding the basics of “gay history” as well as how LGBT folk lived, worked and socialized, you’ll not only locate these relatives, but realize the importance of preserving their stories.