Posts Tagged ‘Genealogy’

Erie Canal Locks Upstate New York.

Oct 14: Banquet with keynote speaker Barry J. Ewell, “Ah Ha! I’m a Genealogist and Lovin’ It.”  He is a writer and researcher with extensive genealogical experience in Internet and field research, digital and software resources and mentoring genealogists.  He lives in Utah and is the founder of MyGenShare.com.

Oct. 15:  “Good as Gold” day-long conference with six program topics.  Barry J. Ewell will present “Top 20 Lessons Genealogists Need to Know” offering five at each of his four workshops.  Other presentations are:  “Researching Rural Communities:  Local Government Records and Other Sources” by Suzanne Etherington, Region 6 Advisory Officer, NYS Archives Government Records Services; “Often Overlooked:  Genealogical Records in Colleges and Universities” by Edward L. Galvin, Director of Archives and Records Management of Syracuse University; “Onondaga County Public Library:  One of the Best Kept Genealogical Secrets” by Holly Sammons, Head Librarian of the Local History and Genealogy Department at the Onondaga County Public Library, Syracuse, NY; and “Gadgets for the Traveling Genealogist” by Roger B. Williams, CNYGS member and active in their website development and County Indexing Project.

A vendor room with special resources for genealogists is an added feature.

Come early or stay after the conference to conduct research at local repositories.  Central New York was the earliest major migration route for New Englanders.  Later immigrants traveled west via the Erie Canal.

Detailed information may be found at http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~nycnygs and questions can be addressed though email:  cnygs50th@yahoo.com.

Sounds like a fun filled day.  Put it in your calendar and don’t miss the festivities and great speakers.

“Save these dates – Oct 14-15, 2011.  Central New York Genealogical Society (CNYGS) 50th Year Celebration Banquet and Conference.  Detailed information may be found on their website http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~nycnygs and email questions to cnygs50th@yahoo.com.”

Related articles

• Wisdom Wednesday – FGS 2011 Conference Sessions (familyhistorytips.wordpress.com)
• Upstate New York Vital Records
• CNYGS “Tree Talks” County Packets

Well I took the plunge and started a DNA Family Group at Family Tree DNA, and I welcome all of you HILLENBRANDs out there to join us.

Last weekend I read on DNAkits.org that FTDNA is having a summer SALE and it is on until the end of the week, so I clicked on an order button on the DNA Testing Kits website and placed my order for a 67 marker Y-DNA test.

Then as no one had yet started a group with my surname I volunteered to become the administrator of the new group.

If you are a male HILLENBRAND anywhere you can also join the group for no additional cost other than the cost of your test kit, which is a bargain at the regular price and now a real good deal at the sale price.

If you are a female HILLENBRAND you will need to have a brother, father, uncle, cousin or nephew with the HILLENBRAND surname submit the DNA cheek swab sample at FTDNA.  I will report here on the Upstate New York Genealogy Blog from time to time as we have further developments.

This should be a lot of fun because in the past few years I have had contacts from other HILLENBRANDs all over the U.S. And though we have not found any direct connections, it seems most of them come generally from Southern Germany.  Perhaps now through DNA testing we will be able to discover if we have a genetic connection and approximately how far back we might have a common ancestor.

The process is very easy.  Just order your Y-DNA test kit and then do let me know when you join.  When it comes to Y-DNA  testing, a male can find out his father’s paternal line of the family. This is because only men have the Y-chromosome. The testing on this short chromosome is the Y STR test. This is helpful in discovering the past since this is passed down from father to son.

The STR is a segment of the DNA in the Y chromosome in the region that is considered Junk. The letters STR stand for short tandem repeats. The number of times a segment repeats itself is called the allele. This number is distinctive within a population which leads to surname lineage.

There are over 100 different markers in the Y-DNA chromosome, but the typical one tested is the 10-67 STR marker. This identifies the haplotype that the sample belongs to.

Here is the link again to order the DNA kit at the sale price:  DNA Testing Kits

Related articles

• Kits for DNA Testing (dnakits.org)
• Locate Ancestral Town
• Genealogy DNA Testing

Missing Airmen Report Footnote.com

As a serious genealogist there is no doubt that you have earned your position at the research table in many libraries and historical societies in many of your ancestral regions.

You most likely also have subscribed to various online services such as ancestry.com, genealogybank.com and various subscription genealogical societies.

I have written about footnote.com on this blog several times in the past but now I want to call your attention to the massive amount of new information that is available to you on footnote. You will also note that many of the groups of records that are online at footnote also allow you to interact with the original records by submitting your own notations and additional documents, photos and research notes.

Footnote pioneered this interactivity a few years ago by allowing people to interact with the 1930 census and the Vietnam Wall records. Footnote does charge a reasonable annual fee to obtain full access to all of the data on their site, but they also provide many collections that are totally free to use by anyone.

Earlier this week I went to a local church supper and the program was a slide show and talk presented by my sister-in-law Janet Hillenbrand who presented an extremely interesting talk about her father Charlie Bennett who was a B17 pilot during World War II.

Charlie was on his 13th bombing mission on April 13th 1944 and though they had an engine shot out by flak over the ball bearing factory target, they were on their return and only a couple of miles from allied controlled Luxembourg when another flak burst along with a cannon shot through the cockpit from an ME109 forced the crew to bail out and the plane crashed.

One man was badly wounded and sent to hospital and all of the others were captured and spent the rest of the war in POW camps. The crew was split up and as Charlie was an officer he was sent to the north east part of Germany and actually was treated with more respect that he had expected.

Charlie always gave thanks to the Red Cross for the food packages that they received and claimed that in some cases the prisoners fared better than the boiled cabbage food rations that their captors were given.

It was an excellent program and the family has all of Charlies old uniforms and medals, letters, diaries and photos in an archive that is just great. Charley received the Distinguished Flying Cross and returned after the war to take over his family owned hardware business. Salt of the earth American history story for sure.

When I got home after the program I went to footnote.com and noticed that they have a large collection of World War II Air Force photos online in their free section that you all have access to and I found many images that were of interest regarding B17s.

Then I logged in to my account and searched on Charly’s name and found three documents that were original government documents called Missing Airmen Reports that gave all of the details about Charley and his crew mates.

This is just one small case of the sorts of things you will find on footnote. You can go to www.NARAgenealogy.com to learn more about the other categories of original records available online at footnote. You really need to exploit all types of original documents to flesh out your own genealogy and to help you find new clues that are in the National Archives Genealogy records

Related articles

• DNA And Genealogy Research Are Made For Each Other (dnanews.org)
• FindaGrave.com (myfamilyjules.com)

The Bombay Historical Society announces the formation of the Bombay Genealogical Society.  Due to the recent surge in genealogy research, Becky Latulipe, president of the historical society, gave the explanation that the genealogical society would be able to serve the public, under the umbrella of the historical society.

The Bombay Genealogical Society will have their own elected officers.  Latulipe said, “We want people to be aware of the pioneer families and community members that have lived here, but it will take some time and research.”

The point she made about genealogy being about 90% of what the historical society is all about seems to be a common theme in most historical societies.

This is from a press release in the Plattsburgh Press Republican newspaper.
New Genealogy Organization Formed

There are contact phone numbers in the article if you are interested in joining.

Heritage Books in Westminster, Maryland is a major publisher of books relating to Genealogy and Local History. Many of the books that they produce are in limited quantities and when offered you should purchase a copy when you find something of interest, as production may be out of stock after a while.

Here are some of the current titles that relate to New York:

1850 Census for the Town of Howard, Steuben County, New York, and Genealogical Data on the Families. —
A Bibliography of New York State Communities, Third Edition —
A Collection of Abstracts from Otsego County, New York, Newspaper Obituaries, 1808-1875. —
A Dangerous Woman: New York’s First Lady Liberty: The Life and Times of Lady Deborah Moody. —
A Directory of Cayuga County Residents Who Supported Publication of the History of Cayuga County. —
A Documentary History of Yonkers, New York, Volume Two, Part One: The Unsettled Years, 1853-1860. —
A Genealogical Dictionary of Wright Families in the Lower Hudson Valley to 1800. —
A Genealogy Of The Family Of Richard Howell Of Mattituck, Southold Town Long Island, New York. —
A Hidden Phase of American History: Ireland’s Part in America’s Struggle for Liberty. —
A History of Deerpark in Orange County, New York. —

Take a look at their website and catalog. (There are lots of genealogies!)

Don’t forget to let our readers know when you find something really good at Heritage Books by adding your comment to the bottom of this Blog. We want to know what you think.

(unyg)

Regular readers will note the new addition to this Blog.

You may now subscribe to the unyg Blog by just inserting your email address in the box at the left.

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(unyg)