Tag Archive for Southern California Genealogical Society

Whirlwind . . . Week

June 21, 2010 Craig Family History, Genealogy

This post was originally commenced last Tuesday evening and was entitled Whilrwind Wednesday, and intended for publication on Wednesday, June 16.  But it turned out to be a much more hectic week than I ever could have imagined and I couldn’t get back to this until just now!

And by now, everybody with a computer has written about the SoCal Genealogy Society’s 41st Annual Jamboree which I attended in Burbank.  It was, as we used to say at Albuquerque’s Van Buren Junior High School, a blast!   The following folks made it a special treat for me: (in random order)

Ruth Himan, Thomas MacEntee, Miriam Midkiff, Kathryn Doyle, Lisa Louise Cooke, the footnoteMaven, Becky Wiseman, Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak, Elyse Doerflinger, Denise Levenick, Schelly Talalay Dardashti, Maureen Taylor, Steve Danko, Randy Seaver, Amy Coffin, Gini Webb, Cheryl Palmer, Susan Kitchens, Ron Arons, George Morgan, Drew Smith, Janet Hovorka, Susi Pentico, A.C. Ivory, [and deepest apologies to anyone I saw there and left out here!].

Here’s some of what went on  there:

  • Becky Wiseman performed a great Act of Genealogical Kindness by taking me to  Rose Hill Cemetery in Whittier, California, to visit my grandmother’s grave. [See Nana's 100th Anniversary for the back story].  We spent considerable time out there (with Becky doing most of the legwork up and down the hills!)  but were unable to locate the grave precisely.  We began to suspect that there was no headstone, which was later confirmed by the person at the information booth at the gate.  Now this is a true mystery to me.  Family members recall that a headstone was ordered and some even claim to have seen it on a subsequent visit. So I don;t know what happened, But be assured you’ll be informed whne we get the full story!
  • Maureen Taylor gave a very informative presentation on what she calls “the Revolutionary War Generation.”  She previewed her new book, The Last Muster: Images of the Revolutionary War Generation (with David Allen Lambert; Kent State University Press, 2010) [available for pre-order now on Amazon.com; release date July 1, 2010].  Did you realize that there were people participated in the Revolutionary War who lived long enough to have their photographs taken?  Well, there were, and of course Maureen has tracked down many of their pictures!  Maureen and one of her children hung out in the GeneaBloggers Lounge for awhile on the last day of Jamboree and she was kind enough to spend a few minutes looking at on of my ancient photos.
  • Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak gave the Saturday banquet address about tracing Michelle Obama’s ancestry.   Completely fascinating and it gave me a few ideas about both process and sources.
  • Lisa Louise Cooke was on the Bloggers Summit panel with me, Thomas MacEntee,  Schelly Talalay Dardashti, and Kathryn Doyle. She did a live version of her podcast alter on featuring Muareen Taylor, Suzanne Russo Adams of Ancestry.com who worked on Who Do You Think You Are? and Friday night keynoter actor and historian Chris Haley (yes, nephew of . . . ). Chris is quite the character and he rose to the occasions both at Friday dinner and on Lisa’s show!  Later, Lisa interviewed me for a podcast sometime this summer.
  • Denise Levenick and Amy Coffin, in addition to being their wonderfully personable selves, took a major role in welcoming bloggers and putting together the welcome “kit.”
  • Ron Arons was selling his new book, Wanted! U.S. Criminal Records.  Coincidentally, I had used the book just days before Jamboree and as a result had found and ordered two sets of records.

And there were many other highlights!  Spending time with people I don’t see in  person very often and meeting others . . . a great weekend!


!

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Introductions At the Jamboree

June 29, 2009 Craig Uncategorized

BURBANK, Calif.–It’s Friday, June 26, 2009, and I’ve arrived at the Burbank Airport  Marriott, site of the 4oth Southern California Genealogical Society Jamboree.

I came down to the lobby and who should be here but:

As we were getting to know each other, Randy Seaver arrived and joined us.    It was a great way to get acquainted in person with folks I know from the cyberworld.   Later on, I ran into Schelly Talalay Dardashti.  By the end pf the evening, I’d run into many of the best genealogical bloggers online today!

I had an interview with The Genealogy Guys, George G. Morgan and Drew Smith, for one of their first videocasts.

There wasn’t much between my arrival and the arrival of someone I was really looking forward to meeting;  my cousin, Steve Bowie.  We have corresponded by email for several years, but had never met in person.  Steve is the intellectual motivator behind the site James Bowie, Free Man of Color.  The site gives the known history and know genealogy of this free man in Louisiana in the first third of the nineteenth century.   The connection to Jim Bowie of Alamo fame, if any, is not known.

Steve and I are both descendants of Rufus Bowie, fourth son and fifth child of James Bowie and his wife, Chaney.  Together with a number of other Bowie cousins, among the vast reaches of total descendants, we’ve been continuing to study the genealogy of this African-American family (which has a number of white people affiliated as well).

I had not planned my time very well , and so we had only a little time to visit.  But I completely enjoyed it!

Later that evening, I attended the address by Tukufu Zuberi, Ph.D, who. among his many talents, hosts The History Detectives on PBS.   He had several clips of episodes, including a teaser for the next season.  He described how they succeeded and sometimes failed at discovering their objectives.

He had a take on history that most genealogists would agree with, though apparently many historians do not.  Zuberi believes that history is best understood by it effects on ordinary people.  This is consistent with what I have said in this space many times: “All history is personal.”

Dr. Zuberi was a very thoughtful yet entertaining speaker.   Unfortunately, due in part to technical problems in the Jamboree’s audiovisual equipment,  his presentation was delayed and went on past my usual bedtime.  I stayed until the end, but was too  tired to blog about it that evening.

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Jamboree 2009!

February 25, 2009 Craig Uncategorized

The 2009 Jamboree put on by the Southern California Genealogical Society will kick off on June 26, just about four months away!  It’s one of the biggest “kinklaves” in the nation and certainly the biggest on the West Coast.  You may recall that last year’s Jamboree featured the first-ever Bloggers Summit.   This year, I have the honor of being one  of the panelists at Blogger Summit II! I’m really looking forward to it!

For more information about the 2009 Jamboree, check out the SCGS Jamboree blog.

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Jamboree: Was It Worth It?

June 30, 2008 Craig Uncategorized

This is a fair question. I look at it from a cost/benefits point of view. The cost of the program itself for me was about $215, to which I have to add hotel costs for two nights (I was actually there for three nights, but I assign one night’s cost to another mission), food, and airfare. So for me, living out of the area, the cost was fairly significant. On the benefits side, I must say that in terms of raw knowledge, I probably didn’t learn anything I didn’t already know to some degree or another. But what I did get were important insights into many issues. And as well, I met people, good people, smart people, people who were both good and smart! I think the opportunity to meet in one place all the folks I did meet is a significant benefit. In my calculus, I think the benefits outweighed the costs. It was worth it!

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Dick Eastman is Highlight Speaker at Jamboree

June 30, 2008 Craig Uncategorized

Dick Eastman was the featured speaker at the SCGS Jamboree’s Saturday Evening Social and Dinner in Burbank last week. Dick described the difference between a “name-gatherer” and a family historian and urged the crowd to be the latter, not the former.

In a speech entitled, “Putting the Genes in Genealogy,” Eastman pointed out the great strides made in genetics and its applications to genealogy–a theme underscored by the number and popularity of the DNA sessions at the conference. But Eastman said that in the not-so-far-off future, the use of DNA for medical predictions and preventive health management will transform genealogists into people who can help save the lives of family members. He sees this as a positive development for the health care system as well as for genealogy.

If you haven’t heard Dick Eastman speak, try to catch him if he’s anywhere near your area. He travels quite a bit. He’s a man of many interests and is a speaker of great talent. It occurred to me during his speech that he is not just an historian, but a futurist as well. I mentioned that to him when I saw him in the hotel lobby on Sunday morning. In his sometimes self-deprecating style, Eastman said, “I sometimes think that’s just a fancy word for someone who dreams a lot.” He thought for a minute, then said, “Maybe there’s no difference.”

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Saturday at the Jamboree

June 30, 2008 Craig Uncategorized

After the Bloggers Summit, everybody headed for lunch. And here is one of the nits I have to pick about the conference. The lunch lines were unreasonably long and there were far too few tables at which to sit. That led a number of people to head “off-campus” for lunch. Those without transportation (moi) went to the hotel restaurant which apparently was also crowded or to their rooms for room service (of course, that was as overwhelmed as the restaurant). I had some meds I had to take with food. So I waited to eat. As a result, I missed the 1:30 session I wanted to attend.

I did go to Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak’s presentation on “Tracing Your Roots With DNA” which was a useful adjunct to the other DNA presentations. It helped me understand more about the various DNA testing companies, what they do, and how to choose one. By the way, it was a standing-room-only crowd!

Then I went to a session called “Genealogy Across the Color Line.” I wasn’t sure what this was going to be. Unfortunately, there was a substitute presenter, who did an admirable job at filling in, but left me with the feeling that there was more left out. Basically, it came down to a sociological discussion of black people who consciously pass for white and why they do it. I’ve written a bit about this phenomenon before.

The most intriguing of what I couldn’t get to on Saturday:

  • Collen Fitzpatrick, “Forensic Genealogy Connections”
  • John T. Humphrey, “Developing the Skills to Become a Genealogist”
  • Bill Dollarhide, “The Best Genealogy Portals on the Internet”
  • Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak, “Beyond Y-DNA: Your Genetic Genealogy Options” (this followed the session that I did get to, but I’m really sorry I missed this one!).

I have a CD copy of the syllabus, as all advance registrants got. There’s been a movement to encourage conferences to save trees and luggage space by making these available in electronic formats. But in many sessions, the presenters referred to page numbers or other matter in the paper versions that those of us with the CDs could not easily look at. Having said that, however, I appreciate having the CD instead of the paper. As I understand it, the CD may be for sale by the Southern California Genealogical Society. Check their website (which has had some maintenance problems in the last week or so).

More Jamboree news to come including:

  • Dick Eastman Charts the Future as Saturday Dinner Speaker
  • Was It Worth it?
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SCGS Jamboree: Why Live Blogging Didn’t Work for Me

June 30, 2008 Craig Uncategorized

And the Implications of That!

I had said that I would “liveblog” the Jamboree. As it sadly happened, I could not, but others did. Why? Well, there are a couple of reasons, each with certain implications and lessons.

FIRST: I had assumed without checking that the Marriott’s Convention Center would have wireless Internet access for all participants. Apparently, there was a network available, but the key was accessible only to the speakers. So I paid $9.95 a day for wired access in my room. That, of course, made liveblogging impossible. I should have checked the situation beforehand. I hope that at other and future conferences, wireless access can be made available to all (even if we have to pay a reasonable fee for it). Additionally, as Randy Seaver has noted, the conference rooms were small and crowded with little space for computer use by participants other than the presenters. This fact made lugging my laptop around a major inconvenience. Now, looking at the majority of participants, I would guess (yes, I realize that I’m stereotyping here by age), many may not have been that interested in almost cutting edge tech issues and may not have had the hardware or the desire to carry it around for the conference. But there are many, regardless of age, who do have such interests and we need to accommodate them. That’s where the world is heading.

SECOND: I did not have the state of the art hardware. I’m a tech dinosaur, I suppose, stuck back in the ancient days of 2006 or even 2005. I marveled at the fact that Elizabeth O’Neal not only liveblogged, she “moblogged.” How did she post a picture of the Bloggers Summit on her blog while the summit was still going on? She used her cell phone! The cell phone took the picture; the cell phone printed the text; and the cell phone transmitted all of that to Blogger! This is facilitated by Blogger Mobile. Any cell phone with the capability to send email via MMS can work with Blogger Mobile. (And I suppose only a 2005-vintage dinosaur would describe Elizabeth’s mobile device as simply a “cell phone”!). My cell phone is text-enabled and can send email via MMS, but I’ve never bother to do this. I can connect to the Internet with it, but I’ve never bother to do that, either. It can’t take photos, however.

It’s a fact of life that time and technology yield for no one. I need to catch up or be left behind. Reading Family Matters is a good way to to catch up for those who want to come along!

AN OBSERVATION: During the Bloggers Summit Q&A, I sensed that a number of people who may want to be more “tech-savvy” are a bit wary, even afraid, of the technology. This afternoon as I prepared to leave the hotel I talked with a woman who said she still didn’t get the “how-to” part of starting a blog. Perhaps local societies should have a tech “How-to/Hands on Day” to demystify some of this for folks not used to it. We’re at a point in history where technology is more accessible to more people than ever before. It would be too bad to let some smart people succumb to tech-phobia.

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Jamboree Quickee

June 29, 2008 Craig Uncategorized

BURBANK, Calif.–I’m about to head off to the Saturday Social and Dinner, so no more updates today. I did attend an interesting session on DNA (again!) by Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak, and a session called “Crossing the Color Line.” I’ll have thoughts on both of those tomorrow. Tomorrow is my travel day and though it’s just an hour’s flight to Sacramento, you know how flying is these days. The posts may not be up until the evening.

I’ll have some thoughts about the entire experience here as well as some thoughts that occurred to me during the Bloggers Summit. Additionally, I’ll have some posts about technology here. Finally, I’ll tell you about a visit with a very special person and my sighting of a television celebrity!

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Jamboree Fashions

June 28, 2008 Craig Uncategorized

Here’s a view of the T-shirt I’m wearing at the SCGS Jamboree!

From VistaPrint.com

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Pix from Burbank

June 28, 2008 Craig Uncategorized

Above: George G. Morgan, flanked by Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak, and Stephen Danko, responds to a question during the first-ever Genea-Bloggers Summit on June 28, 2008, during the 39th Annual Southern California Genealogical Jamboree.

The all-star panel finds themselves looking at themselves looking at themselves thanks to Elizabeth O’Neal’s Little Bytes of Life.

Genea-bloggers gather: front row from left–Kathryn Doyle; Dick Eastman; George G. Morgan; Stephen Danko. back row from left–Leland Meitzler; Schelly Talalay Dardashti, Randy Seaver, Craig Manson, Elizabeth O’Neal.

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