I saw a post on Dick Eastman’s blog that noted there was a very nice YouTube video created by Ancestry.com that lets viewers see what is new at Ancestry.com during the May 2013 time period.
The video is a 27 minute production hosted by Crista Cowan of Ancestry.com who provides the viewers with updates on what new things users of Ancestry.com should be aware of.
You can view this video directly here:
I viewed the first 8 minutes of the video. Crista does an excellent job of sharing what is new at Ancestry.com that can make your use of the product even more effective and beneficial with your family history research. She shows you via her computer screen what to look for at the Ancestry.com site.
I also did a search on YouTube looking for similarly titled videos and did discover that there are many “What’s New At Ancestry.com” videos on YouTube going back at least until April of 2012. These series of videos are a great tool to use to review going back in time so you keep current with all that is being offered and added to Ancestry.com.
Here is a simple link to my search in YouTube that will give you this nice list of these videos posted to YouTube that you can do some catching up on to know about all of the new things at Ancestry.com:
The host does a very good job verbally describing the new additions as well as showing you the new things at Ancestry via screencasting. That allows you to see her computer screen as she points out the various “new” things you may see at Ancestry.com and where they are located.
Because so many of us use Ancestry.com, either via a personal subscription or by using the Ancestry product at our local libraries, these YouTube videos are quite informative to keep users up to date with new features that take root on Ancestry.com. The host provides even more depth to the importance of the change and even why it was done.
I think you will enjoy the most recent video above as well as looking at the link above for even more of these videos.
Tony Kierna
Genealogy Coordinator
Schaumburg Township District Library
FamilySearch has now released a video and a written description of changes announced recently at RootsTech. You can watch the video below and also you might want to read the text that follows.
The following announcement was written by FamilySearch:
New Online Tools Help Preserve and Share Precious Family Photos and Memories
April 16, 2013
Features create connections and bring family stories to life
SALT LAKE CITY — FamilySearch International, a nonprofit, volunteer-driven genealogy organization, announced the release of significant new enhancements to its web services that allow visitors to collaboratively build their family tree online, preserve and share precious family photos and stories, and receive personal research assistance—all for free. Find out more at FamilySearch.org.
“Every person who has ever lived has a right to be remembered and is a story waiting to be told,” said Dennis C. Brimhall, CEO for FamilySearch. “Every family is a story in progress.” Brimhall explained that the new FamilySearch.org features help move family history beyond research to appeal to a larger audience of people who are very interested in their family’s stories, but who don’t consider themselves genealogists or researchers. “We all treasure memorable family photos and ancestral stories that inspire, amuse, or connect us. Families can now share and preserve for posterity those social heirlooms that help vitalize their family history,” Brimhall added.
The enhancements include Family Tree, an online application where users begin by adding information about themselves and then start to add information about their ancestors to collaboratively build, manage, and share their family history. The tree is already populated with over 900 million records contributed by patrons. And there are billions of historic records that can be searched for free to help further expand your family tree.
The Photos and Stories feature lets you preserve favorite family photos of ancestors and share them through social media. You can tag people in a photo to identify who they are and connect them to respective ancestor profiles in the Family Tree. The photos can then be easily shared with the online community. You can also upload your favorite stories about an ancestor to preserve them for future generations.
Julie Lowe from Missouri is the proverbial photo archivist of her family. She has albums of ancestral photos. Between her and her siblings, they are also walking libraries of countless stories and memories of their parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, some great-grandparents, and other ancestors. They will be using the Photos and Stories feature to begin preserving their favorite photos and stories for future generations. Each person can save and share up to 5,000 ancestral photos in Family Tree.
“When a parent or grandparent takes the time to tell you a story, there’s a bonding that occurs there,” Brimhall said. “Likewise, a family photo and story preserved and shared in the context of one’s family tree, in an instant, can personally touch us and teach us time-honored principles by those who have gone on before us, like the value of hard work, dealing with life’s ups and downs, and the impact of choices.”
Other features added include the interactive Fan Chart, a tool used by millions to create a colorful fan chart of their ancestry; the Family Tree Wizard, a tool that asks questions to help you begin to build your personal family tree and get you started; and Live Help, a global online community that provides free product help and personal research assistance by phone and web chat 24 hours a day/7 days a week. The help website and services are available in 10 languages.
About FamilySearch International
FamilySearch is the largest genealogy organization in the world. FamilySearch is a nonprofit, volunteer-driven organization sponsored by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Millions of people use FamilySearch records, resources, and services to learn more about their family history. To help in this great pursuit, FamilySearch and its predecessors have been actively gathering, preserving, and sharing genealogical records worldwide for over 100 years. Patrons may access FamilySearch services and resources for free at FamilySearch.org or through more than 4,600 family history centers in 132 countries, including the main Family History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah.
You know I am a big believer in online tutorials and training videos.
FamilySearch just recently activated its new Family Tree capability that allows registered users with FamilySearch to upload their family trees and much more.
I just recently made a blog post that provided a link to a very nice detailed 160 + page PDF document that can be used as a guide for how to use the new Family Tree function at FamilySearch. You can find this PDF at:
Today, I am glad to be able to provide you with a link to a video from the recently completed RootsTech 2013 Conference that will share even more information about this new functionality.
Ron Tanner of FamilySearch makes a humorous and informative presentation about the Family Tree capability from within FamilySearch. Be ready for a few smiles and laughs while you still learn about the new Family Tree. You can view this presentation at the following link below :
Many of us use FamilySearch frequently. Now we have the capability to upload our family history trees to FamilySearch. So hopefully the PDF Family Tree manual and the video presentation by Ron Tanner mentioned above will provide you with the information to become comfortable with the process.
Your online family trees can certainly open you up to be discovered by other researchers having the same family lines. These connections can facilitate more collaboration between researchers on common ancestral connections.
Now you can spend some time learning more about the new Family Tree capability at FamilySearch, both in print and from a well-versed speaker, Ron Tanner of FamilySearch.
Check them both out!
Tony Kierna
Genealogy Coordinator
Schaumburg Township District LIbrary
FamilySearch has activated the Family Tree function at their website that will now allow you to upload your family trees.
You will need to register yourself with FamilySearch in order to avail yourself of this new functionality. Registering is painless and costs nothing. If you have been a volunteer indexer, you would have already registered yourself with them. By registering, you will also have the capability of viewing database material for some databases that you would not be able to view without being registered. Registering with FamilySearch is also a necessity for you to order online any microfilms you want to review for your own research.
So there is very little, if any, downside to registering.
When there are new functions we may be hesitant to try them out. However, I like to look for any new “training” material via a video or screen shots of how an application works or even some online manuals that can at least provide some insight into the new process.
I was able to find a recently released 160 + page PDF document put together by FamilySearch that will help guide you through the process of using this new Family Tree feature at FamilySearch.
You can find this wonderful learning resource directly at FamilySearch at:
Save the file as a PDF for easy access when you need to use it.
Or just find it at FamilySearch within the “Help” section of the site within the Product Support section for Family Tree. (As much as I love FamilySearch, finding this material was not a very direct route. I think FamilySearch could make this pathway to this learning resource a lot more direct!)
Spend some time learning about this new feature via this manual put together from FamilySearch.
Once you feel more comfortable knowing about how the Family Tree function works, you may then want to actually start loading up your own Family Tree material.
Enjoy the guide.
Tony Kierna
Genealogy Coordinator
Schaumburg Township District Library
I need to make our readers of this blog that use our library aware of 2 items that pertain to WiFi access from within our library.
One is an update. One is an “OOOPs” correction on my part.
If you have previously come into our library and set your laptop or portable device WiFi to automatic connection to our library network, please note that our WiFi connection for the general public has changed from “STDL” to “LIBRARY”. In simple terms this means that your device would have detected a local WiFi network (the library) and in order to have established that connection you would have selected “STDL” as the network connection. Today, the “STDL” designation no longer exists. It has been replaced with “LIBRARY”.
You will simply have to reset your automatic WiFi connection on your laptop to this new network identity we are using of “LIBRARY”. If you do not reset it, your laptop will no longer connect via WiFi within our library because the previous network you used of “STDL” no longer exists.
I think you will easily be able to make this change on your own when you come to our library. If in doubt, just walk on over to our Computer Assistance (CA) area on the 2nd floor and speak to them about it so you can be sure you are connected to our WiFi when visiting us.
The second item related to WiFi in our library is my “OOOOPs” correction.
It was my previous understanding that if you brought in your laptop or portable device and wanted to use Ancestry Library Edition within the library via the WiFi network we have, access would have been denied. You would have had to use our own internal computers to access Ancestry Library Edition.
That may have been true in the past at one point, but it is no longer true.
Many of the genealogy researchers I work with here were easily showing me that they were indeed connected to Ancestry Library Edition from within our library with their laptop or portable device over our WiFi network. Initially, I thought that was a mistake and should not have happened.
However, upon further discussions with our internal staff, I stand corrected.
Yes, you can access Ancestry Library Edition from within our library using your own laptop or portable device over our internal WiFi network!
I am actually very happy to share this corrected information. It obviously makes your research that much easier being able to connect internally to Ancestry Library Edition using your own device. You have been able to do that and probably did do that in spite of me telling you that you could not!! Seeing is believing, and I saw plenty of laptops connected to Ancestry Library Edition over WiFi from within our library.
Enjoy your visits within our location accessing our incredible WiFi network. Make sure you access us internally by connecting to “LIBRARY” as the network that will be detected by your laptop or portable device. If you have not been here for a while accessing our WiFi, just be sure you re-establish the connection using “LIBRARY” as the network and NOT “STDL”.
And yes, access Ancestry Library Edition within our library over our WiFi network using your laptop or portable device.
Enjoy.
Tony Kierna
Genealogy Coordinator
Schaumburg Township District Library
I wanted to see how I can enhance some of my blog posts with more than just text.
This is a free blog from WordPress. As such, I have to use whatever “tools” WordPress provides to “free” blogs. One of the things I noticed they have as a capability is to “embed” videos from YouTube. This means that a video will play directly within the blog post. There will be no other visible link to click on and leave the blog post to see something else.
I thought I would give “embedding” a try with a small video from the just recently concluded RootsTech 2013 Conference.
DearMYRTLE, a renowned genealogist in her own right, was conducting some video interviews at the recent RootsTech 2013. She has these small video interviews posted on her YouTube channel. They were conducted with a myriad of attendees to the conference.
I did notice an interview she had with David Pogue, a well-known “tech” guru who writes for the New York Times. David was also a keynote speaker at the conference and the “buzz” is that his keynote speech “hit it out of the park”.
Here is DearMYRTLE with David Pogue:
I hope you enjoyed seeing the video interview without having to leave my blog post. More importantly, leave a comment for me regarding my embedding the video directly into the blog post! I always want to learn new ways within WordPress and this is my most recent effort.
I would like to do more video “embeds” in the future. I hope you enjoy the continuity of staying with the blog post.
Thanks for letting me experiment!
Tony Kierna
Genealogy Coordinator
Schaumburg Township District Library
A few weeks ago I made you aware that RootsTech 2013 was about to start their annual conference in Salt Lake City, UT. That time has now come and gone. RootsTech 2013 is now history and should be proudly basking in how successful this year’s edition turned out!
Dick Eastman has reported in his online Newsletter about the events that transpired at the conference that was held from March 21 to March 23. Here is a link to Dick’s blog post providing a very nice summary overview of the conference:
Here is a quote (following in Italics) from Dick’s post about the magnitude in numbers that puts the success of this conference in perspective:
“The RootsTech Conference is now the largest genealogy conference in North America. Actually, it earned that title last year but then grew by more than 50% this year. I know it was big because I am exhausted. My feet hurt, my back hurts, I haven’t had much sleep, and I am tired. In other words, it was a great conference!
Sponsored by Family Search, the RootsTech Conference was held for three days at the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City, Utah. More than 6,700 people from 49 U.S. States (why was no one there from Delaware?) and 17 countries were in the Salt Palace Convention Center for the opening day of the RootsTech Conference on March 21. I never heard the final attendance numbers, but I saw a long line of people on the opening day waiting to purchase tickets at the door. Obviously, the final number was higher than 6,700.
That number does not include the nearly 2,000 teen-agers who attended a special “genealogy for youth” session on Saturday. Boy Scout merit badges for genealogy were awarded to many at this session. If you add in the teen-agers, the total attendance at RootsTech 2013 had to be nearly 9,000 individuals.
As if that isn’t enough, another 10,000 people viewed classes and events via live streaming online video, and another 4,000 participated by remote satellite broadcast at Family History centers in 17 locations in seven countries, including the United States, according to FamilySearch.
That totals about 23,000 people, give or take a few, who attended or at least watched some part of RootsTech2003. Who says the popularity of genealogy is slipping?”
The numbers to me are staggering. National conferences of the recent past are often considered very successful if attendance is somewhere in the 2,000 to 2,500 range. Look at Dick’s reporting of the statistics on the event and one would have to assume that the attendance figures among all of the categories is like “knocking it out of the park”.
I highly recommend visiting the RootsTech website and spend some time looking at the magnificent set of 13 videos of a variety of the programs that occurred over the 3 days. These are free to look at on the site. They are brilliant in terms of video quality. If I look at only a few, I like to spend some time looking at the Keynote speakers. These speakers generally give us a “big picture” view of genealogy and things related to genealogy. They are often “rah rah” kind of motivational speeches that often can get our genealogy jump-started again if we were temporarily unmotivated.
Somehow this conference has really taken off like a rocket ship and has been bucking the trend of smaller and smaller audiences attending national conferences.
I just feel the excitement looking through some of the online videos.
The people and the topics are really buzzing.
RootsTech 2014 is already on the drawing board.
February 6 through February 8, 2014 will be the days to do it again in Salt Lake City, Utah!
Read through all of Dick Eastman’s post of the event from the above link I have provided.
Check out the RootsTech 2013 videos from the above link. You will not be disappointed.
Get your “genealogy engine” jump-started!
Tony Kierna
Genealogy Coordinator
Schaumburg Township District Library
You often hear us talk in the world of genealogy about our immigrant ancestors becoming citizens. Related to that, there is an important time-line break that researchers need to understand in their pursuit of ancestral records for citizenship.
For many of us, myself included, my ancestors came to the United States from Poland during the late 1880s and early 1890s. They started on the pathway to citizenship soon after their arrival. In this timeframe, citizenship was a process that was done through the local court system. It could encompass any of the myriad court levels e.g. Circuit Court, Superior Court, etc. A person living in Illinois could become a citizen through a court system in Indiana.
Citizenship documents at this time were not very valuable as genealogical documents. Your ancestor stated they no longer owed allegiance to whatever governmental system they left. The document was dated. They signed it. A witness signed it. It was formerly signed by a court representative. Not much more to help you discover where they came from. What port? What ship?
I found that the best piece of this kind of document was an emotional connection to seeing the signature of an ancestor and the signature of a witness.
In 1906 a major change took place. It was at this time that the U.S. Federal Government became the central agency where our ancestors passed through on their way to citizenship. No longer was it done through a myriad of different courts. In addition to the centralization process, it was also at this time that much more detailed information was provided by the applicant to the Federal Government. Now it was possible that the applicant for citizenship did start providing where they came from, when did they arrive, what port did they come to, what was the name of the ship, their height, their weight etc.
These post-1906 applications really started providing a great deal of genealogical and personal information about the applicant. You could be lucky to even be able to discover a picture of the applicant!
The agency noted in the blog post heading is now your source to track down the documents of your ancestors citizenship process after 1906. This is an important site that I wanted to share with you to facilitate interacting with the agency to gain the copies of your ancestral naturalization documents you seek after 1906.
There is a great deal of good information at the site to explore.
Check out the following links from the Unites States Citizenship and Immigration Services at:
There is so much more information on the above sites that I encourage you to really “roam” around the site. You will not be able to initiate the search yourself online. The agency will do that for you. There is a fee for the search. It runs between $20 to $35 . It is not inexpensive, but there might be a great deal of valuable information you will discover.
If your ancestor became a citizen after 1906, you will need to work with USCIS to see what documents exist that you can obtain. Become familiar with all they describe at their site. Your reward could be great!
I hope the information at this site can get you going to seek documents of your naturalized ancestor after 1906. That information sure beats the little amount you can obtain for a pre-1906 naturalized ancestor.
Good luck and happy hunting with the USCIS!
Tony Kierna Genealogy Coordinator Schaumburg Township District Library
Our Local History Librarian just made us all aware that our library now has available a database of some Illinois focused magazines and journals that you can access through our websites list of databases.
Here is what our Local History Librarian noted about the journals and magazines now in this new database:
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
This is just a heads up that we have added a new index to the Magazines category of our Research page. It is called Illinois Periodicals Online and is coordinated by Northern Illinois University. It indexes the following Illinois magazines:
Illinois Country Living 1996-2004
Illinois History 1992-2002
Illinois Issues 1975-2001
Illinois Municipal Review 1956-1996 (includes scattered years)
Outdoor Illinois 1999-2002
Illinois Heritage 1997-2008
Illinois History Teacher 1994-2009
Illinois Libraries 1984, 1995-2000
Illinois Parks and Recreation 1970-2012
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
You can access the material from our library’s own list of databases as noted above or you can also access it directly at:
I bring this to your attention because as you can see from the list of titles, two of them might be beneficial for your family history research. Note the titles for “Illinois History” and “Illinois Heritage”. The year ranges noted in the above constitutes what is in the online database. You can access the full text and images of the articles in the issues.
For those of you doing Illinois family history research, it would look like “Illinois Heritage” might be a good source for you to consider to look through. There are not that many issues in the collection as you can see by the year range, but the articles do appear to be very detailed and well written. I just happened to be browsing through an issue from the year 2000 and I saw an article on “The Vandalia Statehouse Move to Springfield”.
That is a sample of what you can find by browsing through the material.
Do not expect to find surnames here in a searchable manner like at Ancestry.com.
You can bring the article up in full-text mode and then use your browser “find” command to do a search for whatever you have an interest in. It will find that term, if it is in the article, and you will see it nicely highlighted in color for ease of discovery.
This material can provide you with a lot more historical background relevant to Illinois but not necessarily advance your pedigree searching.
The new database is accessible by anyone from home if you access it through our databases. You do not have to be a Schaumburg Library card holder to access the data.
I would encourage you to check it out or make note of it for future access.
Tony Kierna
Genealogy Coordinator
Schaumburg Township District Library
I am sure you are just like me. We are often creatures of habit.
In this case the “habit” was the appearance of the FamilySearch home page. I thought I always remembered being able to easily find some key “links” at what I thought was the top of the page.
Today when I was looking at the site I kept looking and looking for the link on the homepage for “Learn”. I thought I was looking in the area where I thought it was. This is a link to get you to all things about research aids and online tutorials. So for me it was important.
My eyes finally went way high on top of the page and I did discover the list of links that I thought had previously been a little lower on the page.
My eyes initially looked at the area of the homepage just under the title “Discover Your Family History”. That is where I thought my familiar links called home. Today under the title “Discover Your Family History” I saw the links for “Records”, “Genealogies”, “Catalog” and “Books”.
Maybe you are like me and often used the link for “Learning”. Maybe you also thought it disappeared or you just could not find it.
That is why I am writing this.
Again, look high on the homepage of FamilySearch for a series of key links, then look a little lower under the title of “Discover Your Family History” and you will see another series of links to key areas on the site.
Take another look at the FamilySearch homepage if you have not very recently been there. Look way high on the page and then a little lower for the two sets of key links to help you get around the site for things other than just searching for ancestors.
I don’t know if they altered the main page or if my brain got zapped recently when looking for this material!
Hope this helps you if you felt a little lost on the site as I was when trying to find some key links I always click on.
Tony Kierna
Genealogy Coordinator
Schaumburg Township District Library
Take The New Poll As Of April 30, 2013 – - – Have You Actively Collaborated Your Research With A Fellow Researcher On Some Common Family History Research?
Search This Blog
Subscribe To RSS Notices To New Posts and Comments Here
I saw a post on Dick Eastman’s blog that noted there was a very nice YouTube video created by Ancestry.com that lets viewers see what is new at Ancestry.com during the May 2013 time period.
