Happy Valentine's Day 2012

Church Record Sunday: Jefferson County (IN) Public Library History Rescue Project

The History Rescue Project is housed on the Jefferson County Public Library's website. This project involves records detailing 200 years of history in Madison and Hanover, Indiana. One of the categories of records available are church records.

Approximately 17 churches are represented in this collection including Broadway Second Baptist, Ryker's Ridge Baptist, St. John's Madison German Church and Wesley Chapel. Transcriptions of names are available on the website from what looks to be largely membership records. Some information about the church and/or the records can also be found on each record's page.

The History Rescue Project includes much more than church records. Researchers with ancestors from this area will want to search other links that include birth records, city directories, family histories, funeral home records, land and tax records, marriage records, military and obituaries just to name a few.

Church Record Sunday: Kansas Historical Society Manuscripts

As I learn about new genealogy sources I am amazed at what is available to us todaythat would have been difficult if not impossible to find 20 plus years ago.Take for instance the availability of online finding aids, guides and catalogs formanuscript collections.

The website for the Kansas Historical Society is one of my favorites. Itshould be yours too, even if you have absolutely no Kansas ancestors. Onereason can be found in their large newspaper collection available on microfilm toanyone through interlibrary loan. They have newspapers from throughout theUnited States.

For Church Record Sunday, if you do have Kansas ancestors, you may be interestedin their manuscript collections which includes church records. Church records available include:

• Central Congregational Church Collection
• Leonardville United Methodist Church Records
• Presbytery of Southern Kansas
• St. Joseph Catholic Church Records
• Third Presbyterian Church of Topeka Kansas
• United Presbyterian Church of Lyndon

There are other records in this collection to consider including those of the Women's Christian Temperance Union and some religious based schools.

What If You Can't Go?: RootsTech 2012 Edition

Last year for the FGS conference I posted an article on how to "attend" the conference from home.  What If You Can't Go To FGS 2011 was a look at ways you could still participate in the conference from home and even look towards attending in 2012.  I thought it fitting to post an update for those unable to go to RootsTech this year. All is not lost, there are still ways you can participate.

Download the RootsTech Syllabus. I love that RootsTech has provided the syllabus for the conference for free on their website. This allows everyone to share in what is happening  and for those of us not able to attend, we can still benefit from the presentations. To download the syllabus, see  the RootsTech Downloads page.

Follow RootsTech on Twitter. By using the RootsTech hashtag #rootstech you can follow the latest news from  the conference including information about vendors, presentations and events.

Check out the RootsTech Bloggers. Whether you follow them on Facebook, Twitter,  or their blogs, you are sure to learn about what is happening both during and after the conference. Click here for a list of RootsTech Bloggers.

Attend RootsTech from Home. RootsTech is live streaming 14 presentations starting on Thursday. You can find the list of presentations and times by going to their homepage and scrolling down.

Be a Winner. RootsMagic is holding an online scavenger hunt where you can win an iPad 2. Winners will include both RootsTech attendees and non-attendees. Look for the announcement tomorrow about which blogs will have clues. To learn more about this giveaway, see the RootsMagic  blog.

What About Next Year? In my original posting for FGS 2011, I wrote "The FGS conference (or RootsTech) is yearly,  start planning now to attend next year. With 12 months until the next conference you can work on finances, clearing your calendar and arranging for someone to take care of family members or even bring them with you. (Those who know me often see my kids trailing behind me.) I have written before on this blog and also in an article for Internet Genealogy about saving money so you can do more genealogy.  And I mean it. Yes, I use coupons, specials and discounts so that I can save money and go to conferences. Save money now to store away but also consider ways to save during the conference like finding a roommate, shopping for travel deals, etc. Start now, it's always great to have something to look forward to."

It's impossible to go to every genealogy conference. Fortunately, conference organizers are finding ways for those unable to attend to still participate. Take advantage of these opportunities and let conference organizers know how much you appreciate attending from home.

Church Record Sunday: Church History Library

The Church History Library for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints houses the archives and historical library for the Church. This resource now has their catalog online (beta). To find it you can use this link or go to the Church's website at www.lds.org and then choose, Menu>The Church>History.

From the Church History Library page you can search the catalog as well as search the index for the Journal History. This new website also has Research Guides and Digital Collections.