2018 Monthly Meetings
Jan 27th : Jim Anderson, His power point presentation, “From Notes To Notable [Sommerkamp]”, demonstrated how scribblings on paper led to extensive research linking him to several notables.
Feb 24th : Paul Bocella. Map Conservator and Book Mender in the Southern History Department Linn-Henley Research Building, presents: “Making the most of DNA matches and Analyses”.
Mar 24th : Please note there is no meeting for March. Members are encouraged to attend the Alabama Genealogical Society Spring Seminar to be held on Saturday, March 24, 2018 at Samford University. David Rencher will present “Online and Offline, Records are Windows to the Past.”
April 28th : Bob Davis, Senior Professor of History and Director of Genealogy Program of Wallace State Community College, Hanceville, Alabama, presents: “Summary of Georgia Land Grant and Land Lottery Records.” The state of Georgia used a unique lottery system to distribute land between the years of 1805 to 1833. There were eight lotteries held in total. Although a few other states tried a lottery system, none was to the scale of Georgia’s implementation. In most cases, the land to be distributed had been part of the Creek or Cherokee
nation.
May 26th : Ron Rutherford presents: “Restoring Old Photographs.” Ron Rutherford is degreed professional Texas State Technical College, 1977. Ron’s professional experience includes many different areas. He started in High School as a Newspaper Staff Photographer. While in the US Air Force he was assigned additional duties and Unit photographer. He has taken photos all around the world. He has been a graphics professional working with photo editing software from the 1980’s. He has polished his photo editing skills for over twenty years. He has evaluated many of the current photo editing software programs but has worked with COREL PHOTO PAINT/SHOP. Over the years he has learned to deal with many of the problems associated with “Old Photos” restoring damaged, faded, and scratched to a like new condition. He will share some his secrets to restoring your photos.
June 23rd : Due to our scheduled speaker becoming ill, our substitute speaker was Jim Anderson. Program Title: Genealogy Bank – a tool to research family secrets and other odd things. Using examples of dark rumors passed on to him when he was young, Jim’s research discovered the facts from newspaper articles scanned and indexed on Genealogy Bank. The PowerPoint presentation introduced two family units and focused on a specific member of each where a murder and a suicide were only whispered about in family lore. Each case resulted in a wide-spread journalistic publicity at the time, but details were suppressed within the families.
July 28th : Elizabeth Wells presents: “The Case of the Missing Soldiers: Genealogical Tools to find them!” Elizabeth Wells is very active in genealogical and historical communities, having served as Special Collection Librarian and Archivist at Samford University, Birmingham, Alabama.
Aug 25th : Donna Cox Baker presents: “How to Use Pre-1850 Census.” Donna Cox Baker is the blogger behind The Golden Egg Genealogist and the co-founder of the Beyond Kin Project. Donna has a PhD in history and is editor-in-chief of Alabama Heritage magazine. Her first book, Views of the Future State: Afterlife Beliefs in the Deep South, was published in January 2018. The earliest U.S. Census schedules, 1790-1840, furnish only the names of the free heads of family, not of other family members. These schedules totaled the number of other family members, without name, by free or slave status. Free, white individuals were also grouped by age and sex categories from 1790 through 1810 – a categorization that eventually applied to other persons. The age categories also increased each year, from two age groups for free white males only in 1790, to twelve age groups for free whites and six age groups for slaves and free colored persons in 1840.
Sept 22nd : Please join us as Yvonne Crumpler, former President of the Birmingham Genealogical Society and the Alabama Genealogical Society and former head of the Southern History Department of the Birmingham Public Library, presents “Searching for your War of 1812 Ancestors.” Unlike later wars, service in the War of 1812 was largely through local militias with relatively short terms of service, often only 30 days. Because of this shorter term of service, it isn’t unusual to find a man serving in more than one unit. It’s also not unusual to find men who might otherwise be considered “too old” to serve. The War of 1812 is sometimes referred to as the “Second War for Independence.” Although the Americans had won the Revolutionary War, Britain had not relinquished control of all of the lands it was supposed to per the Treaty of Paris of 1783. By winning the War of 1812, the United States secured its position as an independent country.
Oct 27th : To Be Announced.
Nov 17th : To Be Announced.
Dec : No Meeting — Merry Christmas