MASSACHUSETTS GENEALOGICAL COUNCIL
2004 SEMINAR PROGRAM
Best Western Hotel, Waltham, Mass.
March 27, 2004
A Day With Helen Leary
Is This the Same Man, or a Different One With the Same Name. Proving that our ancestors are who we say they are is essential to proving that they are related to who we claim are their kinfolk. But sometimes everybody in the county has the same name (or at least it seems so to us). How do we separate them from each other, especially when there do not appear to be enough records to do it reliably?
Time Lines and Real Lives – Using Ancestor’s Life Patterns to Find Their Parents. Each event in an ancestor’s life occurred at a specific place on the time line between his or her birth and death. Those occurrences form a pattern. Mrs. Leary describes how to chart the time line, identify the patterns, and use them to find the ancestor’s parents.
Luncheon Discussion Topics Hosted by APG Members
The Resources of the Family History Library, Helen Ullman
Board of Certification of Genealogists, Barbara Mathews, CG, and Christine Sweet-Hart
Jewish Research, Nancy Levin Arbeiter
English/Scots Research, Kathryn Smith Black and William Budde
Irish Research, Donna Moughty and R. Andrew Pierce
French-Canadian Research, Michael LeClerc
Lineage Societies, Carolyn Bingham and Jolene Mullen
Federal Census Records, Helen Shaw
Internet Research, Ernest Jenkins
Colonial New England Research, Rogers Finch and Anthony Burke
19th Century Research, Penny Hartzell and Edward Phillips
Northern New England (New Hampshire, Vermont), Jennifer Bartlau and Diane Gravel
Southern New England (Rhode Island, Connecticut), Joyce Pendery and Pat Wyatt
Access to Records, How to Address the Legislative Efforts to Close Records to Researchers, Shirley Barnes and Jack Gracey
Our Ancestors’ Voices – Getting the Records To Tell Us Everything They Know. Seemingly minor details in a record can be of major importance in solving an otherwise insoluble genealogical problem. Mrs. Leary will discuss (and illustrate) techniques for getting more information from records than seems to be there.
The Hemings-Jefferson Connection: A Genealogical Evaluation of the Evidence. Sally Hemings, slave of Thomas Jefferson, is known to have had at least six children. Was their father Thomas Jefferson, another Jefferson, or a collection of unidentified Virginians? Impartial evaluation of all the evidence, including that derived from DNA comparisons among Hemings and Jefferson descendants (real and imagined), points inexorably to a single conclusion.