Click HERE (or the image above) to see 180+ free programs and presentations from RootsTech ...
The World's Largest Gathering of Genealogists
RootsTech is the largest gathering of Genealogists and Family History Researchers in the world. This is a big, big event and it runs from March 2nd to March 4th, 2023 in SALT LAKE CITY, Utah.
RootsTech has over 180 different programs and presentations from a wide variety of Exhibitors - Ancestry, MyHeritage and 100+ other companies and Genealogy Societies all participate in this event.
Cost is $98 to attend in-person. You can also participate online for FREE.
Here is the definition from their website ...
"What is RootsTech? RootsTech welcomes millions of people worldwide to celebrate family at the world’s largest family history conference and year-long learning platform. With thousands of classes, inspiring speakers, meaningful activities and joyful connections, RootsTech brings the human family together like no other event."
Click HERE for info on RootsTech 2023
The World’s Largest Online Family Tree
with over 1.3-BILLION people
You will find LOTS of contacts here … Free
FREE ONLINE and IN-PERSON HELP
FamilySearch has soooo many ways to help you in your research!
Online Courses ... over 1,500 courses on a wide variety of Genealogy subjects - these are the courses from the RootsTech in 2021 - you can watch them all year long.
Click HERE for the link to the Online Courses
YouTube Channel - hundreds of really interesting videos that are worth having a look at
Click HERE for a link to their YouTube videos
Free Virtual Consultations - talk to a Volunteer to get you started, or give you help along the way
Click HERE for a link to their Free Virtual Consultations
Blogs and Online Community - read about other people's journeys, challenges and successes - ask questions - answer questions
Click HERE for a link to their blogs and online communities
Research Wiki - you'll like the links to hyper-local genealogy research websites and resources. From contacts at the City or County level to Historical Societies, this is worth checking out.
Click HERE for a link to their wiki
Volunteer Opportunities, if you’d like to get involved in researching or scanning projects Click HERE for the link to their Volunteer Opportunities
A BIT MORE ABOUT FAMILYSEARCH.org
Click HERE (or the photo above) for the link
FAMILY HISTORY LIBRARY
The Family History Library in Salt Lake City is home to the largest genealogical collection in the world.
FamilySearch also has 5,000 Family History Centers across the USA, Europe and in dozens of countries around the world. You can walk in and talk to someone about tracking your family history.
PARTNERS
The Family History Library partners with dozens of other, major Libraries and Genealogy Centers to help make their resources available to the public.
On their website, you will find links to the following
-
Allen County Public Library (ACPL) Genealogy Center
-
Arizona State Library
-
Southern History Department of the Birmingham Public Library
-
Clayton Library - one of the nation’s top genealogical research collections
-
Dallas Public Library Genealogy & History Division
-
Historical Society of Pennsylvania - one of the largest family history libraries
-
Midwest Genealogy Center
-
Onondaga County Public Library
-
Ontario Genealogical Society - the largest family history society in Canada
-
History & Genealogy at St. Louis County Library
-
University of Florida George A. Smathers Libraries
-
Columbus Metropolitan Library’s Local History & Genealogy Collection
Click HERE for the links to these amazing resources.
HOW FAMILYSEARCH GETS RECORDS
FamilySearch currently has over 300 Teams working on projects around the world scanning documents that will be useful – like birth, death and marriage records. They do this with thousands of Volunteers who dedicate months (or years) to a project.
Projects can be an entire basement of a Government Office that is filled with records that nobody has touched for decades, or, even bigger projects like the Italian Ancestors Project with over 150-million records containing names of over 500-million people.
Click HERE for a link to the Italian Ancestors Project
Click HERE for a link to the Dallas Public Library Project
FamilySearch.org will setup the equipment to scan everything onsite and dig in.
This is the ultimate in "paying it forward" - these Volunteers are helping thousands of future families, who they will never meet, and who will never know the effort and sacrifices that they have made to help put pieces of the family history puzzle together. I love this – we need more people like them in this world.
FamilySearch added around 1-Billion records last year!
The FamilySearch database is outstanding – and – it is available for everyone to see and expand on.
MICROFILM IS NOW DIGITIZED - 2021 News!
A global effort to digitize FamilySearch’s collection of millions of rolls of microfilm is now complete — a milestone 83 years in the making.
The archive containing information on more than 11.5 billion individuals is available to the public on FamilySearch.org. Over 200 countries and principalities and more than 100 languages are represented in the digitized documents.
Click HERE for a link to the article.
ABOUT FAMILYSEARCH.ORG
FamilySearch is run by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and is open to any person, from any religion.
FamilySearch is 100% free - they do not have subscriptions or any costs of any kind to access their BILLIONS of records.
Here is how they describe what they do ...
-
FamilySearch International 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 free online at FamilySearch.org or through over 5,000 family history centers in 129 countries, including the main Family History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah.
A VERY DIFFERENT TYPE OF FAMILY TREE
The Family Tree on FamilySearch is different because it is TWO Family Trees in one ... your own Family Tree that is unique to you - AND - a Global Family Tree that includes all people ... Think of it as an "Open Source" Family Tree where anyone can contribute information on anyone.
FamilySearch describes it this way ...
“Those who start a Family Tree on FamilySearch aren't just piecing together their family story—they're contributing to the creation of a global, unified family tree for mankind. The FamilySearch shared tree uniquely strives to have just one public profile for every deceased person who has ever lived. Descendants contribute what they know about a person to a single, shared profile”.
This gets really interesting when you start going back 100 to 200-years and begin finding never-seen-before photos and details that were added by one of your distant cousins who shares the same Direct Ancestor.
What does this mean?
Within minutes of searching on FamilySearch's Global Family Tree,
I found an amazing photo of my Grandmother who was 3-years old at the time and posing with her 2 older sisters (from around 1915).
This was posted by an 18-year old, distant cousin who I’ve never met or even knew about ... one of the older sisters in
the photograph was his Great Grandmother.
These are the kinds of really cool, deeply-meaningful surprises
that come up when you’re doing research on your family.
CONTACTS - LOTS OF CONTACTS
Talking to distant relatives is also something that you'll experience during your research.
FamilySearch makes it easy to connect with these relatives by posting the contributor's email in a couple of places on the file - if you see something that is really interesting, you can reach out to the person who posted it via email and open the door for even more pieces to your family puzzle!
Click HERE (or the photo above) to see this fantastic interview from Constance Knox of GenealogyTV and Courtney Connelly, Product Marketing Manager
You will also want to check out Family Tree Magazine’s article on FamilySearch.org
And, and, and ... you'll need to be a subscriber to Family Tree Magazine to get this article - How FamilySearch Obtains and Digitizes Genealogy Records - by Sunny Jane Morton
Click HERE for more info on FamilySearch.org