The 48th annual Genealogy Jamboree began yesterday with a DNA day entitled Diving Into DNA-a full day of sessions all about DNA and genealogy. Today marked the first of 3 days of this year’s Jamboree entitled Hunting Your Heritage. The Southern California Genealogical Society, who put on this amazing event, expect over 1500 people, a combination of volunteers, attendees, speakers, and exhibitors. Yesterday, I was able to attend 4 sessions on topics such as the Y-DNA of the British Monarchy to Genetic Genealogy Year in Review 2017. It is amazing to see how far the field of Genetic Genealogy has come in just the last year as reported by Blaine Bettinger.
Today, I was able to attend a 2 1/2 hour special workshop and 3 additional sessions.
My first session was a workshop entitled Third Party Tools for Autosomal DNA by Blaine Bettinger. What a great workshop and well worth the extra workshop fee. Blaine is a great speaker and instructor who taught us about many of the features and tools in the programs GEDmatch and DNAgedcom. It’s absolutely amazing how the ‘Tools’ in these programs can help you make sense of and interpret all those results from the DNA testing you have done. (Thanks to all my family members who have helped with this research by donating their DNA  ). Blaine helped us in this ‘hands on’ workshop use these ‘Tools’ with our personal DNA results to begin interpreting how our ‘matches’ can direct our genealogy research. I like these ‘Workshops’ when we are not just learning but also ‘doing’ and using the knowledge we have just learned.
Another session where I learned some new techniques were in a session entitled Facebook: A Tool for Genealogy Research by Thomas MacEntee. Thomas is an engaging speaker, who I enjoyed at a full day seminar for the San Diego Genealogical Society in January, and I was pleased to hear again today. We tend to think of Facebook as a connection for keeping in touch with our friends but there are so many ways it can help us with our research whether it’s searching for Family groups with our Surnames or Genealogy Groups in the areas or states we are researching as a way to help us find answers or to find cousins and make those new connections.
The last session I attended was entitled Types of Township Records by Peggy Clemens Lauritzen. Peggy is a speaker I think I could listen to for hours and totally lose track of time. Peggy spoke about the first ‘township’ records which began in England and were records kept in a parish chest or strongbox. She spoke of records we generally don’t think of looking for in a township such as tax records, school records, cemetery records, land records, etc. that can help tell our ancestor’s story. She showed us how you can use locations on a land record in www.earthpoint.us and google earth to find the present day location of land owned by your ancestors. I look forward to the next workshop of hers I can go to…perhaps for the San Diego Genealogical Society?
Other Jamboree highlights:
- Yesterday, I was able to see and thank Drew Smith and George Morgan (of Genealogy Guys and Genealogy Connection podcasts). If you haven’t had a chance to listen to their podcasts I highly recommend you do.
- There is an Exhibit Hall full of vendors and Society representatives. I stopped by the DAR (Daughters of the American Revolution) booth to learn how to start my applications for the 5 Revolutionary War Veterans I have identified recently in my family tree. Another one of those items on my Genealogy ‘To Do List’.
- While learning some new ways to look at my DNA results I was able to figure out how a DNA match I had on Ancestry connected into my family tree and a cousin I didn’t know I had …is found. YEA!!
- A great dinner with my son who lives nearby!
If you have any corrections or additions or stories to share I look forward to hearing them.
Enjoy the journey,
Debby
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