House Histories: an upcoming presentation

When I wrote about the first house I lived in when I was a little girl, back in 2011, I didn't  know that my parents didn't own the building. I learned that when I was preparing for a talk on house histories that I gave earlier this year at the library. 

The Google street view photo is showing 697 but 699 8th Street East is the correct address (the first house). The photo that is currently showing is the view of when the road was under construction. The work is now complete. If you go to the Google page, you can select a different year.

The talk on October 25th will encourage genealogists/family historians to do some house history research of their home(s) or that of an ancestor to enhance and put into context their family history. All are welcome to attend.

The house above is the Squire House in Derby Township of the Municipality of Georgian Bluffs, Ontario. 


© 2016 Janet Iles

House Histories: an upcoming presentation

When I wrote about the first house I lived in when I was a little girl back in 2011, I didn't  know that my parents didn't own the building. I learned that when I was preparing for a talk on house histories that I gave earlier this year at the library. 

The Google street view photo is showing 697 but 699 8th Street East is the correct address (the first house). The photo that is currently showing is the view of when the road was under construction. The work is now complete. If you go to the Google page, you can select a different year.

The talk on October 25th will encourage genealogists/family historians to do some house history research to enhance and put into context the story of their home(s) or that of one of their ancestors. All are welcome to attend.

The house above is the Squire House in Derby Township of the Municipality of Georgian Bluffs, Ontario. 


© 2016 Janet Iles

Nine Things I Learned at the Bruce-Grey Branch Fall Event

Each year for many years as I can remember, the Bruce-Grey Branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society has held a day of presentations on a Saturday in the fall. Yesterday, the branch held this event at Grey Roots Museum and Archives  near Owen Sound.

Yesterday, we had two speakers: Mike Quakenbush and Steve Fulton. Both gave two fantastic, informative presentations. In each, I learned something new or got an idea of something I could do. I am sharing two things I learned from each presentation.

Social Media - making connections for genealogy - Mike [I didn't write down exact title. Mike pitched in for the first time slot as our original speaker on a different topic wasn't able to be there.]

1. Pages can be promoted on Facebook. You pay a fee but can target a particular demographic if you wish.  Groups can not be promoted but you can invite others to join.
2. Twitter can be a way of sharing information and sometimes making requests. Mike gave several examples of "gatherings" related to genealogy: #Acom, #GenChat and #Ancestryhour. [I am not on Twitter. I don't have a smart phone but Mike showed how having a folder on the taskbar of Chrome you can easily access different social platforms].

Getting Started with Digital Publishing From Book to Blog - Mike
3. You can password protect an individual blog post in WordPress but Google can still find them. You can add a request button to your menu where you can have a form where the person explains why they would like to see the page.
4. Having share buttons at the end of each post makes it easy to share your posts. [I have to figure out which plugin I would use. To share with pages on Facebook, it has to been one where I am an admin.]

Cemeteries that Sing - Steve
As a graveyard rabbit and also because I am giving a talk on Grey County cemeteries in November, I was interested in hearing this presentation.
5. When dowsing in a cemetery, Steve always does the width first then the length. This will help in finding where the monument is likely situated. In a Christian cemetery this should be on the west end of the plot. Steve demonstrated the technique using wire clothes hangers cut to make the tool.
6. With difficult to read monuments, take digital photos. Then with the windows paint program or equivalent use the red pencil tool and trace the lettering to help with making out the words.

Technology Overload: Let's Get Back to the Basics and Advance our Genealogy - Steve
7. Plan what will happen after your death with your research. This includes a "will" for your online existence. Make sure someone knows how to access it.
8. You can overlay the 1880 Ontario County maps over Google maps.

9. I would attend future workshops by both of these speakers as I enjoyed their presentation style as well as the information they provided.

© 2015 Janet Iles

Dissecting Ancestry : an Upcoming Presentation

Over the last year, I have worked off and on preparing a talk about Ancestry. Originally, I was going to give the talk in Meaford in December, 2014. Well, in November it snowed heavily and between the organizers and me, it was decided to give the talk in the spring because we, or perhaps, it was I, was worried the snow would hang around and travelling might be poor on the day of the talk. On the chosen spring date, the weather cooperated; it was great travelling weather for attendees and the speaker.

 When I was first working on my presentation, Ancestry was in the midst of making changes to the search page. So I decided I would let those changes happen and I would update what I had prepared closer to the talk. I did that. I gave the talk to an interested group of mainly people who were wondering how best to use it.

Anyone, who gives genealogical talks on any subject, realizes a talk takes quite a bit of time to prepare. It is therefore wonderful when you can give the talk more than once. You also realize you will want to update your talk before you give it again. It is a chance to make improvements.

Now, I am giving the presentation again. Once again, Ancestry is making more changes. So, I need to add information on the changes to the navigation tools within the document. Although, I use Ancestry.ca (world edition) regularly, I keep learning more about it. I hope the attendees will learn something new during the talk, too.

Bruce Grey Branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society - September 22, 2015 at Family History Library, Owen Sound at 7:30 p.m. All are welcome to attend.



© 2015 Janet Iles

Estate Records - More than just wills

Three weeks from today on February 27 (my birthday), I will be speaking about Estate Records for our local genealogical society, Bruce Grey Branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society. The meeting will be at 1:30 p.m. at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Saints on 2nd Avenue  South East (extension of 2nd Avenue East), Owen Sound.

I am going to post various snippets from my presentation, in a series of postings. The information will focus on Ontario, Canada records but I hope the information will be helpful no matter where you live.

© 2010 Janet Iles

Blogging for Genealogists - the Presentation

Here is the presentation that I gave several weeks ago about Blogging for Genealogists.

Blogging for Genealogists (revised)

View more presentations from researchergal. (tags: genealogy blogging)

Of course, you do not get the benefit of my comments but it will give you an idea of what I talked about during my presentation to the Bruce Grey Branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society. Thanks once again to all the fellow geneabloggers who gave me permission to use screen shots of their sites in this presentation.

Blogging for Genealogists

During the last few weeks, I have been working on my presentation on blogging for genealogists. Thanks to the assistance of fellow genea-bloggers who gave permission to use screenshots from their blogs, the presentation is coming together very well. It will be a colourful presentation.


I wish I could highlight all the genea-blogs out there, but I can't; but I will point to places where the audience can find them.


The talk will be divided into two sections: reading blogs and writing your own blog. Not everyone will want to have a blog of their own but genealogists benefit from reading the work of others.


Some of the points I will cover

What is a blog and how does it differ from a web site?
Different parts of the blog.

Reading
How to find blogs
How to keep updated on postings - RSS feeds and readers
Different types of blogs with examples


Writing
Getting Ready to blog - Who, When, Where, Why and How
Setting up a blog
Tips concerning layout and writing

The details on the presentation
Grey Bruce Branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society
will meet January 24, 2009 at 1:30 p.m.
at the Family History Centre at the LDS church
490 2nd Avenue South East
Owen Sound, Ontario

All are welcome to attend.

View Larger Map

Resolutions 2009 - How will I do? Check back in 365 days

The 63rd Carnival of Genealogy asks

New Year's Resolutions! What plans do you have for your genealogy research next year? How about for your blogging? No groaning or whining now. Write 'em up and let us know!

Goals have to be clear and specific with a plan of action. They need to be achievable. Last year I proposed a long list of things I wanted to achieve so I will review what I accomplished in a separate blog posting. I am going to make a shorter list this year.


My Genealogy Research for 2009


I resolve to
1. finish the soldiers project
2. spend one hour a week on cleaning up citations in my genealogy program
3. continue research on Emily Iles nee Pugh (write a blog article on Emily)
4. post at least two blog articles a week on this blog
5. post at least two blog articles a month on Graveyard Rabbit of Grey County Ontario.

I have not made a long list this year. Why? Because I think I will be busy with other related projects. I will be adding another web site as volunteer web master and chief writer of the blog for the Grey County Historical Society. I have two presentations coming up. In January - blogging for genealogists for the Bruce Grey Branch Ontario Genealogical Society and in March the place names of Grey County for the Grey County Historical Society. I have been asked to teach a family history course at night school at the end of April. In addition to my personal research, I will have client work to do.

Snow - update

Just a short update. Yes, I know, I said yesterday's posting was going to be a short one.

About 20 gathered for the meeting last night. Although not a large turn out, those who were there seemed interested. About half had used land records before in their genealogical research. I hope I have encouraged the rest to check them out and that they will feel comfortable using land records as part of their "exhaustive search".

Fortunately, the winds died down in town and no snow had fallen during the meeting. I hope the trip home was safe for everyone.

Will the snow stop people from coming?

Just a short post. Sometimes when I look out the window this afternoon, the snow is coming down heavily and the snow is swirling around.

Tonight is the meeting of the Bruce Grey Branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society. For I don't know how many years, I have been the guest speaker at the November meeting. The last couple of years, it has snowed and the wind has blown wildly on the day of the meeting. What will it be like tonight?

Usually the meeting has been at the public library but tonight it will be at the Family History Centre. Tonight's topic - land records - an introduction. Perhaps not the most exciting topic if your people of interest did not own land or if you can only find a few straight forward bargain and sales. But look closely at the records, what clues can you find? Perhaps this will be source will be the one that will help solve a break wall in your genealogical research. Even if your person did not own land, are they mentioned in a land transaction as a witness, or as a trustee of a church?

As I prepared for this talk, I looked back over some of my own research. After copying some abstract index listings from some property in Markham Township a few years ago, I put the sheets of paper in a file. I hadn't done anything with them. As I looked at the listing of the various instruments, I found one that puzzled me. What was a cert. v.o.? It was obviously something related to a court case about a property as there were a list of names and the mention of the High Court of Justice. I couldn't find anything in my notes so I asked my colleagues in the Ontario Chapter of the Association of Professional Genealogists in our mailing list for help.

Remember back in my earlier blogs I talked about life long learning? One of the 7 1/2 habits of life-long learners was to have a toolbox. The toolbox included people resources to ask for help. Well, I was not disappointed. I received two replies with the explanation - certificate of vested orders. It was not limited to the basic explanation but I received great suggestions for further research. This research project will take some time as it will required finding the appropriate land records from about 1850 to 1920 for this land, checking court records and newspaper records. - Land records don't need to be boring.

Tonight, I will be teaching others. I find I learn so much from the preparation for the talk. I also look forward to learning from those who can get there and will share their success stories. I hope the snow does not discourage people from coming.

PowerPoint Presentations - Getting the Message Across

The other day when I was talking about goal setting in relation to my upcoming talk for the Grey County Historical Society, I mentioned that as part of my learning in preparation for that day, I was going to be seeking out ideas about creating effective PowerPoint presentations. Although, I could just talk about the history of Knox and its predecessors, I want to show photographs and maps to illustrate what I am talking about. I will use the PowerPoint presentation with projection equipment.

I did some searches of web sites to see what I could find. I have read several books but wanted to see if there was any new information out there. I found Cliff Atkinson's web site sociable media. He has a blog but there are several webinars available. I have watched three of them. Instead of using bullets and lots of text, he talks of creating a storyboard first to get the presentation organized. Each slide has a sentence and a graphic. The speaker provides the detail, about one minute per slide. The webinars introduced me to the Notes view where you type your notes and the slide information is above. He advocates very clean slides with no extra material to ensure learning.

His book, Beyond Bullet Points sounds like one I would like to read.

I have prepared a list of what needs to be done before my presentation with the deadlines that I want to meet. I will keep in mind the points that I learned from the webinars when I am working on my presentation.

Goal setting - Historical Presentation

Althougth not all goals relate to learning, learning usually happens when you are working on your to do list.


As I look over the events that I have marked on my calendar for September and October, I see some that need preparation and along with that will be some learning.


For example, on Wednesday, October 17, I am the guest speaker at the Grey County Historical Society meeting to be held in Owen Sound at Knox United Church at 1:30 p.m. (all welcome). As we learnt in the tutorial on the 7 1/2 habits of successful life long learners, the importance of creating written list of goals with target dates. I need to define what needs to be done to prepare for that day. I will be speaking about the history of Knox United Church and its predecessors Knox Presbyterian and Chalmers' Free Presbyterian Church. When I was researching and preparing the book, The Churches of Grey Presbytery of the United Church of Canada: historical highlights, I discovered that this congregation had ties to other Churches in Grey County. I will share this information.

Knox Presbyterian Church (now United) circa 1908


So what are some of the tasks that will go out on the list to reach my goal of a highly informative and interesting presentation? I will be re-reading the appropriate sections of the book. I will look at my notes. I will go to Grey Roots to take photos of land records. As I will be doing a PowerPoint presentation, photos and other documents will have to be scanned. The presentation will have to be completed and tested with the equipment before the presentation date.


Although I have given PowerPoint presentations before I will read some tips to make a great presentation and use those that apply. ("using technology to your advantage"). A google search for blogs relating to PowerPoint, let me to find SlideShare It is searchable. This is an alternative to videos and podcasts as learning mediums, although you can get only key points. It gives examples and you can decide for yourself if the slides are effective in presenting a point.


I am not going to take the time to read the blogs now but will add them to del.icio.us with a tag - unread (thanks Tim for that suggestion). I will add other tags as appropriate. I love del.icio.us - how it brings up your list of tags when you starting typing a letter as well as suggestions for tags.


Do any of you who give PowerPoint presentations or those who have sat through them, do you have any great tips of your own?