Family History's October Webinars & Classes

Free Family History Library Classes and Webinars for October 2018 

Salt Lake City, Utah (28 Sept 2018), 

The FamilySearch Family History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah, has announced its free family history classes and webinars for October 2018. Research classes will focus on records from Denmark, Holland, England, Germany, and Wales. One class is offered in Spanish. A class for deaf community indexing is included. The genealogy merit badge is also featured. Participants can attend in person or online. See the calendar below for the complete list of classes. No registration is required. (Find or share this announcement online in the  FamilySearch Newsroom.)

Select webinars are offered weekly along the following track schedule throughout the month:

Mondays—FamilySearch Catalog at 10:00 a.m. MDT

Tuesdays—FamilySearch.org and Family Tree Classes at 10:00 a.m. MDT

Wednesdays—Indexing Classes at 10:00 a.m. MDT

Thursdays—Research Classes at 1:00 p.m. MDT

If you are unable to attend a class in person or online, most sessions are recorded and can be viewed later online at your convenience at Family History Library classes and webinars. Online classes are noted on the schedule as webinars. Webinar attendees need to click the link next to the class title at the scheduled date and time to attend the class online. Those attending in person simply go to the room noted. Invite your family and friends.

All class times are in mountain daylight time (MDT).

DATE AND TIME	CLASS	SKILL LEVEL	WEBINAR | ROOM
Tuesday, 2 October, 10:00 a.m.	What´s New at FamilySearch	Beginner	Webinar | Main Lab
Thursday, 4 October 10:00 a.m.	Indexing Dutch Records (1.5 hours)	Beginner	Webinar | Main Lab
Thursday, 4 October, 1:00 p.m.	Using Archion for German Research	Beginner	Webinar | Main Lab
Tuesday, 9 October, 10:00 a.m.	Starting Family Tree: Overview of FamilySearch	Beginner	Webinar | B1 Lab
Thursday, 11 October, 1:00 p.m.	United States Research: Pacific Region	Beginner	Webinar | Main B
Tuesday, 16 October, 10:00 a.m.	Starting Family Tree: Navigating, Adding, Editing, and Standardization of Dates and Places	Beginner	Webinar | Main Lab
Thursday, 18 October, 1:00 p.m.	England and Wales Census	Beginner	Webinar | Main Lab
Saturday, 20 October, 10:00 a.m.	Boy Scout Genealogy Merit Badge (1½ hrs). For Registration.	Beginner	2S Lab
Saturday, 20 October, 1:00 p.m.	Recursos genealógicos de la emigración Hispanoamericana	Beginner	Webinar | Main B
Thursday, 25 October, 10:00 a.m.	Deaf Community Indexing Training	Beginner	Webinar | Main Lab
Thursday, 25 October, 1:00 p.m.	Using Gazetteers to Determine Jurisdictionsin Denmark	Beginner	Webinar | Main Lab
Tuesday, 30 October, 10:00 a.m.	Using the FamilySearch Catalog Effectively	Beginner	Webinar | Main Lab

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About FamilySearch

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 4,921 family history centers in 129 countries, including the main Family History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Family Search Records Weekly Update

New Free Historical Records on FamilySearch: Week of September 24, 2018

SALT LAKE CITY, UT—FamilySearch expands its free online archives this week with almost 4 million new searchable names from England and Wales, taken from the National Index of Wills and Administrations, 1858-1957. New indexed records are also available from Argentina, Australia, Colombia, France, Lesotho, Liberia, and the United States (Georgia, Iowa, Maine, Montana, New Hampshire, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Virginia). Find and share this announcement online from the FamilySearch Newsroom.
Research these free new records and images by clicking on the collection links below, or go to FamilySearch to search over 8 billion free names and record images.

Country	Collection	Indexed Records	Digital Images	Comments
Argentina	Argentina, Santa Fe, Catholic Church Records, 1634-1975	61,422	0	Added indexed records to an existing collection
Australia	Australia, South Australia, School Admission Registers, 1873-1985	44,673	0	New indexed records collection
Colombia	Colombia, Catholic Church Records, 1576-2017	372	0	Added indexed records to an existing collection
England	England, Devon and Cornwall Marriages, 1660-1912	17,927	0	Added indexed records to an existing collection
England	England and Wales, National Index of Wills and Administrations, 1858-1957	3,860,310	0	Added indexed records to an existing collection
France	France, Calvados, Military Registration Cards, 1867-1921	94,106	0	New indexed records collection
Lesotho	Lesotho, Evangelical Church Records, 1828-2005	70,366	0	Added indexed records to an existing collection
Liberia	Liberia, Marriage Records, 1912-2015	21,998	0	Added indexed records to an existing collection
United States	Georgia, Fulton County Records from the Atlanta History Center, 1827-1955	13,031	0	Added indexed records to an existing collection
United States	Iowa, Monroe County, Card index of births, deaths & marriages from newspaper clippings, 1898-2015	212,068	0	New indexed records collection
United States	Maine, Knox County Cemetery Records, ca. 1800-2007	12,156	0	Added indexed records to an existing collection
United States	Montana, Toole County Records, 1913-1960	4,561	0	Added indexed records to an existing collection
United States	New Hampshire, Hillsborough County, Manchester, Cemetery Records, 1800-2007	38,819	0	Added indexed records and images to an existing collection
United States	Oregon, Lane County, Marriage Records, 1852-1921	1,462	0	New indexed records collection
United States	Pennsylvania, Philadelphia City Births, 1860-1906	265,223	0	New indexed records collection
United States	Texas, Swisher County Records, 1879-2012	2,590	0	Added indexed records to an existing collection
United States	Virginia, Fluvanna County Colbert Funeral Home Records, 1929-1976	2,942	0	Added indexed records to an existing collection
United States	Virginia, Petersburg, Gillfield Baptist Church Record, 1827-1906	15,162	0	New indexed records collection

Searchable historic records are made available on FamilySearch.org through the help of thousands of volunteers from around the world. These volunteers transcribe (index) information from digital copies of handwritten records to make them easily searchable online. More volunteers are needed (particularly those who can read foreign languages) to keep pace with the large number of digital images being published online at FamilySearch.org. Learn more about volunteering to help provide free access to the world's historic genealogical records online at FamilySearch.org/indexing.
FamilySearch 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 for free at FamilySearch.org or through more than 4,921 family history centers in 129 countries, including the main Family History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Wordless Wednesday: Skaneateles Lake

Stephentown Historical Society

Address: PO Box 11, Stephentown, NY (Staples Road @ the Corner of Garfield-Nassau Road)

Phone: Call: (518) 733 6070

Website: https://www.stephentown-historical.org/

Email: SHS@Fairpoint.com

Hours: The Heritage Center is open from 1 to 4 p.m. on Fridays and by appointment. The volunteers will gladly make an appointment for you if they can.

Photocopies are readily made by the volunteers for a nominal fee. There is no charge to research at their facility, but donations are gratefully accepted.

Heading either east from Albany along winding roads or north or south along NYS Route 22, it doesn’t matter. Any route you take to Stephentown will find you on country roads winding up and down mountains and through forested areas until you feel you are somewhere in the wilderness. It is in this area close to the Massachusetts border that many of our ancestors settled for either a brief time or a generation or more. Here, nestled in a small community that was once a bustling place, is an old Methodist Episcopal church in the small country style that is now home to the Stephentown Historical Society. Tracks once carried passenger and freight trains through here including milk to New York City, but they have been abandoned since 1951.

In the 1790 census, Stephentown was listed as the ninth largest town in the United States. Looking at the town today, this is hard to believe, as it is a sleepy little rural area that is sparsely populated. However, I have found in researching, as I’m sure others have as well, that many more people have connections to Stephentown than you might believe. More than once, I have heard somebody comment that a family in the late 1700s or early 1800s was in Rensselaer County briefly. I have replied: “Let me guess, Stephentown.” and I was correct. Part of some of the major routes for westward migration out of New England crossed the Massachusetts border near here and headed on westward through small communities including especially Stephentown.

While at the historical society, I found more information about some of my family lines. The volunteer, Bill Zimmerman, who opened for us, was the son-in-law of one of the founders, Elizabeth McClave, who had been a font of information about the early families. Luckily, she wrote much of this information down on index cards that are used to locate obscure information on the early families.  Although not sourced, these cards have been found to be extremely accurate.

While at the historical society, Bill gave us not only information on the people I was interested in and the cemeteries they are buried in, but also directions to a hidden cemetery.  I don’t have any direct ancestors buried at the Tifft Cemetery, but the name derives from the family, as my 4^th great-grandfather’s brother and family are many of those buried there. The cemetery is about 500 feet off the road along a logging trail. The trail, barely discernable from the forest now, is all uphill to this little cemetery tucked into the woods so much that it has become a part of the woods itself. However, we found it and were able to see for ourselves these family graves.