Group’s Activities in 2016
A brief look at the Family History Group’s activities in 2016
There were several important announcements for family historians in 2016.
The partial release of the 1939 Register and the General Register Office moving to be of more assistance to us were welcome. The abandonment by Ancestry of its Family Tree Maker software was not so good.
On a personal level many of us undertook the 6 week on-line course on Genealogy and Family History hosted by the University of Strathclyde.
In JANUARY, Steve & Lesley arranged an enjoyable meal together at Battlesbridge
At our FEBRUARY meeting, Mike Hawker gave us an illustrate talk on the research he had being doing on a little is known battle that took place one hundred years ago that his Father was involved in. Because this was well received at our meeting, Mike went on to present a version of this talk at the main U3A meeting in AUGUST.
The MARCH meeting gave us the opportunity to discuss the 1939 War time registers and how it could help us advance our family knowledge.
For our meetings in APRIL MAY and JUNE we as a group looked at what the on-line course was about and how it could help us. All the material has been archived and can be used to develop further presentations.
JULY. We discussed the software Family Tree Maker as another company have taken it over and will continue to develop and support it. Also if you have an on-line tree you will still be able to sync with Ancestry.
If you have FTM 2014 the company is going to provide a FREE upgrade. Any previous edition there will be a small charge.
SEPTEMBER Although most of us may not have a DNA test, two of our members have had it done. For the first half of our meeting we had a presentation on some of the facts and figures of DNA, then looked at how DNA can help family historians. We also heard from those who had taken the test and the results they got.
OCTOBER We had another look at how to get the best out of Newspapers archives. Also we had a look at ‘Search Terms’ that can also be used for other search engines.
At our NOVEMBER meeting we had a discussion and some slides about the latest developments at the General Register Office.
We agreed to cancel our December meeting with the date to near Christmas for many to attend.
Also introduced was our group’s ’Creative Writing’ folder. Members are being encourage to contribute to this folder by writing short accounts of their ancestors in a variety of situations.
These articles will help us to formulate our own family histories. Also with your permission they could be used for our U3A newsletter.