ROOTS & BRANCHES

“Distance programming,” usually called webinars in the genealogy world, has been a real growth in genealogy education during the last decade or so. For many local, regional and state genealogical societies, they have been a way to cut the costs of genealogical programming (since they don’t have to fly in, feed and lodge the webinar …

Last week’s “Roots & Branches” column talked about using German phonetics as a way to overcome spelling changes based on those phonetics. I also introduced my modest attempt at helping researchers diagram the gamut of surname spelling variations with the “phonetischen Namenkarte” or pNK for short. This same diagramming aid (which, as noted last week, …

I’ve touched on the importance of staying flexible about the spelling variants of surnames numerous times in lectures and in “Roots & Branches” installments over the years. I’m to the point that I can smile weakly when someone recounts to me family traditions such as “the two brothers had a disagreement and each decided to …

I wrote a column just a couple of months ago about the International Germanic Genealogy Conference that will make Minnesota the center of the German genealogical world at the end of July. The conference is running for a total of four days, with the leadership day scheduled for July 27 and presentations / vendors from …

A couple of weeks ago, your “Roots & Branches” columnist tackled the explosion of DNA testing in genealogy with the caveat that I know “only enough about DNA and genealogy to be very dangerous.” You can continue to attach that caveat to anything I write about DNA, but I feel compelled to write about it …