ROOTS & BRANCHES

As advertising gimmicks go, my invitation the other week from genealogy genetics testing firm Living DNA to find out my percentage of “Viking ancestry” was a pretty good one. Since I was already a Living DNA customer, having done the basic autosomal test some 3 years ago, getting my Viking on was only going to …

One of the first things I did when I started my professional genealogy career Some 30 years ago was teach a basic genealogy course at a local community college.  Keen observers of the “Roots & Branches” column will recall that I reviewed this long-ago effort a couple of years ago and found some elements held …

I’m not going to name names because that’s not the point. But I am going to make a few points that I hope program planners take into consideration when they are putting together genealogy events. First a bit of a disclaimer: at heart I am an old-school, in-person type of individual. While I have warmed …

That time-tested tradition for brides to have somethings old, new, borrowed and blue might be applied to the recent National Genealogical Society conference in Sacramento, California. Of course, you could well say the old part was simply having an in-person conference after two fraught COVID years of virtual events. And the new part was well …