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 presenters) and even enhance the quality of that programming with nationally known speakers.

In addition, webinars offer the convenience for “attendees” to travel no further than their home computer to access the programming … which is helpful since many times people seek out membership in societies from there their ancestors lived rather than where the members live now.

Many other businesses are offering webinars and podcasts, but the best outfit at doing it right now is Legacy Family Tree.

Before I get much further, it’s time for full disclosure of my conflict of interest: I have been a presenter for Legacy Family Tree webinars … but my endorsement comes from the fact that whenever I present at a live conference, there’ll be at least a few people who come up to me and say “Oh, yeah, I feel like I know you already – I’ve heard you on Legacy.”

In part that’s because Geoff Rasmussen, who’s at the controls for most of the Legacy webinars, sweats the details like no other group for whom I do webinars. He makes sure you have the right headset for clear audio and works out the finer points of the computer controls so that the audience gets an excellent video feed.

And the audiences often are over a thousand people, which gives the event a synergy by providing loads of good questions after the formal lecture. Additionally, the formal lecture lasts close to an hour with up to a half hour of questions afterward.

Free live webinars are available weekly and recorded webinars can be downloaded for a fee. Legacy also offers low-cost monthly ($9.95) and annual ($49.95) memberships that include access to the webinars.

The large audiences have resulted in Legacy’s presenters being an absolute “who’s who” of the best genealogy lecturers. For example, May’s lineup includes:

• Angela Walton-Raji, a prominent African-American genealogist
• Fritz Juengling, one of the Family History Library’s Germanic specialists
• Debbie Parker Wayne, a leading DNA expert
• Michael L. Strauss, an expert on military records

For some webinar series, that would be a year’s worth, but that’s not even the full month of May for Legacy!

The Legacy Family Tree product line doesn’t end with software and webinars, either; they also have produced a large line of downloadable “Legacy QuickGuide” products on many genealogy topics.

You can find out more about Legacy Family Tree webinars at https://familytreewebinars.com/