ROOTS & BRANCHES

When I finished chairing the 2021 International German Genealogy Partnership’s online conference—a wildly successful event that literally “brought back from the dead” an event originally scheduled as an in-person get-together before COVID-19 hit—I was left with a sense of “what’s next?” in my professional life.

Little did I know that Kathryn Donahue, then Board secretary (and now a vice president) of the Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania, had plans for me.

Donahue had been a registrant for the IGGP conference and was enthralled by what the conference offered, and immediately thought GSP should do something similar.

Long story short is that just short of two years later, I’m assisting Donahue in producing “Pennsylvania’s Genealogy Event” or PaGE, an all-virtual conference running from Aug. 5 –12 on the highly interactive Whova event platform.

Among the “must see” features will be one of the keynote addresses by State Archivist David Carmicheal, who is preparing an exclusive, “first look” video from behind the scenes of the move by the Pennsylvania State Archives into its new building, expected to be fully occupied shortly after the conference.

Other keynoters on the opening and closing Saturdays of the conference will talk about the past, present, and future of Pennsylvania family history will include some of the biggest names in the Pennsylvania and genealogy world and beyond—FamilySearch’s Chief Genealogy Officer David Rencher; DNA expert Blaine Bettinger; Adrienne Whaley from Philadelphia’s cutting-edge Museum of the American Revolution; and material culture expert Lisa Minardi, formerly of Winterthur Museum and now with the Lutheran archives in Philadelphia.

 In addition to the keynoters, the middle days of the conference will include a large program of pre-recorded sessions on Pennsylvania topics from a mixture of familiar names as well as new presenters. These will be people such as: Elissa Powell, one of western Pennsylvania’s leading genealogists and co-founder of the Genealogical Research Institute of Pittsburgh; Sharon Cook MacInnes of Ancestor Tracks; Michael Lacopo, a German and church records expert; renowned Legal Genealogist Judy Russell; Jill Morelli on family history writing; immigration and naturalization expert Rich Venezia.

Even better, these pre-recorded sessions will be dropped in batches on Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday of the conference for viewing at your leisure; best of all, most of these speakers have committed to doing live Q&A periods during the event.

There will also be Sponsors and Exhibitors offering deals and prizes for participation in the Expo Hall. There will be scheduled “Gatherings” (these topics will be announced soon) available as well as the opportunity for impromptu Meetups (where participants themselves choose the topics) and even one-on-one chats with other attendees.

Most features of the event will remain available for three months on the Whova app.

There are several registration options for page, but the “All-Access” package offers everything over the eight days of the event for a GSP member discount price of $199 until June 30.

To register, go to the URL, https://genpa.org/programs-and-events/