ROOTS & BRANCHES

I generally write “Roots & Branches” about one week ahead of when it “goes live,” so there have been rare instances in which it has become outdated during that lag time.

Likely you know where I’m going with this. Like just about everything else, the Coronavirus is stalking the genealogy world.

Specifically, live genealogy events that typically drawn hundreds or even thousands of people are being cancelled in an attempt to forestall the spread of the virus.

Several events that I was going to attend have been dropped already and I fully expect that more cancellations and postponements to come shortly. This is a very bad year to be in charge of programming, unfortunately!

In the average year, I have two dozen or so genealogy speaking dates, usually sponsored by a mix of national, state and regional societies, as well as those on behalf of libraries and groups that are more local.

Some are part of larger, multiday conferences, while others are single-day, single-speaker events and still others are at groups’ monthly meetings.

An increasing segment of programming has been so-called “webinars,” in which my PowerPoint presentation and my voice (and occasionally video) are made available over the Internet.

The reason that the number of webinars has been growing is simply that it’s a way for a society to bring its programming to members who may be distant from the society’s geographic base (many societies have had large proportions of “distance members” for a long time, mostly county and local groups who appeal to people with ancestors from those areas).

While many state groups have made webinar programming a staple of their programming diet, I get the sense that county and other local groups have felt daunted by the technology. Or perhaps thinking that changing most or all programming to virtual will deny them the “social-ness”—wanting to get together—that was the initial impetus for the group.

But in these days when “social distance” is being proclaimed as a goal to tamp down the spread of Coronavirus … maybe this is the moment for groups to take the plunge and go digital, at least for the meantime and maybe permanently!

Start with any computer savvy members of your own group. Then look to see if you can get tech help from some of the known online gurus such as Thomas MacEntee or Pat “Dear Myrtle” Richley-Erickson and Russ Worthington. If you don’t know these folks, Google away and you’ll see the sort of stuff they’ve been doing online for years.

Thank goodness that even hunkered down at home, today’s Internet genealogy sites can allow you a lot of access and hours of activity as we work to triumph over Coronavirus!