Vol 7 Jun 2002

MEETING CHANGE JUL 13^th Meeting has been changed to JUL 20^th
2002 Meeting & Events Schedule
Dedication of Kraemer Library & Community Center
Jul 13, 2002 Workshop on German States - Whitewater
NGS Conference in the States , Milwaukee WI May 15-18^th 2002
May 11, 2002 Meeting - Doing research at WHS Library and Baraboo
May 11, 2002 Meeting - Project – Saint Luke’s Chimes
Guided Visits to Research Sites
July 20, 2002 Meeting

The next meeting will be Jul 20th, 9:30 am at the Kraemer Library & Community Center.

As a general rule, meetings will be held at the library on the 2^nd Saturday of the month at 9:30 am in "odd" months. An email and newsletter will come out before the meeting. Things can change so check the website and watch your mail.

Jan 12 Mar 9 May 11 Jul 20 Sep 14 Nov 9

The new library will be dedicated on Sunday Jun 23, 2002 from 12 noon to 3 p.m.

I will be there with some of my "stuff" to show people. This will be a good opportunity to let people know what our group is about and how we can help them with their family research. The more the merrier. It would be great if you could bring in some of your "good stuff" to display. Hope to see you there.

If you have never attended a genealogical seminar this is a good one to go to. It is dedicated to German research and is sponsored by the German Interest Group - Wisconsin. (GIG is a great group and it is well worth the membership dues $7.50/$10.00 annually just to get their newsletter.)

The cost for the seminar is $21 ($25 for non-members) if you register by June 29^th

The facilities are great. A simple sandwich buffet bar for lunch is included. The speakers will be great. And yes, there will be a VENDOR TABLE selling all sorts of good stuff.

I strongly recommend this seminar. I will be there.

They are trying something new this year, multiple, smaller sessions to choose from instead of one big session for everybody.

8:30 Registration Coffee, Juice & Cinnamon Roll Vendor tables open all day
9:00 Welcome
9:15 Prussia ---- Don Litzer Posen --- La Vern Rippley Rhineland - Jerry Paulson German Script Basics --- Sarah Litzer
10:15 Break
10:45 Schleswig-Holstein - La Vern Rippley Pomerania -- Don Litzer German Bohemia - Robert Paulson
German Gen. Internet ------------ Linda Herrick Travel Routes-------------------- Jerry Paulson
11:45 Lunch (turkey or roast beef on a Hoagie roll, fresh fruit, chips, cookie and soda or coffee)
1:00 Pomerania (repeat)-- Don Litzer East & West Prussia - La Vern Rippley
Hanover--- Carol Knigge More German Script --- Sarah Litzer
2:00 Break
2:30 Mecklenburg -- La Vern Rippley Württemberg -- Linda Herrick Prussia (repeat) ---- Don Litzer
From Hills of Bohemia ------ Robert Paulson Church Records------------------ Carol Knigge

Translation Service:
Sarah Litzer will be available to look at documents you may wish to have translated, and will provide estimates for that service. Bring photocopies (no originals) to leave with her. Translations will not be done that day but will be mailed to your home when completed. All arrangements are made between Sarah and her clients.

Check out their website for more information and a registration form. http://www.rootsweb.com/~wigig/index.html

This was a great conference. It ran from Wed through Sat and you had over 250 different events you could attend. One of the great things about a conference this size, is that the handouts for the various sessions are great. They put all the handouts into a 582 page book so you see what went on in the sessions you couldn't attend.

It was great to see all the "big names" in genealogy and to hear their presentations.

Wisconsin Historical Society Library in Madison - I will meet you at the library and help you research. PRIOR TO GOING YOU SHOULD USE ARCAT & MADCAT AND COME UP WITH A RESEARCH PLAN.

There will be several Saturday trips to the library. The first scheduled trip is Aug 17^th 2002. At the next meeting we will try to set up other visits. (It is possible to have a trip during the week.)

Family History Center - Madison - If you are doing serious family research, you have to use the resources of the Church of Jesus Christ - Latter Day Saints (Mormons). If there is interest in going we can schedule visits. It might good to schedule a visit on a Tuesday and combine this with a visit to the WHS library. At the next meeting I will give an overview of doing research at a FHC.

4405 Regent St. Stake Family History Center Madison, Wisconsin 53705 U.S.A. Phone: 608 238 4844 Hours open: Tues.9a.m.-9p.m.Wed. & Thurs. 6p.m.-9p.m. Sat. 9a.m.-noon (Last updated: May 24, 1999)

Sauk Co Court House & Sauk County Historical Museum- Baraboo - This will definitely be a trip during the week. Probably the earliest we could go would be August or September. Let me know at the next meeting if there is any interest in this visit.

Sauk County Historical Museum at 531 Fourth Avenue year round Tuesday through Saturday, 12-5 p.m.

At the next meeting we will try to firm up dates. Have your calendar available. Check the 2002 Meeting & Events Schedule for weekends that are already booked.

At our last meeting we discussed some of the great research centers in our area.

To start with, you must prepare a research plan before you go. The books and stuff that you are looking for will not just throw themselves at you, you got to find them.

The first step in coming up with a research plan is to know yourself and what you are researching. Surnames, dates, events and locations are important to have written down. A family pedigree / family tree with ancestors' vital dates and locations is an excellent start. Dates are especially important. Dates help narrow your search because there are different sources of data based on the date you are looking for. (Some of this stuff might already be on the Internet.)

The next step in making a research plan is finding out what is available at the research site you are going to. You can find a lot about research sites on the internet.

Making a detailed list of what you want to look for at the research center is the final step. Put a lot of stuff on this list. Not that you are going to get to everything on this. But if things go to heck, you will have several alternate things to research. Having a "plan B" is a good thing.

Once you "know what you know", know what is available and have a detailed research plan you are ready for the road trip.

The best part of the WHS Library is that it is located in Madison. It is close and it is also the ARC site for Sauk County. ( Documents related to counties are kept through out the state at Area Research Centers.)

ARCAT catalogs the Archives Room, MADCAT catalogs the rest

It takes some doing, but you need to get used to using search engines. (This could be the topic of a future training session.)

If you can't find something of interest here you aren't trying hard enough.

As expected, you can find the vital records for Sauk County: birth, death & marriage. They have gone back to their old policy of letting you get your own documents. (They had caught some idiot making "corrections" to the original documents so they went to a check-out system. ) Land records and probate records (across the street) are also available. You can also get area photos from the office of land management.

If you go to Baraboo, you have to stop here. It is like rummaging through your grandmother's attic. It is loaded with good stuff and you never know what you are going to find. They have historical photos, newspaper clippings and stuff about individual families in Sauk County.

Our objective is to "preserve" these books by copying them and making them available to the general public.

We have already made a preliminary contact with St. Luke's church to make sure that this project is "acceptable" to them. When we have all of the details worked out, we will be going back to them with a plan.

For the Jul 20^th 2002 meeting please bring any original copies of the Chimes or Ox's Tail that you have. The first step in our project to try to find the best quality originals that we have available.

These were some "thoughts" (not final decisions) from our last meeting.

We do not want to damage the originals. Because of the way the books were bound, it will be difficult to copy them without taking them apart.

Making a paper copy of these books have a number of drawbacks. Costs in time and money, low quality of final production. We discussed making a limited number of paper copies and giving them to local libraries.

Our primary copy will be in a digital format CD-ROM. This is a much cheaper and easier to use format. The quality of output will be great. For example, there are a lot of group pictures. A regular paper copy will not show enough detail. A digital copy will allow you to blow up the picture so that you can see a person's face in good detail.

A regular scanner has the same problem as a copier, it will require us to "damage" the original. At this time a digital camera with greater than 3 mega-pixels will give us good quality. (I have one that creates output on a CD disk which will make the "copying" quicker.)

I estimate that this will take about 2-3 hours to make our "first" copy. After reviewing our "first" digital copy, we can redo any bad copies.

In addition to making a copy of the full page, we can make copies of individual items on thepages. (This will allow us to zoom in on the photos in great detail.)

Our current plan is to have this project completed in time for Christmas.

Eventually we would like to create a complete name/event index for these books. With a Christmas goal, this is not possible at this time.

The following is a tentative agenda for the next meeting

1. Federal & State Census 1930
2. Family History Centers
3. Visits to research sites
4. Lending library
5. Work on Projects - St Luke's Chimes

Be sure to check the website occasionally. solo18.abac.com/garylhaas/