APG will be awarding its third “Professional Achievement Award” at the Professional Management Conference, Little Rock, Arkansas, September 2, 2009. Elizabeth Shown Mills, CG, CGL, FASG received the award in 2007; and Sandra Hargreaves Luebking received it in 2008.

Nominations for this award can be made by individual APG members, by APG chapters, and by the APG Board of Directors. The Awards Committee will select the award recipient from the nominations. Selection is approved by the Executive Committee. Nominees not selected in a given year may be nominated again in another year.

A member in good standing in APG for at least one year prior to the nomination is eligible.

The criteria for this award is to have a record of exceptional professional achievement with contributions to the field of genealogy through individual excellence and ethical behavior in one or more of the following categories: published research, teaching, public presentations, innovative organizational leadership, writing or editing for professional publications, or successful business achievement by creating valuable products or services; and commitment to advance and promote the highest standards of the field.

Send your nominations to the APG office (admin@apgen.org) by July 10, 2009. Include a summary of how the person you are nominating has contributed to APG and/or the field of genealogy.

Thanks to Kathleen W. Hinckley, CG, Executive Director, Association of Professional Genealogists, for the above item.

Twelve new collections were added to the FamilySearch Record Search pilot this week. International collections were added for Argentina, Australia, Mexico, Netherlands, and Spain. New United States collections were added for Delaware, Massachusetts, New Mexico, Rhode Island, and Utah. Happy searching!

These collections can be searched for free at the FamilySearch.org Record Search pilot (click Search Records, and then click Record Search pilot).

Special thanks to the growing number of online volunteers who help make these collections freely available by donating their time and talents to the FamilySearch Indexing program.

About FamilySearch
FamilySearch International is the largest genealogy organization in the world. Millions of people use FamilySearch records, resources, and services to learn more about their family history. To help in this great pursuit, FamilySearch has been actively gathering, preserving, and sharing genealogical records worldwide for over 100 years. FamilySearch is a nonprofit organization sponsored by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Patrons may access FamilySearch services and resources free online at FamilySearch.org or through over 4,600 family history centers in 132 countries, including the main Family History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah.

TROY [New York] Uncle Sam is an iconic figure known worldwide, but he hasn’t always received respect at home. In 1971, his house at 144 Ferry St. was knocked down just before it was to be featured in a television show.

And Uncle Sam’s local supporters have scrambled recently to find a new home for an exhibit at City Hall now that the local government is poised to move out of the building and into the Verizon building. After considering storefront locations, the Uncle Sam Memorial Foundation has found a partner to help promote the Uncle Sam story.

The exhibit will be going to the Rensselaer County Historical Society, said Jim Shepard, the foundation’s secretary. At the historical society building at 57 Second St., the exhibit will take on a slightly different cast. Details for the revamped exhibit are still to be worked out by the society and the foundation.

“We’re going to be adding some of our artifacts to it,” said Cindy Silkworth, the historical society’s administrator. “It’s still very much in the planning stages.”

Troy meatpacker Samuel Wilson supplied meat to the American army during the War of 1812. Barrels containing the meat were stamped with the letters U.S. They were said by soldiers to stand for “Uncle Sam,” a nickname for Wilson that would come to represent the United States. The first personification of the national symbol dates to the 1850s. In 1961, Congress recognized Wilson as the inspiration for Uncle Sam.

Read the full article by Kenneth C. Crowe II in the July 3, 2009 edition of the Times Union.

Thanks to Pat Morrow for the heads-up on this one.

Assembly Bill 130 will be heard in the Senate Appropriations Committee very soon. It was introduced by Kevin Jeffries (Republican ) of the Temecula area. The Bill was presented at the request of the Recorder Association of California. They want to be able to handle Marriage Records the same as Birth and Death Records. That means that they can black out the Mother’s Maiden name, if the County Recorder chooses. The Recorder also has the option of sending out an informational copy only.

The main concern is what the Recorder of each county may or may not choose to do. At least that is the way it is written today.

As we know, the unfounded fear of ID theft is a worry to Legislatures on the State and National Levels. Yet, research shows that ID Theft is caused by Data Hackers or stolen items from a friend or acquaint!

I urge you to notify the Senate Appropriation’s Committee and your State Representatives of our feelings about access to these public records. Remind them that these records help us to find family and determine if an inherited disease is running through the family lines. That seems to get their attention.

Go to www.senate.ca.gov/ and click on Committees go to: Standing Committee to Appropriations. There you will see the members of the committee and staff information. Call or write these committee members and let them know who important changing this rule is to genealogists world wide!

Go to http://www.legislature.ca.gov/ to find your local representative. When this bill goes to the Senate and Assembly Floor, we will need to jump in and let them know how important access to these records is to us!

We have been advised by Jan Meisels Allen, of the International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies and Chairperson, of Public Records Access and Monitoring Committee to “write to the governor as it can be heard as soon as today and the way this bill is moving it won’t take long for it to pass both houses on the floor.” Urge the governor to veto the bill…” http://gov.ca.gov/interact#contact

Please take a moment to make a call, or write a letter or Fax your thoughts. It will only happen if we take the time to do it now!

Liz Stookesberry Myers
California Alliance of Genealogical Societies
Legislative Committee
562/598-3027

We left Bountiful, Utah and drove to Las Vegas on Wednesday, the 24th. Thursday, we drove on to Burbank and got checked into the Marriott. At 6 am Friday morning, I was outside the back door of the convention center unloading the truck. We got the Family Roots Publishing booth set up and fully functioning by the 12:30 opening of the exhibit hall. For the next 3 days, Patty, Dollarhide and I stayed plenty busy caring for customers who were looking to purchase genealogy books. We just happened to have a few, so most went away happy.

I spoke three times during the Jamboree with good crowds, numbering in the area of 300 each time from what I’m told. Not bad, considering all the GREAT competition I had from other terrific speakers during the same time slots. I also had the privilege of participating in a panel discussion - lasting 2.5 hours - called Son of Blogger… Great fun.

The exhibit hall closed at 3 pm, and Patty and I were on the road by about 6:30. (Dollarhide flew out Monday am) We got into Vegas just after midnight on Sunday and back home in Bountiful about 10 pm last night - dead tired.

Expect to see a lot more blogging after we fill a whole lot of orders that have come in, and get the truck unloaded.

arcalife is an online platform for members to securely store and showcase their genealogy and family history research. Members can showcase and share their work with family friends and relatives. arcalife is a unique family community where you can bring together your life experiences, events, stories, family history and genealogy research, all in one place.

arcalife provides a user-friendly feature-rich environment for social networking, scrapbooking, and information sharing to enhance day to day connectivity. The company’s mission is to support members in using the power of common and shared life experiences to connect family and friends and share a rich and engaging living history of you adventures, memories, and opinions.

Unique features found at arcalife include the following:

• Family Tree: build simply, fast & flexibly - including genealogy rules, ex-relationship & GEDCOM upload.
• Timeline: Display and share your ancestors lives or your own life on a multimedia timeline, play from birth to present day, with audio. A unique view of your life only available at arcalife.
• Time Capsule: Instead of burying the time-capsule in a cornerstone or some such place, lock away your documents and other family history materials, then release them at a preset date to a defined audience.
• Photo Moments: arcalife’s Generation Gallery has era appropriate frames, album book view & carousel. Build and share life’s best photos or life experience albums with the rest of the family.
• Life Cube: The cube will make the best bits of your life flash before your eyes on your own 3D multimedia cube. You can build your life cube and send links to your family and friends.
• Memories and Experiences, Life Profiling: If you want to leave more behind for future generations, arcalife’s guided life profiles will help you chronicle your life or the lives of your ancestors.

Needless to say, I was very impressed with the cool stuff that the site allows genealogists to do. I recommend that you check it out.

Follow arcalife.com at their blog.

Also follow them at http://www.twitter.com/arcalife

BURBANK, Calif. - June 25, 2009 - Genealogy Today announced the second release of the Live Roots search experience. Included in this release are project management tools to help visitors keep track and organize the genealogical resources that they discover while using the search engine.

Throughout the Live Roots search experience, registered members will now see Follow, Comment, Record and Share buttons. These buttons let the members conveniently interface with the new project management tools. Follow is an active bookmarking feature; Comment allows members to post comments on resources; Record lets members make entries in a dynamic research log; and Share is a way to send notices about resources to friends and family via e-mail.

All members will be given a , and may create additional projects as they wish to organized the resources that they wish to track.

Within each project, the following features will be accessible:

• Recent Activity - a running history of your interaction with the Live Roots features.
• Ancestor Notecards - profiles of your brickwall ancestors. These profiles are accessible throughout the Live Roots search experience, reducing the times you need to retype the names that you frequently search for.
• Related Resources - items that are “followed”, providing a quick method of revisiting them, and when transcriptions are followed, a unique way to search across the items you find most relevant to your research.
• Research History - the dynamic research log. Capture all of your online and offline research activities, whether it be searching an online database or mailing away for documents from an archive.
• Personal Library - catalog your own private collection. A convenient way to simplify research log entries and also a way to share access to your unique resources via lookups.
• Research Notepad - a simple notepad for recording miscellaneous items related to your research: clues, follow-up todo lists, anything you like.
• External Resources - allows members to configure links to their research activities on other websites (e.g. Flickr, Scribd, Twitter, etc.).

“While we are all very passionate about working on our family histories, the reality is that life frequently interrupts us,” commented Illya D’Addezio, owner of Genealogy Today. “With the addition of these new features, Live Roots is better equipped to assist genealogists when these interruptions occur. Follow items that you may want to return to; Post comments to remind yourself what you intended to search for; Record activities that you completed to avoid doing them over again in the future; and Share items with fellow researchers that may have the time to investigate them when you don’t.”

In order to access the project management section and the follow/comment/record/share buttons, you will need to become a Team Roots member. This free service was launched in 2001 to provide visitors of GenealogyToday.com with password protected access to special features and content, and is also available on the LiveRoots.com web site.

For additional information, visit: http://www.liveroots.com/genealogy/research.html

I am pleased to again announce that the folks at NewspaperARCHIVE.com appreciate what we’re doing with GenealogyBlog, and are now officially SPONSORING this website. I’m very thankful for the support of NewspaperARCHIVES as well as the support of my readers who purchase their services.

The following list is alphabetical - first by state, then by city, then newspaper and the dates of those posted over the weekend.

ALASKA
Fairbanks, Alaska
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner (1932-1934)

ARKANSAS
Blytheville, Arkansas
Blytheville Courier News (1932-1937)

Camden, Arkansas
Camden Times (1932-1937)

Hope, Arkansas
Hope Star (1931)

CALIFORNIA
Covina, California
Covina Argus Citizen (1932-1934)

Oakland, California
Oakland Tribune (1935)

Ukiah, California
Ukiah Dispatch Democrat (1931-1936)
Redwood Journal (1931) (1935-1936)
Ukiah Republican Press (1934-1936)

ILLINOIS
Carbondale, Illinois
Free Press, The (1931) (1935)

INDIANA
Greensburg, Indiana
Greensburg Daily News (1931-1936)

Logansport, Indiana
Logansport Pharos-Tribune (1931-1934)

IOWA
Algona, Iowa
Algona Upper Des Moines (1932-1937)
Kossuth County Advance (1932-1934)

Altoona, Iowa
Altoona Herald, The (1932) (1934-1937)

Bayard, Iowa
Bayard News, The (1936)

Carroll, Iowa
Carroll Daily Herald (1934 - 1937)

Estherville, Iowa
Estherville Enterprise, The (1932-1937)
Estherville Daily News (1932-1937)
Vindicator And Republican (1932-1933) (1936)

Hawarden, Iowa
Hawarden Independent (1931-1936)

Humboldt, Iowa
Humboldt Independent (1933-1936)

Rock Valley, Iowa
Rock Valley Bee (1931-1936)

Sioux Center, Iowa
Sioux Center News (1935 - 1936)

Sumner, Iowa
Sumner Gazette (1936)

Wapello, Iowa
Wapello County Supervisors Books (1933)

Williamsburg, Iowa
Williamsburg Journal Tribune (1931) (1933-1936)

MARYLAND
Cumberland, Maryland
Cumberland Evening Times (1933) (1935-1937)

Hagerstown, Maryland
Morning Herald (1931-1933) (1936-1937)
Daily Mail, The (1934-1937)

MASSACHUSETTS
North Adams, Massachusetts
North Adams Transcript (1931-1934)

MICHIGAN
Ironwood, Michigan
Ironwood Times, The (1932-1936)

Marshall, Michigan
Marshall Evening Chronicle (1931-1936)

MISSISSIPPI
Greenville, Mississippi
Daily Democrat-Times, The (1936-1937)
Weekly Democrat-Times, The (1936)

MISSOURI
Jefferson City, Missouri
Daily Capital News (1932-1937)
Daily Capital News and Jefferson City Post-Tribune (1932-1933)

MONTANA
Billings, Montana
Billings Gazette (1936)

NEW MEXICO
Clovis, New Mexico
Clovis New Mexico Evening News-Journal (1932-1934)

Gallup, New Mexico
Gallup Independent and Evening Herald, The (1932) (1934-1936)/em>