Showing posts with label Brian Gilchrist. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Brian Gilchrist. Show all posts

Saturday, January 31, 2009

OGS Conference information is now online!

I was just going around my weekly check of things on the Internet recently, and I said to myself, " I wonder if they have put anything about Conference '09 on the OGS site?" - and by gosh, they had!

In fact, they have put the whole thing on - so you can go ahead and check the program, see who's coming, and what special events will be happening.

One of the features will be the celebrating of the 300th anniversary of the Palatines, with features by prominent Palatine researchers on the Irish Palatines who settled in Ontario.

I will be there Thursday evening, and starting Friday, I will be on the tour of the new Ontario Archives and will cut it a bit short to come back and see the Graduation Ceremony of the National Institute for Genealogical Studies, as well as the Opening Ceremonies of the conference.

Kory L. Meyerink is slated to speak at the J. Richard Houston Memorial Lecture that evening, and a reception will follow.

On Saturday, it's off to an early start. At 8:00 a.m., Brian Gilchrist will start the day off by giving his talk at the Plenary Session entitled, "Pedigree and Progress: Making Connections in the Digital Age from the Printed Page".

The rest of the day I am going to hear a couple of lectures and go around the "Marketplace" and say my "Hellos!" to old friends and new acquaintances.

Saturday night, I will go to the banquet and hear Charlotte Gray speak, and on Sunday, I will be going around taking pictures and getting more news for the OGS NewsLeaf and e-NewsLeaf. There will be the closing ceremonies in the afternoon.

I plan to blog while I am there, and after the conference I hope to stay in Toronto for a couple of days and visit around to see what has appeared since I was there last summer.

If you want to see the material that has been put on the OGS website, please go to www.ogs.on.ca/conference.

Sunday, November 2, 2008

The first question out of Brian Gilchrist——the Reference Archivist of The Region of Peel Archives who was at the Library and Archives Canada yesterday to give the second annual Ryan Taylor Memorial Lecture——was the question, "How savvy a researcher do you think you are?"

And this was just the first of many questions he asked during his lecture, the purpose which was to spur everybody on to evaluate their research - what is the quality of your research?

Do you, as you are supposed to, always work from the known to the unknown? Do you always ask the correct question of fellow genealogists, librarians, and archivists?

Do you think about how many levels there may be to your question? Is there a difference between what you need to know and want to know? And when do you need to know it?

I was reminded of a question that I have had since I started my own genealogy in 1994. That is why my g-g-g-g-grandfather Andrew BARCLAY had listed as his occupation - a bookbinder, and not as a farmer as was his father's business?

He was not the first son, so he did not get the land owned by the Barclay's in Kinrossshire, Scotland ... so was else was he to do? But bookbinding seemed so off the wall at first glance. Why bookbinding?

Through research I found that his grandfather had been a bookbinder in Edinburgh! And that area of Scotland there had been a huge trade in printing, and bookbinding, a profession he would take with him to the United States in c1760.

But maybe the most important question Brian asked through the entire lecture was the one he finished with - "What legacy have we left behind?"

That is perhaps the most important question these days since so many Canadian genealogists over the past three or four years have died. (In our immediate area, there are three nationally-known genealogists—-Sandra Devlin, Ryan Taylor, and Paul McGrath——who have passed on since 2005). Where has their work gone? What has happened to it?

Have you made a provision in your will to give direction to your executive as what to do with your papers, photos, video, and anything else you may have discovered along the way? What will happen to your genealogical "stuff"?

These questions he raised yesterday have made me think. I plan to finish the BARCLAY genealogy over this winter, and post it to the Internet as well do a limited production run of it to give to the Shelburne County Genealogical and Archives in Shelburne, Nova Scotia. I also have photos, certificates, and other family memorabilia which I plan to give to them for safekeeping, and for other people to research.

So, have you done the same thing with the "stuff" you have collected?

Thursday, September 11, 2008

Ottawa Branch Sends "News"

The Ottawa Branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society has just sent out the "News" this week - the August-October, 2008 newsletter.

This issue is 55 pages long, and covers such topics as The Early Carleton County Settlers (Early Medical Practitioners in Carleton County and The Lillico Family Chain Migrants to Gloucester Township, Ontario); Early Residents of Ottawa's Sandy Hill Neighbourhood; Celebrating Beechwood Women! Beechwood Cemetery 14th Annual Historical Tour; and the section titled, Old-Time Stuff covers Early Trangraphs.

They have a section called "News", which really brings you up-to-date about what's going on in the National Capital Region of Ottawa-Gatineau.

In this issue, they have set the date for the Gene-O-Rama conference for March 27 and 28, 2009 and the special focus will be on the census. The Ryan Taylor Memorial Lecture will be held November 1st, with Brian Gilchrist talking about developing a Research Strategy. On Tuesday, September 16, there will be a meeting of the OGS in which Marc St-Jacques will talk about Searching Gatineau Archives.

In the "Electronic Noteboard" is the latest of the websites on the Internet, and Heather Oakley always does an interesting article about places to check on the Internet.

It is interesting to note that Mike More, the Chair of the Ottawa Branch of the OGS, states that their attendance is down 5% per year since the late 1990s.

They, unlike the Nova Scotia Genealogy Society, aren't thinking about cutting back on the number of issues on the newsletter but are looking for a Publicity Coordinator to get the message out about their meetings, etc.

Are you interested?

Contact Mike More at <chair@ogsottawa.on.ca>.