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What's Coming Up
September 2020
Monday, September 21st WWCGS General Membership Meeting
(via Zoom Webinar)
Guest Speaker: Jessica Trotter is an Archivist with a Master of Science in Information, Archives and Records Management Specialization from the University of Michigan. Ms Trotter works in Lansing for the Capital Area District Libraries, Collection Development Department. Jessica’s background is as a genealogist and genealogy instructor. She has presented regionally for the past six years including annually for the Archives of Michigan Abrams Foundation Family History Seminar, for the Genealogy Center at Allen County Public Library, and at the NGS Conference in 2018. In addition to today's topic “British Isles to Canada to Michigan”, Jessica has presented on African-American Research, Cluster Research, the TB Epidemic of the late 19th / early 20th century, Finding Non-Traditional Records, genealogy basics, DNA, resources and researching local history collections, immigrant ancestors, and scandalous ancestors. Her genealogy research areas include the Midwest, African American, British Isles, Canadian, and Early American research. She also maintains a genealogy research related blog called Genie Road Trip at http://genieroadtrip.com
Topic: “British Isles to Canada to Michigan”
This session looks at this popular migration pattern for British Imperial subjects and explores resources available to researchers studying families who traveled these routes.
October 2020
Monday, October 19th WWCGS General Membership Meeting
(via Zoom Webinar)
Guest Speaker: Alexander Tolksdorf is a financial analyst for the Ford Motor Company, the President of the Ford Genealogy Club, and a native resident of the Metro Detroit area. He has been active in researching his family for over 10 years, starting with a high school class trip to Ellis Island in 2009. Paternally, his family is German, primarily from the Prussian provinces of Westphalia, Posen, and East Prussia. Maternally, his family roots are Ukrainian, Belarusian, and Lithuanian. All four of his grandparents immigrated to the United States in the 1950s following the Second World War; as such, the majority of his research experience and focus is in German and Eastern European sources.
Topic: “Tracing Your Belarus Roots”
Eastern Europe has an extremely complex history, and until more recently, was mostly closed off to outside genealogical research, owing primarily to the nature of the Soviet Union. This presentation will provide an introduction to Belarus and its history, as well as explore research methods and strategies to tracing your Belarusian ancestors in one of the most difficult areas to research in Europe.
November 2020
Monday, November 16th WWCGS General Membership Meeting
(via Zoom Webinar)
Guest Speaker: Sue Cromwell Sue has been a member of the WWCGS for over 25 years. She is also a member of the Famington Genealogical Society and has served as its president in the past. Sue started her researching back in 1978, and has written eight (8) family history books of her parents' families. She is now researching her husband's families. Most recently, Sue finished a 642 page book about her life story!!!
Topic: “If You Don't Write It, It Will Be Gone Forever!”
You have done many years of research and have located a lot of information. So what are you going to do with it? You're going to write it down by way of a very readable family story. “ I always do things the easy way, so I can show you how as well”
Want to Become a WWCGS Member? Or Need to Renew?
Want to join the WWCGS? It's easy. Just download the form via the link below, complete & sign the form, then return it along with your annual dues payment.
If you are already a member but have not renewed your membership yet for 2020-2021, you must do so soon before the grace period expires and you lose your membership rights including access to the members-only sections of this website. To renew your membership simply download the form via the link below, complete & sign the form, and return it along with your annual dues payment.
Ways to Get Involved
Want to become more involved with your Society? Here are some ways that you can help make your WWCGS better for everyone:
1) Become a part of the Hospitality Committee by:
(a) signing up to be one of two or three members who provide the break-time snacks for a given monthly General Membership Meeting. Action Step: Contact one of the Hospitality Committee Co-Chairs Marge Najarian or Charlotte Neary.
or
(b) Volunteering to help arrange tables and chairs prior to a monthly General Membership Meeting. Action Step: Simply show up at the Livonia Senior Center about 5PM on the day of a scheduled Monday membership meeting and seek out Hospitality Committee Logistics Coordinator Raul Rodriguez.
2) Attend a monthly board meeting and learn about the planning and work that goes into making your Society what it is. Action Step: Just show up at the Livonia Civic Center Library by 6:30pm on the date of a scheduled board meeting (usually the 2nd Wednesday of the month).
3) Join the Cemetery Committee and help with one of its ongoing projects of canvassing, transcribing and/or photographing area cemetery grave markers. Action Step: Contact the Cemetery Committee Chair John Mills.
4) Contribute a family history research experience, a special family history photograph, or an interesting story from your family history for publication in the WWCGS newsletter. Action step: Contact Newsletter Chair Harvey DeWitt.
5) Join the Query Management Team and help respond to or redirect inquiries received by the Society. Action step: Contact Vice-President Mary Hazlett.
6) Volunteer as an indexer. There are indexing oportunities through the WWCGS' Transcription Guild Team working in conjunction with the Michigan Archives and FamilySearch.org. The team is scheduling one or two indexing work nights a month at the Westland Family History Center. Action step for Transcription Guild projects: Contact Team Leader John Mills for more details about volunteering.
WWCGS is also involved in genealogy indexing projects at the Livonia Civic Center Library. One library project involves indexing engagement and marriage notices that have appeared in the Livonia Observer newspaper. The newspapers are on microfilm and would require a time commitment of about two hours per work session using a microfilm reader at the Library. There is no minimum nor maximum number of work sessions for which you need to volunteer. Another Library project involves creating surname only indices for genealogical books at the Library for which no such index exists. This work may be done at home. Action step for Library projects: Contact WWCGS Librarian Shirley Connors or send an email to info@wwcgs.org with “Library Volunteer” in the subject line.
7) Volunteering for a Roundtable. This involves simply sharing a personal research story, a brickwall find, or possibly something new you found on a website. An experience shared with others for 20 minutes or more will undoubtively spark questions and comments and make for a very good round table discussion. Examples: Mary Hazlett talked about the WWCGS wewbsite in September, 2018. In November, 2018, Steve Schwartz shared his experiences with census research and how he tracks all the discoveries he's found. In May, 2018, Loretta Dunham shared information on the vast holding of the Monroe County Archives. Action step: Contact President Harvey DeWitt to discuss your ideas.
