The Genealogy Guys Podcast & Genealogy Connection

News You Can Use and Share RootsMagic 12 has just been released. MyHeritage has added 338 million records in August and 450 million records in September. Ancestry released an update to its DNA regions. Registration is now open for RootsTech 2027. Drew shares newly released records at FamilySearch. Listener Email Carol writes about obtaining Swiss canton records from FamilySearch online or in person from the FamilySearch Library. George discusses how he used Artificial Intelligence (AI) to generate a handbook of genealogical AI prompts. He steps through his process and how he combined three results into a single prompt library in an MS Word document. Drew describes how he used AI to migrate from one iMac computer to the new Studio and display. The checklist this assistant compiled captured the details and nuances of migrating computers. Please email us at [email protected] with your questions and comments. And please support us on Patreon!

The Guys have been on a hiatus because of Hurricanes Helene and Milton and the damage in Florida. News You Can Use and Share! David Rencher, Chief Genealogy Officer at FamilySearch, received the Italian Heraldic Genealogical Institute's Lifetime Achievement Award. MyHeritage has given its Inbox a fresh new look. MyHeritage added 56 million new records in September 2004. MyHeritage has updated its Theory of Family Relativity facility by 40%. Ancestry has launched its largest update to DNA matches. Findmypast has added large numbers of Cornwall baptisms, marriages, and burials. RootsTech 2025 registration Is now open and an early bird discount registration rate is available through 31 October 2024. Listener Email Kelly asks for suggestions to locate marriage annulment records. Kristina has located her grandfather's WWII draft registration card and wants to know how to proceed to obtain his service records. Jean shares a website, "A Guide to Interpreting Passenger List Annotations" at the JewishGen website. Drew discusses the WikiTree Symposium online on 1-3 November 2024. He will be presenting a talk about Copyright and Plagiarism. Schedule. Please let us hear from you at [email protected] with your questions and comments.

News You Can Use and Share! MyHeritage added 20 million historical records in June. MyHeritage and Family Tree DNA announced a new partnership to connect DNA tests to family trees. JewishGen announced a new partnership between its Romania Research Division and the Jewish Federation of Romania to photograph and document Jewish graves. Drew talks about 19.4 million historical records released by FamilySearch in May 2024. Book Review The Guys review the latest book by Nathan Dylan Goodwin, The Deserter's Tale, a new Morton Farrier genealogical crime mystery. Listener Email Sam writes about the new RootsMagic 10 update and the book. Drew warns listeners about some fake book entries in Amazon. Stacy Cole responds to an earlier email about her strategies in researching the James James family in Georgia. The Guys discuss their experiences at the South Carolina Genealogical Society's summer workshop at the South Carolina Department of Archives and History. George shares how Patrick McCawley, the Deputy Director of Archives and Records Management, spent time sharing with him a history of South Carolina's geopolitical organization from colonial times to the present. From parishes to electoral districts to counties and boundary changes, George now has a deeper understanding of South Carolina for his research there. Thank you to all our Patreon supporting members for their support. Your Patreon support helps us improve our technology and provide even more podcast content to you! You can join us for as little as $1 a month or as much as you'd like to contribute. Visit https://www.patreon.com/genealogyguys to get started. And don't forget to order Drew's new book, Generation by Generation: A Modern Approach to the Basics of Genealogy, from Genealogical Publishing Company (https://genealogical.com/) or Amazon.com. Please let us hear from you at [email protected].

News You Can Use and Share! MyHeritage added 71 million historical records in March, including French censuses! MyHeritage added three important New York City historical records collections, including indices and images. MyHeritage has added a multi-photo scanner to the MH mobile app. The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in College Park, Maryland, has unveiled a new Mass Digitization Center. It will address digitizing records in various formats up to 10 times faster yearly. American Ancestors has announced the appointment of Ryan J. Woods as its new President and CEO. Ancestry announced its largest partnership with the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) to date. As part of the project, Ancestry will invest over the next five years to digitize tens of millions of records that will be added to Ancestry.com. Ancestry has made a new record collection available to honor the 125,000 persons of Japanese descent who were unjustly imprisoned in the U.S. between December 1942 and January 1948. FindMyPast has added more recent new records to its collections of Scotland Deaths (1855-2024), England and Wales Deaths (2007-2024), and Northern Ireland Deaths (1980-2024). Listener Email Cathleen describes her research into her mother's paternal grandfather, Georg Sokop, including traditional and DNA investigations. She is looking for advice to extend her research. Don writes about Swedish research, including Swedish churches and membership lists, and the resources at Ancestry and ArchivDigital. Jean-Daniel wrote to thank us for sharing an email about Blaise Farny. He now has a great to-do list. He has located an Ivoryette photo of Farny from 1892, and is investigating to locate the original among family members so that he can see if anything is written on the back. Tom wrote to follow up on slide scanning, and to suggest resources for scanning long panorama photos. He also discusses the Stories Behind the Stars Project, which seeks to preserve and expand the information about the more than 421,000 Americans who lost their lives in WWII. Check the STARS website at https://www.storiesbehindthestars.org/. Nick let us know about his efforts to organize thousands of notes in Evernote, doing several each day. Drew discusses attending his 50th high school reunion, what a wonderful time we had, and how important it was. Drew will be presenting at the South Carolina Genealogical Society Conference on 12-13 July at the South Carolina Department of Archives and History in Columbia. George will also be attending and conducting personal research. Thank you to all our Patreon supporting members for their support. Your Patreon support helps us improve our technology and provide even more podcast content to you! You can join us for as little as $1 a month or as much as you'd like to contribute. Visit https://www.patreon.com/genealogyguys to get started. And don't forget to order Drew's new book, Generation by Generation: A Modern Approach to the Basics of Genealogy, from Genealogical Publishing Company (https://genealogical.com/) or Amazon.com. Please let us hear from you at [email protected].

David from Addison, Texas, is the winner of our drawing for a MyHeritage DNA kit. More drawings will be announced later this year. News You Can Use and Share! RootsTech, the world's largest genealogy conference, takes place in Salt Lake City, Utah, and online next week, 29 February through 2 March 2024. FamilySearch International and American Ancestors announced a collaboration on the 10 Million Names Project. The project "seeks to recover the names and restore information to families of the estimated 10 million men, women, and children of African descent who were enslaved in pre- and post-colonial America, including the area that would become the United States." DNA Segment In our DNA Segment, DNA expert Diahan Southard discusses Ancestry DNA with Drew Smith. Listener Email Douglas responds regarding our discussion of slide and negative scanners. He reminds people to check with their local library for the availability of a scanner for checkout. He was able to use a Wolverine slide and negative scanner. (It and the Kodak model discussed on the last podcast are available through Amazon.) Jeannie discusses FamilySearch's computer indexing problems. Mike writes again to provide additional information about the Old Fulton Postcards website and the New York local government historians' (LGH) roles. Ryan asks about two different marriage records dated the same date in adjoining states for the same couple. Laura writes in response to Dennis' questions about writing a family history, and uses the "52 ancestors in 52 weeks" approach presented by Amy Johnson Crow. Matt is seeking a missing Pennsylvania death record from 1914. He has conducted extensive research and is looking for more suggestions. Kristen is seeking advice for locating records for a missing family member, Arthur Tozer. Thank you to all our Patreon supporting members for their support. Your Patreon support helps us improve our technology and provide even more podcast content to you! You can join us for as little as $1 a month or as much as you'd like to contribute. Visit https://www.patreon.com/genealogyguys to get started. Please also tell your friends and your genealogical society about our free podcasts, blog, and the Genealogy Guys Learn subscription education website. And don't forget to order Drew's book, Generation by Generation: A Modern Approach to the Basics of Genealogy, from Genealogical Publishing Company (genealogical.com/) or Amazon.com. Please let us hear from you at [email protected].

News You Can Use and Share! Don't miss the opportunity to win a free MyHeritage DNA Kit. Listen to the MyHeritage ad later in this episode for details on submitting your entry to our raffle. MyHeritage recapped their activities in 2023: 4M DNA kits in their database 9M faces tagged with Photo Tagger 700M historical records added in 366 new collections 320M new Family Tree profiles added 4M MyHeritage and Reimagine mobile app downloaded 19M new Theories of Family Relativity™ New AI tools added: PhotoDater™, AI Record Finder™, and AI Biographer™ 3M photo dates estimated with PhotoDater 26M photos uploaded 2,112 webinars on Legacy Family Tree Webinars 605 articles added to the MyHeritage Wiki George recaps MyHeritage's Historical Record Collections added in December 2023. Drew recaps FamilySearch's 2023 highlights. FamilySearch announced the historic release of the 1931 Census of Canada. Drew shares what to expect from FamilySearch in 2024. DNA Segment Our popular DNA Segment returns with expert Diahan Southard and Drew Smith in conversation about 23andMe. Listener Email Mike writes about genealogy podcasts and the lack of references made to the newspaper research site, Old Fulton New York Postcards website at https://www.fultonhistory.com/ for a collection of New York newspapers and postcard images, and Advantage Archives at https://www.advantagearchives.com/. Sheila writes concerning how to get a "long photo" (30" long x 6" high) scanned and then how to locate software to tag each person's face with their name. The Guys suggest obtaining advice from archivists at university archives and special collections, and state/provincial/national archives, to find out who offer large scanning jobs services. Julie writes to discuss her and her daughter's interesting DNA matches (and non-matches) with another individual on different websites. Dennis's 40 years of collecting data in Germany and Ireland was entered into Family Tree Maker and uploaded to Ancestry. The data seems to have disappeared and he asks for suggestions. He also seeks suggestions about how he and his sisters can/should format the family history they are planning to compile. Laurie writes to ask about the possibility of a researcher being able to bulk-download data from databases such as Ancestry for a specific county. Diana writes to advise us that there is a law in New York state requiring that each county have a county historian to help preserve and promote the history of that county. They can guide you to resources and other organizations. There is a website at https://www.aphnys.gov where you can identify and contact these people. Judy asks for advice and recommendations about sorting potential ancestors who share the same name in a specific area at the same time. Tom has inherited family photos, slides, and negatives from his mother. He is seeking information about scanners to effectively digitize these things. George suggests the Kodak Slide N Scan with a 5" color LCD screen which scans to an SD or SDHS card. Thank you to all our Patreon supporting members for their support. Your Patreon support helps us improve our technology and provide even more podcast content to you! You can join us for as little as $1 a month or as much as you'd like to contribute. Visit https://www.patreon.com/genealogyguys to get started. Please also tell your friends and your genealogical society about our free podcasts, blog, and the Genealogy Guys Learn subscription education website. And don't forget to order Drew's new book, Generation by Generation: A Modern Approach to the Basics of Genealogy, from Genealogical Publishing Company (https://genealogical.com/) or Amazon.com. Please let us hear from you at [email protected].

News You Can Use and Share We just added a new video to the subscription Genealogy Guys Learn site. It is "Archives and Special Collections: An Introduction" by associate librarian emeritus Drew Smith. MyHeritage memorializes two of its employees, Ron Shemer and Ilay Nachman, who were killed on 7 October 2023 at the onset of the Hamas-Israel War. My Heritage announced the addition of 43 million historical records in September 2023. MyHeritage released the 1931 Canada Census with a new index. Drew recaps the highlights of the newest record releases at FamilySearch on 10, 17, and 24 September 2023. Listener Email Gavin reminds everyone to check multiple websites for record collections that may have been indexed differently. He was researching his great-grandfather's family's immigrant arrival at Ellis Island, NY. He searched at MyHeritage and found his wife's brother and family indexed with his great-grandfather's name as the individual they were traveling to meet. He found a great match. He performed a similar search at Ancestry.com, and the result did not show up because Ancestry doesn't index the name of the individual the immigrants were traveling to meet. Therefore, different sites' collections are often indexed differently and may yield different matches and clues. Kayla wrote about her exhaustive efforts to trace her great-uncle, James Edward Farden. The family story is that he went AWOL and disappeared from subsequent records. Judi writes again about her Irish Bannon ancestry and asks Drew and his brother about possible DNA matches with her line. Julie wrote about her great-great-grandmother Ann Marie Delaney, who was born in County Laois in Ireland and immigrated to the U.S. She asked Drew about a possible connection to his ancestors. Drew discusses his 10-day research trip to Ireland with his brother that began on 4 October 2023, with a week in Dublin led by expert Donna Moughty. He shares some places he visited, some of the things he learned, and the vital importance of advance preparations that he recommends for all research trips. Thank you to all our Patreon supporting members for their support. Your Patreon support helps us improve our technology and provide even more podcast content to you! You can join us for as little as $1 a month or as much as you'd like to contribute. Visit https://www.patreon.com/genealogyguys to get started. Please also tell your friends and your genealogical society about our free podcasts, our blog, and our Genealogy Guys Learn subscription education website. And don't forget to order Drew's new book, Generation by Generation: A Modern Approach to the Basics of Genealogy, from Genealogical Publishing Company (https://genealogical.com/) or Amazon.com. Please let us hear from you at [email protected].