Historic Happenings Blog

Bergen Roots—Part Two: Church, Cemetery, Wills, & GSBC Resources Genealogical Society of Bergen County, NJ On-Line Seminar Monday, June 15, 2020, at 2 PM – 3:30 PM Join us as we talk about all things Bergen County! Over two sessions, we will dive into County-specific topics, history, and resources with the experts, historians, and genealogists who know Bergen County, New Jersey, best. Bergen Roots—Part One: Monday, 1 June @ 2pm Genealogies & County Histories; Newspapers & Land Records REGISTER: https://register.gotowebinar.com/register/8248219979138168335 Bergen Roots—Part Two: Monday, 15 June @ 2pm Church & Cemetery Records; Probate & Wills; GSBC Website Resources REGISTER: https://register.gotowebinar.com/register/3714471742934309391 Any level of questions—from beginner to expert—is welcome. We will try to answer as many as we can and may follow up with you after the session to help. We will field questions during the sessions but you can also present a question t...

The Genealogical Society of New Jersey 2020 Spring Conference Saturday, June 6th, 2020 Join us for a Virtual Conference! Registration Deadline: June 3rd, 2020 Presentations on Immigrant Records, Irish Ancestors, Genetic Genealogy, African American Cemeteries, NJ Revolutionary, and Civil War Ancestors and Writing Your Family History to help you advance your research!   Registration is open for the Genealogical Society of New Jersey 2020 Conference!  See     https://www.gsnj.org/gsnj-2020-springgenealogyconference/    for details and registration.

Finding Your Family and Ancestors in One Click with MyHeritage Thursday, June 4, 2020 4 PM – 5:30 PM On-Line Webinar Genealogical Society of Bergen County Daniel Horowitz, MyHeritage’s Genealogy Expert. will be presenting FIVE live sessions to help you use this special time to make progress on your family history research. Enjoy these presentations from the comfort of your home and submit questions during the Q&A. All sessions are free—register for one or all of the sessions. —— Session 5: “Finding Your Family and Ancestors in One Click With MyHeritage Search Engine” Thursday, 4 June @ 4 pm EDT by Daniel Horowitz MyHeritage search engine is delighting family history fans worldwide. Learn how this search engine works, and how it can benefit your research. Covering billions of records and important repositories and databases, in a single search, it will find the resources you need. Registration URL: https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/2260497357279990288 — To see ALL five sessi...

Bergen Roots—Part One: Histories, Newspapers, and Land Records Genealogical Society of Bergen County, NJ On-Line Seminar Monday, June 1, 2020, at 2 PM – 3:30 PM Join us as we talk about all things Bergen County! Over two sessions, we will dive into County-specific topics, history, and resources with the experts, historians, and genealogists who know Bergen County, New Jersey, best. Bergen Roots—Part One: Monday, 1 June @ 2pm Genealogies & County Histories; Newspapers & Land Records REGISTER: https://register.gotowebinar.com/register/8248219979138168335 Bergen Roots—Part Two: Monday, 15 June @ 2pm Church & Cemetery Records; Probate & Wills; GSBC Website Resources REGISTER: https://register.gotowebinar.com/register/3714471742934309391 Any level of questions—from beginner to expert—is welcome. We will try to answer as many as we can and may follow up with you after the session to help. We will field questions during the sessions but you can also present a question to us in...

MyHeritage's New Advanced Features and Technologies Thursday, May 28, 2020 4 PM – 5:30 PM On-Line Webinar Genealogical Society of Bergen County Daniel Horowitz, MyHeritage’s Genealogy Expert. will be presenting FIVE live sessions to help you use this special time to make progress on your family history research. Enjoy these presentations from the comfort of your home and submit questions during the Q&A. All sessions are free—register for one or all of the sessions. —— Session 4: “MyHeritage's NEW Advanced Features and Technologies” Thursday, 28 May @ 4 pm EDT by Daniel Horowitz An advance review of new features and technologies on MyHeritage, the online family history service. Take full advantage of MyHeritage's unmatched technologies to help you find long-lost relatives, with: The tree Consistency Checker, PedigreeMap, Theory of Family Relativity, Calendar and Events, Statistics, Pedigree Tree, Charts, Relationship Report, Surveys, and more. Registration URL: https://a...

Find Relatives Without Really Searching With MyHeritage Daniel Horowitz, MyHeritage’s Genealogy Expert. will be presenting FIVE live sessions to help you use this special time to make progress on your family history research. Enjoy these presentations from the comfort of your home, and submit questions during the Q&A. All sessions are free—register for one or all of the sessions. —— Session 3: “Find Relatives Without Really Searching With MyHeritage” Thursday, 21 May @ 4 pm EDT by Daniel Horowitz MyHeritage tools help you find relatives effortlessly with top-of-the-line technology: Instant Discoveries help you grow your tree and enrich individuals’ information with personal photos; Smart Matching can extend your family tree and can reunite you with long lost relatives; Record Matching looks at billions of records automatically and provides the actual records. Registration URL: https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/3917477873011079184 — To see ALL five sessions, visit our websit...

Organizing Your DNA Matches Workshop: Using the Leeds Method Thursday, May 18, 2020 2 PM – 3:30 PM On-Line Webinar Genealogical Society of Bergen County, Bolger Heritage Center, Ridgewood Public Library The Leeds Method is a simple and logical way to organize your 2nd, 3rd, and possibly 4th cousin matches by family lines using color clustering—regardless of which DNA testing company you use. This FREE webinar workshop will be organized in two parts, lectures include: – Part 1 (18 May, 2pm) covers the construction of a simple Leeds spreadsheet and analysis; – Part 2 (20 May, 2pm) covers advanced topics like including 4th cousins and identifying a common surname. The webinar-workshop will also include a downloadable worksheet and sample spreadsheet. Attendees should have a basic understanding of your DNA results (Note: NOT for DNA newbies.) Experience with spreadsheets (Excel, Google Sheets, etc.) is helpful, but not required. REGISTER for this Webinar-workshop, here: https://attendee.go...

Planting a Family Tree Online on MyHeritage Thursday, May 14, 2020 4 PM – 5:30 PM On-Line Webinar Daniel Horowitz, MyHeritage’s Genealogy Expert. will be presenting FIVE live sessions to help you use this special time to make progress on your family history research. Enjoy these presentations from the comfort of your home and submit questions during the Q&A. All sessions are free—register for one or all of the sessions. —— Session 2: “Planting a Family Tree Online on MyHeritage” Thursday, 14 May @ 4 pm EDT by Daniel Horowitz Learn how to build an online family tree in the free and friendly website MyHeritage.com. Enter detailed information, upload images, and use, invite, and share information with family members. Find long lost relatives and historical records for every person in your family. Registration URL: https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/4176224844863941392 — To see ALL five sessions, visit our website: https://www.njgsbc.org/event/thursdays-with-myheritage/

GSBC “Ask the Experts” Online! (Session 2) Hosted by Genealogical Society of Bergen County, NJ  Monday, May 11, 2020, at 2 PM – 3:30 PM Online On Monday, 4 May (2 pm) and Monday 11 May (7 pm), the GSBC is bringing its popular “Ask the Experts” online! This event will be free and open to the public and is a great opportunity to pick our brains about all things related to researching your family history. In preparation for this event, we are asking for questions in advance, so that we can make sure the experts we ask to participate are the best fit for your questions. So what types of questions can you ask? – Questions about your New Jersey and/or Bergen County family—and how to find them – Questions about general research challenges and problems – Questions about online research and where to find stuff – Questions about "brick wall" problems (just make sure they are broad, i.e., "how can I find my mid-1800s soldier-ancestor" rather than super-specific, i.e., "wh...

Family Tree Builder Free Software Thursday, May 7, 2020 4 PM – 5:30 PM On-Line Webinar Daniel Horowitz, MyHeritage’s Genealogy Expert. will be presenting FIVE live sessions to help you use this special time to make progress on your family history research. Enjoy these presentations from the comfort of your home and submit questions during the Q&A. All sessions are free—register for one or all of the sessions. —— Session 1: “Family Tree Builder Free Software” Thursday, 7 May @ 4 pm EDT by Daniel Horowitz Family Tree Builder is a popular, free, software that is well suited for genealogy, with full support in more than 40 languages. Learn how to create trees, reports, publish and share research over the Internet, and learn the advanced technologies available only in Family Tree Builder. Registration URL: https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/6470371249381191696 — To see ALL five sessions, visit our website: https://www.njgsbc.org/event/thursdays-with-myheritage/

GSBC “Ask the Experts” Online! (Session 1) Hosted by Genealogical Society of Bergen County, NJ  Monday, May 4, 2020, at 2 PM – 3:30 PM Online On Monday, 4 May (2 pm) and Monday 11 May (7 pm), the GSBC is bringing its popular “Ask the Experts” online! This event will be free and open to the public and is a great opportunity to pick our brains about all things related to researching your family history. In preparation for this event, we are asking for questions in advance, so that we can make sure the experts we ask to participate are the best fit for your questions. So what types of questions can you ask? – Questions about your New Jersey and/or Bergen County family—and how to find them – Questions about general research challenges and problems – Questions about online research and where to find stuff – Questions about "brick wall" problems (just make sure they are broad, i.e., "how can I find my mid-1800s soldier-ancestor" rather than super-specific, i.e., "wha...

Moments in Time: The Importance of Primary Sources Hosted by Burlington County Lyceum of History & Natural Sciences Monday, May 4, 2020, at 4 PM – 5:00 PM Online Join us for our first Zoom presentation!  Primary sources are of great importance for future generations of researchers and genealogists. They often take you back to a time long since forgotten and provide vital information on some of the histories well-known, and some lesser-known, events. This presentation will illustrate the importance of primary sources by examining a Revolutionary War diary and Civil War correspondence. We then invite you to create and share your own first-hand account of our time to be read and listened to by future generations. To register, go to https://secure.rec1.com/NJ/burlington-county-nj-/catalog

Registration OPEN—Jersey Roots Genealogy: NJ Room, Rutgers Monday, April 27, 2020, at 7 PM – 9 PM Online GSBC General Meeting Monday, 27 April 2020 @ 7pm FREE ONLINE WEBINAR Watch this presentation from the comfort of your home computer. REGISTRATION IS NOW OPEN, here: https://register.gotowebinar.com/register/4713570470678057741 —— Michelle Tucker Chubenko Jersey Roots Genealogy: Using the New Jersey Room, Special Collections & University Archives, Rutgers University An introduction to the New Jersey source material and available research tools for collections on deposit at Alexander Library, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ.  Free and open to the public—all are welcome! —— Michelle Tucker Chubenko is a professional genealogist who has over 27 years of experience in researching families in New Jersey, Maryland, southwest Virginia, and Oklahoma/Indian Territory, and countries in Europe including Latvia, Lithuania, Ukraine, Poland, Austria, and Germany. She is the founder o...

FYI, our colleagues at the Newark Public Library have organized two online programs related to Newark history and started a COVID-19 archive: -- Thursday, April 23 at 1 pm :  Newark genealogy talk via Zoom with professional genealogists Melissa Johnson and Mark A.J. Szep discussing their extensive experience researching Newark family history.  They will talk about repositories, sources, and strategies for researching Newark family history at a time when all repositories are closed. Details for how to join will be posted on NPL's website before the event. - -COVID-19 archive . The Library is asking those who live, work, or go to school in Newark to contribute written and/or visual reminiscences to their COVID-19 Archive. Written memories of no more than 1500 words, and/or photos with captions and/or short videos (no more than 5 minutes) can be emailed to  njreference@npl.org . More information at:  https://npl.org/documenting-an-incredible-mom...

Sunday, March 8 – Monmouth County The Monmouth County Genealogy Society “Doing Time - Prison Records as Genealogy Resources”     Judy Russell, The Legal Genealogist, will speak at the Monmouth County Genealogy Society meeting on Sunday, March 8, 2020, at the Community Center, 72 Broad Street, Eatontown. She will be speaking on “Doing Time - Prison Records as Genealogy Resources.”   Join us for refreshments and networking at 1:30 P.M. followed by the business meeting and speaker at 2 P.M. Admission is free and the public is welcome.     “The brick walls of a family tree are no match for prison walls”, Ms. Russell writes about this topic. “From intake photo to receipts for cash and clothes when they see release, prisoners in jails and prisons were recorded and documented, often in stunning detail.” Her audience will learn what records may exist about their families’ wayward members, at least the ones who got caught, and wher...

Thursday, February 13 – Union County The Genealogical Society of the West Fields Meeting Thursday, February 13, 2020      The Genealogical Society of the West Fields invites you to join Jacquelyn Oshman of the New Brunswick Free Public Library on Thursday, February 13, 2020.  The meeting will be held at 1:00 pm in the Westfield Memorial Library, 550 East Broad Street, Westfield, NJ.      Jacquelyn Oshman has been a reference librarian at the New Brunswick Free Public Library for 15 years. She specializes in local history and genealogy and has given genealogy presentations to numerous organizations around New Jersey. Her presentation will focus on  the collections held at the New Brunswick Free Public Library that are most widely used by researchers and how they can help genealogists in the area.