23 January 2007

The Genealogy Community

I try and keep an eye on visits to this blog and have noticed a slight surge in hits by new visitors today. I wasn't sure why, then had a look at my Bloglines search file. I have a standing search for "genealogy" combined with a few negative search terms to filter out some of the garbage. Anyway, I spotted that I've been tagged by Family Matters: tech support for the family historian.

I'm not entirely sure what's involved, but as I understand the game I'm supposed to reveal some little know facts about myself, and finish with some links (tags?) to other genealogy blogs I read. Here goes.

  • Anglo-Celtic-Connections is a rip off of Anglo-Celtic Roots, the quarterly chronicle of the British Isles Family History Society of Greater Ottawa (BIFHSGO). I've been compiling a monthly email newsletter that goes to BIFHSGO members a week before each monthly meeting. Last March I decided to start previewing some of those items in this blog which is now passed 200 posts.
  • My computer skills go back a long way but are pretty rusty. I first learned to program at the University of London (England) in the mid 1960s using the ATLAS computer and CHLF3 autocode. Anyone hear of them?
  • In my teens I was once an extra in a movie, and have done TV interviews including as a subject expert on History Television Canada on the most deadly US hurricane, 1900 landfall at Galveston, as it continued north to Canada and then east to Newfoundland waters where more than 100 people were killed.
  • I have been a resident of Ottawa for more than 20 years, but have also lived in Toronto, Fort Collins (CO), Winnipeg, Montreal, Halifax, and back in the UK in Leicestershire and Norfolk.
  • I'm still lamenting the loss last year of genealogist Ryan Taylor, who, reflecting on the friendships generated, said "I enjoyed all the memories. That's the real truth about family history."
Now for the hard part as I don't read many genealogy blogs, preferring to find things via the Bloglines route mentioned above. Naturally I read Dick Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter (Blog). Are podcasts allowed? If so I also listen regularly to the Genealogy Guys Podcast with George Morgan and Drew Smith. Another blog I visit regularly is Stephen's Lighthouse which is aimed at the technical library community. Don't genealogists depend on libraries? Stephen's ideas are most often worth pondering. Along the same lines, interesting but not genealogical, is The Ten Thousand Year Blog. Finally I'll mention the blog for Your Family Tree, a British Genealogy Magazine for which I occasionally write.