SCGS Jamboree Update #3

Here is our last Jamboree Updated from yesterday.  We had a blast using Facebook Live Stream and we hope you enjoy the video.

Make sure you check back later today as we give our last update from SCGS Jamboree.  Friend me first and keep an eye out around 3pm to see our last installment.  Till then…

SCGS Jamboree Update #1

Here is the first video of a series of three where we give an update of 2016 Southern California Genealogy Society’s Jamboree Conference – DNA Day on Facebook Live Stream.

Friend me on Facebook and watch out for out last Facebook Live Stream later today around 3pm’ish as we update you on our last day here at Jamboree.  Leave me a comment below and let me know if there is anything else you would like me to Facebook Live Stream about.  #scgs2016  #genealogy

Monday Memories

This is the first of my Monday’s Memories series.  This series will be posted on the 4th Monday of the month.  These posts will be of my memories from my lifetime and will be a way of me getting the information written down and on the internet for other family members and blog subscribers to read.

This first memory is my memory of the 1971 Earthquake, also known as the San Fernando Earthquake, that rattled Southern California on February 9, 1971.  It is one of my earliest memories and occurred when both of my parents were still together.

Here are the facts:

Date:               February 9, 1971

Time:               6:00:14

Duration:        12 seconds

Magnitude:     6.5 or 6.7

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1971_San_Fernando_earthquake)

This earthquake hit early in the morning and my father told me that he was right in the middle of shaving and getting ready for work when it started.  I remembered my dad waking me, picking me up and standing me in one of the 7 doorways that led into our hallway.  This hallway had doors connecting to all 3 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, the living room, a linen closet and a small storage room.  My dad put me down in the doorway that led to the living room and told me to hold on to the door jam.  At first, I was confused, I had been abruptly woken to chaos.  My mom was yelling for my brother to wake up and I can hear the urgency in my dad’s voice.  My dad then went to get my two sisters up and they stood in their bedroom doorway.  After my mom’s yelling, my brother got himself up and stood in the doorway to his bedroom and my mother got my younger sister, she was only 3 at the time, and was in the doorway to her and my dad’s bedroom.  After my dad was able to get my sisters up and they were standing in the doorway, he came to my side, and stood in the doorway with me.  I remember holding on to the door jam with my right hand and my left hand was hugging my dad’s knee, I was only 5 years old.  During the time everyone was getting into the doorways, there was shaking.  I remembered it started as a slow rolling motion and by the time we were all in the hallway, the real shaking began.  My dad said to hold on and my sisters were crying while my Mom was trying to comfort them from across the hallway.

We used to have a toy that we called knicker-knockers.  It was two glass balls connected to each other by about 6 inches of rope, it was the 70’s and was the toy of the time.  Someone had placed this toy on the doorknob of the small storage room and during the heaviest shaking, the two glass balls were moving up and down fast and were touching each other at the top and again at the bottom.  This frightened me because I was thinking it was going to break apart.  I remember turning around and looking behind me into the living room and watching the windows, which were floor to ceiling, move with the shaking.  I remember asking my dad, “Daddy, when is it going to stop shaking?”  I was scared and hung on to his knee.  Later when I was older and remembering this event, my dad said that I was holding on to his knee pretty tight and possibly cutting of circulation.  There was a lot of damage and deaths due to this earthquake but for me and my family, we survived it.

What do you remember from the 1971 San Fernando earthquake?  Let me know in the comments below.

Day 2 of my Who Do You Think You Are trip

The start of Day Two started differently than the first day. One of the things I vowed to do on this trip was to have some fun. It’s not every day I am in Missouri so I wanted to play tourist and do touristy things, see the sights and have delicious food. In researching some of the tourist spots, I found that I wanted to see the Gateway Arch. I not only wanted to see it but I wanted to go up to the top and see St. Louis from that vantage point. In researching visiting the Arch, I found that due to the construction and the sprucing up of the Gateway Arch for their 50^th Anniversary, each person who goes to the top must have a timed ticket. I also found through reviews from others who have visited already, that going in the morning was better than later in a possibly hot day. So, I purchased my ticket for 9:10am on Tuesday, May 12^th. When I drove, I didn’t realize that traffic would be so bad, it made me late to my assigned time, but they let me up. It was so AWESOME!

Here are the pictures I took from my visit to the Gateway Arch:

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I also visited the Old Courthouse. I love old buildings and this one didn’t disappoint. I love the paintings and decorations on the domed ceiling. Here are the pictures:

 

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By this time, I had bags of souviners for my family back home and was getting hungry. I headed to a sushi place called the Drunken Fish. Their sushi was really good and the service was top notch. My waiter, David, was the best too! The Drunken Fish was in the entertainment center that was next door to the Busch Stadium, home of the Cardinals baseball team. Now, I am a born and bred Dodger fan, but their stadium was a really nice one. I loved the look of the black wrought iron and red brick. I really tied in with the teams colors and was just pretty to look at! Here are the pictures I took of Busch Stadium.

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After all of this walking, I decided to head to my very last cemetery that I had planned to visit.  Then it happened.  On the way to the parking structure where I had my rental car parked, I tripped on some uneven sidewalk and sprained my ankle.  In the process I also broke the handle off a coffee mug that I purchased, but we were able to repair it.  Now, I have sprained both of my ankles several times in my lifetime but this time was the worse I have ever sprained it and it was the most painful.

At Urgent Care, waiting for the Dr. to come in and see me and my ankle.

 

In the hotel after I was done at Urgent Care.

 

Now, do you think that this stopped me from going to the last cemetery of this trip? Heck No, I am a hard-core genealogist to the bone! I did go to the last cemetery on my list, Valhalla Cemetery.  Here I found my husband’s paternal grandfather and his paternal great Aunt who past away at 13. When I went to the office, the kind lady behind the desk was very helpful in helping me locate the burial plots. She did tell me that the records show that both the grandfather and great Aunt had no markers, but she told me the last name of the person they were buried next to. She was so detailed in her instructions that I found them in no time. I did search the other tombstones surrounding my husband’s grandfather and great Aunt and I found a few more family members. I came to Missouri to find a list of family member’s burial plots, couldn’t find one, but found three new ones! It was a great trip. Here are the pictures from Vahalla Cemetery:

 

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All in all, it was a fun trip. I found most of what I was looking for and although I sprained my ankle; I had a great time in Missouri!

Up next, an recap on the NGS Convention!

This time next week…

This time next week, I will be at the SCGS Jamboree which is being held at the Burbank Airport Marriott, June 6-8, 2014.  It is a great source of genealogical education and it is a whole lot of fun too!  I am very excited to attend and can’t wait.

A good friend is joining me at the conference this year.  She asked me what tips I could give her as a first-time attendee.  I started thinking about it and came up with a few so I decided to post my tips here and hopefully it could help others besides my friend.

#1     You will see this on most tips for attending a genealogy conference.  Bring comfortable shoes, dress is layers and drink water.  You will do a lot of walking and being comfortable and well hydrated is very important.  The temperature in each room varies and you won’t know what the temperature will be like until you get the room.  It is best to dress in layers or bring a sweater for when the room is either too hot or too cold.

#2     If the genealogical conference has an app, USE IT!  Its a great tool to help you keep track of not only your first & second choice in classes.  The app is also good for when you have friends at the conference.  Within the app, you can send a friend request to your friends and if they accept your request, you can communicate with them in getting a group together for lunch.  If you are really close with your friend or if you have family attending and you can also share your schedule with each other.  This helps you to see where this person might be at in case you need to get a hold of them or if you want to attend the same class together.  I love using this feature of the app with my daughter so that I can keep track of what classes she might be in and possibly sit with her in a class.

#3     This next tip really depends on your note taking habits.  Usually you get a syllabus book/binder free with your registration but if the organization putting on the conference is trying to cut down on costs, you might just get a CD copy instead.  I like to obtain the syllabus and mark my first and second choice in classes, then when I attend the classes, I write on the syllabus for each class itself.  It helps me to keep up with what the speaker is saying and to keep the appropriate notes  and what the speaker is saying together.  HERE IS MY TIP: If you are not able to get a printed copy of the syllabus, go into the app and on each of the classes you want to take, if there is a PDF symbol, you can email the handout to yourself, then print them before attending the conference.  You still get the syllabus for each class and to write on each of the appropriate speakers outline.  You also are helping  by not printing out every single page of the syllabus.

#4     Don’t be afraid to start up a conversation with the people sitting around you.  You might find a cousin sitting right next to you!

#5  Don’t be afraid to network with other genealogists outside of the classroom.  There are some genealogists that do get paid for the research they do, but if you meet others who are researching the same area as you, they might be helpful when you have hit a brick wall.  It is also a good idea to keep their contact information handy too.

I hope that these tips have helped you and my good friend as well.  If you have any other tips for first-time attendees to a genealogical conference, please list them in the comment section so that others can use your tips.

Happy Ancestry Hunting!

Tricia