“Blaine Day” at Archives of Michigan

For over a month I have been helping a family member prepare and recover from a hip replacement surgery so genealogy time has been almost null. But an opportunity arose which I am thankful I was able to attend thanks to a family member covering for me.

Blaine Bettinger at the Fall Family History Event

Yesterday was the Michigan Genealogical Council and Archives of Michigan's Fall Family History Event in Lansing. It was titled, "A Day with Blaine Bettinger."

Or in my words, "Blaine Day." A day packed with four — yes four! — presentations by Blaine Bettinger on various DNA topics.

With a start time of 9:15 a.m., this meant getting up before the chickens, scraping the first frost off the windshield, and driving "an hour and a half" to arrive in time for the 8:30 a.m. start of registration. Thankfully the weather other than a bit cold was great for driving and traffic was strangely light despite game day while the sun raced up in the rear-view mirror. I arrived with plenty of time to spare.

The event seemed to be well organized (even with a good couple handfuls of early arrivals) and from the morning announcements this was the largest attendance they had in the 12 years of hosting this event.

The Archives of Michigan
(and Library of Michigan) in Lansing, Michigan.

Another morning announcement was regarding the digitization and indexing of the naturalization records for the 70 Michigan counties that the Archives of Michigan has in its collection. The images will eventually be at the AOM's SeekingMichigan.org website. There will also be an index to the collection on the SeekingMichigan website and at the FamilySearch.org website. They are not announcing a timeline for the project. (Remember Michigan Death Certificate anticipation?) And since the index will be done by volunteers aka us the genealogy public, when it gets done depends on our participation. The Archives of Michigan staff is working on obtaining the naturalization records from the remaining Michigan counties that have not turned their records over to the archives.

Now as for "Blaine Day" which ran from 9:15 a.m. to 3:45 p.m., the Forum auditorium was pretty much packed all day with a bit less attendance at the last of the four presentations. Bettinger's presentations were:

• Using Y-DNA and mtDNA to Explore Your Ancestry
• Using Autosomal DNA to Explore Your Ancestry
• Using Third-Party Tools to Analyze Your Autosomal DNA
• DNA and the Genealogical Proof Standard

I thought each presentation was really good. Bettinger covered enough of the basics that the DNA uninitiated could understand the concepts but also enough of the technical end that intermediates had something too. The handouts, which were sent out via email a day before the event, were informative following the main points of each presentation but not every detail. One handout was not in the order of how it was presented but it was easy enough to follow along. Bettinger also made time to answer questions after each presentation which was great because there were a lot of questions.

Couldn't make it to yesterday's Family History Event? Much of the content in the presentations also seems to be covered in Bettinger's new book, The Family Tree Guide to DNA Testing and Genetic Genealogy. I bought a copy (along with another copy for a cousin too) about a month or so ago and I'm slowly reading it. It's not a hard read, it actually explains concepts very clearly, I have just been so busy and tired it is taking me longer than normal to read things.

So if you get a chance to see Bettinger speak or hear him via a webinar, do try to do so. I don't think you will be disappointed.

The drive home was just as pleasant. Towards the end the big moon was visible ahead of me as the sun was going down behind me. I arrived home in the driveway just as darkness fell.

Blaine Day aka a DNA Day for me was a good day. And as I learned upon getting on the internet after dinner, November 12th was also the day Family Tree DNA released its Ancient European Origins feature on it Family Finder tests. It was interesting seeing FTDNA's estimates of how much Metal Age Invader, Farmer, Hunter-Gatherer and Non-European DNA we are still carrying in our DNA. I don't think it will be of much use, but it is interesting.

©2016 All Rights Reserved, goneresearching. All text and photos in this post are copyrighted & owned by me (goneresearching) unless indicated otherwise. No republication (commercial or non-commercial) without prior permission. You may share (tell others) of this blog as long as you give credit and link to this site (not by downloading or copying any post). Thank you.

They're Here!!!!!!!! Michigan Death Certificates 1921 to 1939 are Now on SeekingMichigan.org

I've checked several times a day for a couple months. And the one time I go to bed early so I'm rested for the next day, look what happens ... the Michigan Death Certificates for 1921 to 1939 go live online.

These long awaited images are at the Archives of Michigan website a.k.a. SeekingMichigan. 

SeekingMichigan.org Website Screen Capture

Once there, click on Advanced Search in the upper right corner of the webpage. From there you will see a listing of the various collections available. The one you want is: Death Records, 1921-1952 OCLC LOADING.

Because specific search fields do not automatically load when you select a collection to search, you need to do a little trick. 

Click to check on the box for the Death Records, 1921-1952, and click to uncheck all other collections that are already showing a checked box. (Generally, advanced search starts with just the Death Records, 1897-1920, pre-checked.) Then select search with no information filled in. Once the results page appears click on advanced search to return to the search page. Now the specific search fields are loaded for the Death Records, 1921-1952, collection.

SeekingMichigan Screen Capture

The specific search fields available for this collection are: County; city/village/township; Last Name; Given Name; Death Year; Death Month; Death Year; Age; Father's Given Name; Father's Last Name; Mother's Given Name; Mother's Last Name. That's more fields than are available for the earlier death records collection for 1897-1920.

SeekingMichigan Screen Capture

If you perform a search using one field, remember to remove the second search field line or you will get an error. (Click on remove to the right of the line.)

SeekingMichigan Screen Capture

Once on the results page, to see the death certificate click on the thumbnail image. The image viewer is the same and has not been updated. You can enlarge your view, expand the viewer in the browser, pan/move around the image, or rotate the image.

SeekingMichigan Screen Capture

Digital images of the certificates can be downloaded in a choice of three different sizes: small, medium and large. The file is saved as JPEG (jpg) image.

Remember that the search capability of SeekingMichigan is limited. There is no Soundex and wildcard use does not always seem to work.  So think of it as exact search only and try different spellings. (Ask yourself, how could someone have read this name?)

FamilySearch Screen Capture

To get around this, try searching the Michigan, Death Certificates, 1921-1952, collection on the FamilySearch website. This is an index to this collection but there is no direct link to the images at SeekingMichigan. FamilySearch uses a fuzzy search and catches different spellings. If you find the one you want in the index at FamilySearch, put that spelling into the search at SeekingMichigan.

I wouldn't be surprised if an index with links to the images appears on Ancestry.com at some point. Having an index database at Ancestry.com like there is for the earlier Death Certificates for 1897-1920 would give us Soundex search capability.

Finally, remember that even though the collection says 1921 to 1952, you will only see actual images up to the year 1939 due to Michigan laws. With each coming year, another year of death certificates will be release for viewing.

Have fun finding your ancestors and relatives!

©2015, goneresearching. All text and photos in this post are copyrighted & owned by me (goneresearching) unless indicated otherwise. No republication (commercial or non-commercial) without prior permission. You may share (tell others) of this blog as long as you give credit and link to this site (not by downloading or copying any post). Thank you.

Another New Database on Ancestry.com -- Michigan Marriage Records 1867-1952

There's another new rabbit hole to investigate on Ancestry.com this month. Today, Ancestry.com added the database Michigan, Marriage Records, 1867 - 1952.

Though the online index goes up to 1952, you will only find actual images of the records up to the year 1938 due to Michigan laws. So you get 13 more years of images (FamilySearch.org has images up to 1925) and 27 more years of index and transcribed records.

Oh, what fun! Could the posting of the additional images of the Michigan Death Certificates (up to 1938) on SeekingMichigan.org be near? One can only hope!

©2015, goneresearching. All text and photos in this post are copyrighted & owned by me (goneresearching) unless indicated otherwise. No republication (commercial or non-commercial) without prior permission. You may share (tell others) of this blog as long as you give credit and link to this site (not by downloading or copying any post). Thank you.