African Roots Podcast Episode # 241 November 15, 2013

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Welcome back to the African Roots Podcast!
You can reach me at AfricanRootsPodcast@gmail.com

A special thank you to all who tuned in last night to listen to the Blog Talk Radio program, Research At The National Archives and Beyond. I had the honor of being the guest host and special thank you to Bernice Bennett for that opportunity. And a special thank you to my guest–the African American Genealogy Bloggers—Nicka Smith, Melvin Collier, George Geder, and Terry Ligon, who discussed history through their own eyes. All are blogging through the series “Many Rivers to Cross” on PBS and hosted by Henry Louis Gates. If you missed it, go and listen to the archived version. We had a great time last night.
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Today is notification day as several of us await the word from the Southern California Genealogy Society Jamboree, and we await the decision if our proposals have been accepted to speak in 2014. So we are keeping our fingers crossed and hope we are accepted for next year.

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Best wishes to Professor Dru (Drusilla Pair) who has a production coming up next week in Hanover VA where she has taken her interest in family history and genealogy to the stage. I love it that she has managed to merge with other interests and talents, and take history to the stage. She has studied the history of a family that came out of the historic Hanover Tavern. Several stories have emerged from that space, including an old diary that told the family’s story when they were enslaved in Hanover. The room where the presentation will take place is the old kitchen–where one of the characters in her play actually lived and toiled as a slave. This is a story of resistance and is important in so many ways. The presentation will be on Tuesday at the Hanover Tavern,so break a leg, Professor Dru.

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I just learned about an intersting conference will emerge–the Slave Dwelling Project will host a conference and it will take place in Savannah Georgia in late July. There is no detailed data as yet, but when I get it I shall pass it on. This comes from the work of Joseph McGill’s Slave Dwelling project.

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Some interesting records are now available on Ancestry of late. The service records of World War I, from Georgia as said to be online. I have not used these records, but in case you have ancestors were were drafted from Georgia in WWI, then you may want to take a look and see if this collection is useful to you. The Freedmen records of the Five Civilized Tribes can now be found on Ancestry. These reside primarily on Fold3, but are also now on Ancestry. Also note that a very small collection of records from the US Virgin Islands can now be found also on Ancestry.

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I also want to encourage more of you to consider taking your family stories out and putting them down–write them in some kind of way. I have found the genealogy blogging circle to be helpful for me, but also the Book of Me project to be a great way to write more. If you are not yet comfortable with your own writing, then perhaps the Writers Bootcamp that was mentioned today on Geneabloggers, might be a good vehicle to get you started. Whatever works for you, go for it. We need more stories out there!
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Well winding down again for another week. Please know that I appreciate the time you take to tune in an listen, and know that you are appreciated. In the meantime have a great week and remember to keep researching, keep documenting and keep sharing what you find.

Posted by Angela Y. Walton-Raji

Author, lecturer and researcher. Author, "Black Indian Genealogy Research, An Expanded Edition". Editor, Voices of Indian Territory. Member AAHGS -Afro-American Historical & Genealogical Society. PAAC-Preservation of African American Cemeteries. Founding Member of AfriGeneas. Faculty member for Samford IGHR, MAAGI-Midwest African American Genealogy Institute.

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