Welcome back to the African Roots Podcast! You can reach me at AfricanRootsPodcast@gmail.com.
Well fall has really settled in and in fact many of the leaves have already falled from the trees, and I understand that a few places even got snow yesterday. I do hope that you are staying safe and warm, and are getting ready to settle in for the winter.
Just a warm shout out to those who attended the fundraising event this week in Chicago. This event was sponsored by the Center for Black Genealogy. I look forward to hearing more about this group and the what might be unfolding through their efforts. Such as center is needed, and a forum, place, facility for African American genealogy is a great idea, so as their effort develop, I hope that we can all be supporters of such an organization. I hope it was successful!
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Cemetery Preservation Work Continues
This year I have been following the work by groups restoring and preserving African American burial grounds. I still hear from friends in Little Rock Arkansas who are working digligently to preserve historic Haven of Rest Cemetery in Little Rock. I have ancestors buried there and hope that they will continue their work. But this is a sample of work being done in multiple cities throughout the country. I know that Zion Cemetery in Memphis has been the effort of cemetery preservation work, and also Mt. Auburn Cemetery in Baltimore is another one. These burial grounds should be considered sacred places and if you can assist, please do. As winter approaches I know that the best opportunity arises to conduct some preservation work. And right after the first killing frost, the burial ground is safer–as ticks, and snakes especially will no longer be a threat, so lots of work to clear excess brush can unfold. So support your own local group where you can, for these places are indeed sacred ground and it is our obligation to see that the remains of our ancestors are properly protected.
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For the second time African American Genealogists were able to join the fun in a Google Hangout and exchange thoughts and ideas with each other. Nicka Smith developed the idea and this week’s discussion was Finding Offline Resources for African American Genealogy. The discussion was a healthy one on how essential courthouses and vital records offices, and university collections and archival holdings are for research. We are all creatures of habit and use the online databases like Family Search and Ancestry, and there is a concern that beginners will think that everything is online. So far–that is not the case, and it is really critical that those facilities are still considered “must visit” repositories in our genealogical documentation process. Hopefully more Google + Hangouts will be scheduled over the next several weeks.
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An interview with author of Back There, Then
I encourage you all to tune in if you missed last night’s guest on Bernice Bennett’s show, who was Linda Crichlow White who published the memoir of her mother Marietta Stevens Crichlow. The book came from having discovered a manuscript that Marietta, her mother had written about her own life. The manuscript was found long with hundreds of photos and letters that went back over a century. She turned these wonderful photos, letters and stories from her mother into the wonderful book, Back There, Then. This is the kind of story that should inspire all of us to not only treasure the artifacts that we find, but to turn them into something! Writing those stories, not just collecting them and storing them, is something essential. You will enjoy hearing the story of how Ms. Crichlow White was able to put the book together, and hear about the treasures that she found. Ms. Bennett’s show airs every Thursday evening at 9pm on Blog Talk Radio.
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DNA & Your Genealogy
Speaking of Bernice Bennett, if you are in the Central Maryland area, you may be interested in attending the Central MD Chapter of AAHGS at the Owen Brown Community Center in Columbia MD. Bernice will be speaking about DNA and Genealogy. You know DNA can be a useful tool, for genealogists, and for many it can be away to solve some family mysteries. Of course DNA should not be considered a short cut to the genealogical process, but it can, for some, be a valuable tool to find out unknown information. I know that Bernice has a unique story as she continues to find matches all the time with DNA–and she has found close cousins who were previously unknown.
Now I have personally never had such luck, but my own families were enslaved in small rural communities. They were among the millions who were sold south. And almost every generation ended up in a different place. So I know that I will never find many or any matches that can be solved. But I know that Bernice has a number of DNA cousins who especially come out of a larger community–New Orleans, and sh has found 1st and 2nd cousins and been able to solve the mystery of how they were related. So I think many will enjoy hearing about her successes, so if you can make the meeting at 1pm tomorrow, by all means do so.
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Well have you ever decided to define your genealogical niche? Do you find that you enjoy documenting the community, or have you become interested in Civil War soldiers from your ancestral home? Have you noticed that there is no one who is the African American specialist in your area of interest? Well perhaps that is the call to action for you to make the commitment to take your research a bit further and become that person who tells the story. There are so many opportunities out there, and some of your are already doing it unknowingly. You may be the one who works with beginners to get them started, or you have an interest in an extensive funeral program collection that you have amassed. You may be the one who can become the voice long lost. We need many more people to step up and to focus on those areas and to tell the story. We need the voices from the community to document the community’s history and we need commitment from the genealogical family. I hope that many of you will step up and become the voice that is sorely needed.
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Well folks, time to wrap things up for this week. Thank you for taking your time to tune in as I know you have many things that you can choose to do with your time. Tune in next week and in the meantime, remember to keep researching, keep documenting and keep sharing what you find.
