Received at the Library

The Dec./Jan. 2019 issue of Internet genealogy leads with Railroad Retirement Board benefits.  If you have come up empty in the Social Security Death Index, you might be able to find an ancestor in this database maintained by the Midwest Genealogy Center.  An article on data security reminds us that we would do well to have a plan to keep our hard-won genealogy information safe from loss or tampering.  New York State genealogical resources are reviewed.  Mariner ancestors are common on the Cape, and US Customs Records can be a fruitful place to look for records about them, both at the National Archives and in private collections such as university archives; newspapers, business ledgers, and insurance records can also yield relevant information.  If you have an ancestor who was institutionalized you may find "Asylums and Family History Research" useful.  I always learn something new reviewing each magazine issue we receive, and this time it is "Métis", a people of mixed native American and European ancestry originating in Canada; research resources are suggested.  Lisa Alzo reviews Airtable as a flexible spreadsheet application to organize things like your family archive, timelines, research logs and more.

Catching up with the April-June 2018 issue of NGS magazine, it gathers a number of interesting articles under the general theme of nationality.  Topics covered:

• Enemy alien registrations during World War I
• Resources for tracing impressed American seamen
• Gold Star Mother pilgrimages of the 1930s (mothers and widows of deceased servicemen)
• Discover German families in CompGen's free databases [German SIG members should review the many resources in this article!]
• Overcoming the language barrier: the genealogical translation process
• Records of Irish dissenting churches (part 3)

Another article is a case study of success using broader search parameters.

Received at the Library

Do you need inspiration for finding the elusive grave of an ancestor?  "Researching abandoned cemeteries" is featured in the Nov./Dec. 2018 issue of Your genealogy today.  It chronicles the methods and adventures of a pair of friends who comb the Midwest finding abandoned grave sites in farmers' fields and other remote locales.  Another article provides a step-by-step guide to connecting with a recent relatives classmates.  Advice is offered on the tricky situation of illegitimate birth, which can block the way to the past in your family tree.   Other topics include military pensions at the state level, the Louisiana State Archives, and a succinct explanation of the significance of cM or centimorgan in DNA research.

The July-Sept. 2018 issue of NGS magazine has an overall theme of family secrets, and provides case studies of some of the most disturbing things you can find when doing ancestral research: desertion and court martial, divorce, mental illness, prostitution, and criminal activity.  This issue also has an article about data security, from the point of view of a genealogist's responsibility to safeguard data that could injure others.  German Interest Group members might also be interested in "Researching Eighteenth-Century German Immigrants."