ROOTS & BRANCHES

Steady readers of the “Roots & Branches” column know I have a special affinity for the burial grounds of Bern Reformed United Church of Christ, now owned by the Bern Cemetery Company, of which I am a trustee. I was raised in this Berks County church—almost literally, since my mother was often there “until the …

The Ohio Genealogical Society’s conference earlier this month was a reminder that great in-person family history experiences do exist. As I often do with a column such as this, I being with the disclaimer: I’ve been a speaker at the spring OGS conference for more than a dozen years now and find the people who …

What was once proven and then unproven—is now proven again! I’ve corresponded with and written a couple of columns over the years about Kathy Williams’s attempt to restore the patriotic dignity of John Peter Weaverling in the Revolutionary War. The story in brief is this: Weaverling had fought in the American Revolution and was considered …

It’s either my blessing or my curse—or probably a bit of both!—that for reasons unknown to me that some of the genealogy topics to which I’m most attracted as a researcher are ones that don’t resonate as deeply with other family historians. Take historical newspapers. Oh, sure, every genealogist uses them now that so many …

OK, let’s get the name thing out of the way. Trappe is a Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, borough with an evocative name. It took that name from a tavern called “the Trap” that was operated by the town’s founder Jacob Schrack Sr., with the spelling altered over time as often happens. I have an affinity for …

The Western Pennsylvania Genealogical Society was founded in 1974, which makes this year the organization’s golden anniversary. And what could be more appropriate for a 50th anniversary than a two-day hybrid conference, which will be held for in-person participants at the historic University Club in Pittsburgh. The conference carries the theme of “The Journey of …

Last week’s “Roots & Branches” took my readers to my home library’s bookshelf, particularly the books I keep on the “top shelf.” Apparently, it struck chord with some of those readers, who made comments about the column as well as talking about their own bookshelves. Trey Kennedy gave this list: “Elizabeth Shown Mills, Tom Jones, …

I had just hit upon this week’s “Roots & Branches” topic when Facebook showed me a shot of Germanology Unlocked’s Katherine Schober rightfully crowing about the fact that Brigham Young University uses her two books as texts in their paleography course. The irony of this is that those two books—Tips and Tricks of German Handwriting …

When I was first cutting my teeth in the genealogy world some four decades ago, there were some conferences with one-off lectures and just a few weeklong institutes for intensive study. Those latter opportunities have greatly expanded in the last decade or so, and one of them—the Genealogy Institute of Pittsburgh or GRIP—is now in …

There was a collective sigh from many in the family history community when the National Genealogical Society announced at last year’s conference in Richmond, Virginia, that the 2024 event would be fully virtual. After two COVID-19 years of virtual-only NGS conferences in 2020 and 2021—the former of which was turned on a dime from in-person …