Del's Ramblings on a Lazy Sunday Afternoon

Mocavo Follow-Up

 On July 21 I blogged http://delram.blogspot.com/ 

about the results of a few Mocavo searches that I had conducted.  I noticed that none of the documents found in the searches highlighted or otherwise identified the person for whom I was searching.  This makes it very difficult to find the person in a large document.  I contacted Mocavo and they were very prompt in getting back to me.  They asked that I identify the specific document(s) that I found in the searches.  I provided the information and asked them how the system was SUPPOSED TO WORK.  They sent me an example, shown below, which displayed the person of interest highlighted in yellow where ever the name appeared in the document.  

They provided the following guidance "Once you are in the document click CTRL+F and you will see a search bar open up. Type in the name you are looking for, in this case Robert Jones, and you will see his name highlighted wherever it is located on the page".

I tried that and it did work for some document, so they are still researching to determine if they can find why it didn't work on the other documents.  If you have had the same problem, you use the solution, above, they sent to me.  I will keep you informed of any further developments.  

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Weimer Genealogical Center Albuquerque

My 11 July blog discussed the Weimer Genealogical Center (WGC) which had documents relating to my son-in-law's family.  I was concerned that the center no longer existed and, most of all, wanted to find out where their documents and other resources might have gone.  I sent an e-mail to the Albuquerque Genealogical Society (AGS) inquiring about the center and the whereabouts of its documents.  I sent the e-mail at 8:15 p.m. on 18 July and received a lengthy reply at 9:35 p.m. from a woman who was a member of the AGS and had belonged to the Weimer Group working with the founders of the Weimer Genealogical Center.  The response came from a woman who was out of town on travel and my original e-mail had been forwarded to her.  All that occurred in an hour and 20 minutes in the evening hours--amazing!

She provided me great detail about her line of Weimers and informed me that most of the collection was donated to the Albuquerque Genealogy Center which is located in the Special Collections Library.  She even provided me a hyperlink http://abclibrary.org/home to the library's catalog.  Sure enough, when I want to the site and typed in "Weimer"; up came a listing of the books that had been referenced in the article about the WGC.  They were just what I was looking for!  

My wife has always wanted to go to the Albuquerque Balloon Festival, which I believe is in October; so we might be able to kill two birds with one stone! 

I continue to appreciate (I started to say "be amazed"; but it happens so often, I am no longer amazed--I just appreciate it) how interested, helpful and responsive genealogists are in assisting others who are researching their families.  I guess we genealogists are just nice people!
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Researching Your German Ancestors--A Great Webinar

This past week our German Interest Group viewed one of the Legacy Family Tree Webinars and it was great!  It was presented by Kory L. Meyerink and had originally been shown on June 6, 2012.  Kory, of course, is know to be one of the top experts on German research in the country.  As he explained, it is like drinking from a fire hose; but he touched on a very wide and complete range of German research topics.  Included were the following:  German Ancestry: Background & Popularity, The German Language, German Places and Jurisdictions, Records (church, civil, emigration, societies and periodicals, Published sources, Family History Library collection), and Helpful Tools for German Research which included Major Websites.

Copies of the handout that accompanied the Webinar were also provided, and that was very helpful because Kory provided lots of reference documents and they were listed in the handout.

If you have any interest in German research and need a refresher, or are just getting started, I highly recommend you view the Webinar.  The following link will take you to it:  http://www.familytreewebinars.com/download.php?webinar_id=100.