Posted by conference on November 26, 2009 under Blog: New Postings, Canadian Records, Essentials Stream, Novice Researchers Stream, Speakers and Program | 
Fawne Stratford-Devai will present two in-depth lectures on Ontario's land records.
Conference 2010 organizers have made it their business to track down and sign up the speakers with the very highest ratings in Conference 2009 evaluations. Fawne Stratford-Devai is the third speaker we’ve announced from this list (the previous two being Dave Obee and Gary Schroder).
Many will know Fawne from her appearances on the popular History Television series Ancestors in the Attic, where she has been of the genealogical sleuths who unravel family mysteries.
Fawne’s passion for archival research began in 1987. As a university student she worked to understand the internment of German-Canadian citizens during World War II. Her love of history soon led to curiosity about her own origins. Before long she was hooked on discovering her English and Irish roots.
Fawne’s work on early Ontario records generally, and land records specifically, is well known. Author of such books as The Men of Upper Canada and The District Marriage Records of Upper Canada/Canada West, she has also published a number of research guides through Global Heritage Press and contributed articles to the online family history newsletter The Global Gazette.
Above all Fawne is dedicated to preserving Ontario’s heritage records. Together with Ruth and Howard Burkholder, Fawne and her husband Andrew traveled all over the province to rally hundreds of volunteers in the cause to identify and find homes for Ontario’s important land registry office records, with the Association for the Preservation of Ontario Land Record Office Documents.
A graduate of sociology at McMaster University, Fawne spent many years in health policy and epidemiological research at McMaster before joining the Ontario government.
Her lectures on genealogical and historical topics, particularly Ontario records, are always entertaining and educational. At Conference 2010 Fawne will demystify Ontario land records in two, two-hour, in-depth lectures on Friday.
Posted by conference on November 13, 2009 under Blog: New Postings, Essentials Stream, Innovations Stream, Speakers and Program |
Lisa Louise Cooke will share her multimedia expertise at OGS Conference 2010.
It’s not every day you get a chance to meet a podcaster and blogger with no electricity or running water. You’ll have that opportunity when Lisa Louise Cooke speaks at the Ontario Genealogical Society Conference 2010.
OK, we exaggerate, slightly, about the electricity and running water.
In 2006, motivated by her lifelong passion for history, Lisa starred in the PBS eight-hour history miniseries, Texas Ranch House. She had the opportunity to live in West Texas with her family for three months on a 400,000-acre cattle ranch with no electricity or running water, as in 1867. Lisa says, “It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to not only see what is was like for my great great grandparents who lived in Texas in 1867, but also a unique opportunity to bring my own 21st-century sensibilities to the same environment and find a way to survive.”
Usually Lisa can be found in the San Francisco Bay area producing and hosting both the Genealogy Gems Podcast and the Family History: Genealogy Made Easy podcast, two “online genealogy radio shows” available through her web site www.genealogygems.TV and iTunes. Her podcasts and website strive to help listeners make the most of their family history research time by providing innovative ideas and fascinating interviews with genealogy experts. Needless to say, genealogical podcasting is one of Lisa’s lecture topics at Conference 2010.
Lisa also inspires her audience to creatively share their findings with their families through creative projects and motivational stories. In her book Genealogy Gems: Ultimate Research Strategies, she offers how-to instructions for all of the gems featured in the first season of the show. And she provides daily doses of genealogy news and fun to readers with her Genealogy Gems News Blog.
As if this weren’t enough for the average dynamo, Lisa also writes for Family Tree Magazine, hosts the magazine’s podcast and produces videocasts for Family History Expos.
Lisa will deliver three lectures on Saturday at Conference 2010. We guarantee there will be plenty of electricity in the room (but hopefully no running water).
Posted by conference on November 11, 2009 under Blog: New Postings, Canadian Records, Essentials Stream, Speakers and Program |
Gary Schroder will present extended lectures on Quebec family history at Conference 2010.
Conference 2009 had barely ended when a member of Toronto Branch Council exclaimed at a meeting that we had to have Gary Schroder return to Conference 2010—and we had to give him plenty of time to talk about Quebec records. Several weeks later, the evaluations from Conference 2009 arrived and they confirmed Gary as one of the highest rated speakers.
So we are thrilled that Gary will be delivering four hours of lectures at the Ontario Genealogical Society Conference 2010, two 2-hour workshops on Friday morning and afternoon.
Instead of inviting him as a speaker, we should have probably asked him to run the Conference. As President of the Quebec Family History Society since 1995, Gary has chaired three highly regarded, international Roots Conferences at McGill University in Montreal. And he’s now planning Roots 2011, which will be held in June of that year.
Even though he’s best known in Ontario for speaking about Quebec records, Gary speaks elsewhere on a wide variety of family history topics, including Canadian, English and Irish research and British military resources. He notes that his first known ancestor to set foot in Canada was his great-great-great-grandfather Cornelius Flynn, who arrived in the port of Quebec in 1805. Cornelius Flynn (1787-1861) served in the Royal Navy for over twenty years and was wounded during the Battle of Trafalgar.
Gary has taught family history courses at both McGill and Champlain College in Montreal and lectured right across North America. He was a speaker at the 2001 International Conference on Irish Family History held at Trinity College, Dublin. He is currently a member of the Special Advisory Board of Library and Archives Canada. He is the editor of various published works and is a frequent guest on Canadian radio and television answering a wide variety of genealogical questions and promoting the educational value of family history research.
Gary’s lectures at Conference 2010 will be of interest to all those with Quebec ancestry, regardless of language or faith.
Posted by conference on November 1, 2009 under Blog: New Postings, Essentials Stream, Speakers and Program |
Maureen A. Taylor, "The Photo Detective", will present a series of lectures on collecting, preserving and understanding photographs.
If you have family photographs, you won’t want to miss the first visit to Canada of the woman The Wall Street Journal has called “the nation’s foremost historical photo detective”. Maureen A. Taylor investigates photos the way private eyes investigate cases. Even better, she’s also a family historian!
First as a photo curator and editor and now as a writer and consultant, Maureen has established herself internationally as an expert at the intersection of history, genealogy and photography. She has been featured in top media outlets, including The View, Martha Stewart Living and The Today Show. Maureen is the author of a number of books and magazine articles, as well as a contributing editor at the U.S. Family Tree Magazine
Maureen also enjoys teaching children about their roots and authored a guide to family history for kids, Through the Eyes of Your Ancestors (Houghton Mifflin, 1999).
Her latest project is The Last Muster: Images of the Revolutionary War Generation (Kent State University Press, June 2010).
In four lectures at Conference 2010 on Saturday and Sunday, Maureen will give us the essentials of building and preserving our family photo collections, as well as strategies for identifying, dating and extracting every shred of genealogical information from our photos.
To learn more about Maureen, please visit her websites; www.photodetective.com and www.maureentaylor.com
