Accentuate the Positive Geneameme 2019 - The Responses

Although I have not had as many responses to the Geneameme Challenge this year as in earlier years the quality of the responses tells me that it is a worthwhile exercise. I owe a HUGE thank you to everyone who put their fingers to the keyboard for this exercise. A shoutout also goes to
these people Jonny Perl, Blaine Bettinger and this event DNA Downunder that got so many mentions in the responses.

Back in the day when I was a Teacher/Librarian we had a big push to teach Information Skills that could be applied to any task which the students undertook. These are life skills that can be applied to everything from making a peanut butter sandwich to breaking down a brickwall in a family tree. 

The Information Skills Process

It's interesting to note that not only schools have a commitment to information skills. A quick tour of Google found that many universities have information skills programs.

So often we genealogists are so keen to attend to the next task on our list that do not take the time for step 6 ie to assess or reflect on our work. If we do not take time then we may continue to repeat our mistakes. Now I will step off my soapbox and share the reflections of those committed genies who took up my challenge.

Alex Daw  https://familytreefrog.blogspot.com/2020/01/accentuate-positive-geneameme-2019.html

Bobbie Edes  https://gsq-blog.gsq.org.au/accentuate-the-positive-geneameme-2019/

Harrison  https://harrison2214.wordpress.com/2020/01/04/accentuate-the-positive-geneameme-2019/

Jacquie  https://seedstotree.blogspot.com/2020/01/saturday-night-2019-positive-geneameme.html

Jane  https://janeologist.blogspot.com/2020/01/accentuate-positive-reflection-on-my.html

Janelle Collins  http://janellestree.blogspot.com/2020/01/accentuate-positive-geneameme-2019-as.html

Janice Sellers  http://www.ancestraldiscoveries.com/2020/01/saturday-night-genealogy-fun-accentuate.html

Jenni  jengenie.wordpress.com

Jill Ball  https://geniaus.blogspot.com/2020/01/accentuate-positive-geneameme-2019.html

KerrieAnne   https://asteelygenesjourney.wordpress.com/2020/01/12/accentuate-the-positive/

Kirsty Gray  https://family-wise.co.uk/blog/

Lilian Magill  http://researchbylily.blogspot.com/2020/01/accentuate-positive-2019.html

Linda Stufflebean https://emptybranchesonthefamilytree.com/2020/01/accentuate-the-positive-geneameme-2019/

Lisa Gorrell  https://mytrailsintothepast.blogspot.com/2020/01/saturday-night-genealogy-fun-accentuate.html

Lois Willis  https://loiswillis.blog/2020/01/12/sunday-afternoon-genealogy-fun-accentuate-the-positive-geneameme-2019/

M. Diane Rogers  https://canadagenealogy.blogspot.com/2020/01/a-merry-new-year-ahead-in-2020.html

Maureen Trotter  https://geniaus.blogspot.com/2020/01/accentuate-positive-geneameme-2019-from.html

Megan Franklin  http://meganfranklin.com/accentuate-the-positive-geneameme-2019/

Pauleen Cass  https://cassmobfamilyhistory.com/2020/01/03/accentuate-the-positive-2019/

Randy Seaver  https://www.geneamusings.com/2020/01/saturday-night-genealogy-fun-accentuate.html

Robbie Stockfeld  https://robbiesspot.wordpress.com/2020/01/11/accentuate-the-positive-2019/

Samantha John  https://lyfelynes.com/accentuate-the-positive-geneameme-2019/

Shauna Hicks  http://www.shaunahicks.com.au/accentuate-the-positive-geneameme-2019/

Vorfahrensucher @kafeldu Tweeted her responses.

Sincere apologies if I have missed anyone. Please let me know and I will add further responses here.

Accentuate the Positive Geneameme 2019 - from Genimate Maureen

My genimate, Maureen Trotter, whom I first met on an Unlock the Past cruise several years ago, took up my offer to send her geneameme responses to me for posting on this blog. I thank Maureen for her support and thoughtful responses.

Should you wish to send me your responses I will be happy to post them here too. See http://geniaus.blogspot.com/2019/12/accentuate-positive-geneameme-2019.html

___________________________________________________

1.  An elusive ancestor I found was - the missing quarter of my ancestry

3.  A geneajourney I took was – to South Gippsland taking a DNA test to my 92 year old Aunt

4.  important record – I am in the midst of locating lots about my “new” family

5.  A newly found family member shared

·    lots of 2^nd cousins sharing their DNA results (and some trees) made identifying my paternal grandfather’s family much easier. It was one of the neighbours!

·       a 3C2R living in Dublin shared a copy of the 1841 Census of Coatbridge (near Glasgow) which showed his great grandmother was living with her sister, my great great great grandmother and her family on Census night.

6.  A geneasurprise I received was – the surname was not what we had been told!

8.   I made new genimates who – share my passion for using DNA analysis to learn more about our ancestors

9.  A new piece of technology or skill I mastered was – lots this year, mostly DNA related!  Next steps include trying some of the more recent possibilities for Genetic Affairs clustering and finally starting DNA Painter itself. Visual Phasing sounds like a wonderful challenge for a bit further down the track.

10. I joined – the GSV DNA Genetic Genealogy Study Group and lots of Facebook DNA groups

11. A genealogy education session or event from which I learnt something new was – the 4 days of DNA Down Under

12. A blog post that taught me something new was – just about everything by Blaine Bettinger, Roberta Estes, Dana Leeds, Yvette Hoitink, and many others

13. A DNA discovery I made was - a very distant DNA match with genimate & Facebook friend Janelle.

14. I taught a genimate how to – in the 6 months since my first DNA test results arrived, I have helped many people with analysing and clustering their DNA results and using the WATO tool more effectively.

15. A brick wall I demolished was -not quite demolished yet, but my grandfather has to have been one of two brothers!

16. A great site I visited was – the DNA Painter site has been incredibly valuable to me in sorting out my DNA results. If you haven’t used the Shared cM Project or WATO yet, you should!

17. A new genealogy/history book I enjoyed was – “Genetic Genealogy in Practice” and “Advanced Genetic Genealogy”.

18. It was exciting to finally meet – a couple of my “new” cousins

19. I am excited for 2020 because – my sister and I are planning a trip to parts of Scotland that our newly discovered ancestors came from.

20. Another positive I would like to share is – how wonderful it is to be retired, with good health and sufficient income to be able to delve into a range of hobbies and interests, go on the occasional trip and still have time and energy to help family and community groups.

Accentuate the Positive Geneameme 2019 - GeniAus

Accentuate the Positive Geneameme 2019

As it would be rather rude of me to ask my genimates to respond to this challenge without doing so myself I thought I had better get a move on. I realise how onerous this challenge can be so I applaud all who have taken the time to participate.

1.  An elusive ancestor I found was unfortunately they are all still in hiding.

2.  A great newspaper article I found was... this is difficult as every time I return to Trove I find something new about one of my ancestors because Trove keeps on adding new titles to its collections. 

I have been unable to pinpoint when my Pusell Great-Grandparents moved from Burraga to Cobar. Just one sentence in a new to me article on Trove from 1903 quotes someone talking about an incident in Burraga. The chap said "I got up and went to Mr. Jas. Pusell's, about a quarter of a mile away. Mrs, Pusell came out and struck a match and looked at me."  This seemingly unimportant statement is geneagold to me as it gives me a contemporary source for my ancestors' location. 

3.  A geneajourney I took was  as I'm rather greedy I took several geneajourneys to conferences in the US, UK and Australia this year. 

I love catching up with the Geneabloggers at Rootstech in Salt Lake CIty

We changed our itinerary at the last minute to visit Yorkshire in June when I found a new record on Ancestry that sent us chasing down some of Mr GeniAus' ancestors. 

4.  I located an important record.  Following on from the discovery mentioned in qn. 3 I made contact with Rev Hilary Smith from the Fulneck Moravian Archives who smartly replied with information on the Midgley ancestors. We made arrangements to visit Fulneck and view the amazing records there. We received a royal welcome at the Fulneck village where we were given tours of the Museum, village and archives. 

Rev. Hilary had laid out on a table in the vestry a collection of original records that contained mentions of the Midgley ancestors. 

Original records in the Fulneck Archives

As if this wasn't enough we visited the Fulneck Cemetery and found the grave marker for one of Mr GeniAus' direct ancestors. We were also give directions to the Gomersal Moravian Cemetery where we found a grave marker for another direct ancestor. 

Elizabeth Midgley nee Birkby Grave Marker in Gomersal Moravian Cemetery

5.  A newly found family member shared  a photo of Mr GeniAus Great-Grandparents, William Henry Parkinson and Martha Jane Midgley.

6.  A geneasurprise I received was contact through my website from a living Kealy cousin in Waterford, Ireland. A descendant of Patrick Kealy and Katherine Bowe he is keen to meet up when we next go to Ireland. I wonder if he would like to do a DNA test. My shout of course.  It pays to have your genealogy posted on the web. 

7.   My 2019 social media post that I was particularly proud of was... Number 10 - the New arrival, https://geniaus.blogspot.com/2019/10/number-10-new-arrival.html,  in which I tried to document the history of our searches for clocks mad by James Gowans and son.

8.  I made a new genimate who... I have made several new genimates this year. Highlighting one of them just one of them would be very difficult.

9.  A new piece of technology or skill I mastered was the The GotoWebinar Dashboard. As I am now hosting some of the webinars for The Society of Australian Genealogists I had to learn how to launch, monitor, produce and save the webinar recordings. 

10. I joined  the committee of my local Family History Group as President.  One of the first things I did was set up a Facebook Page for them here,  https://www.facebook.com/lmfhg/.

11. A genealogy education session or event from which I learnt something new was  Of all the events I attended I learnt the most from DNA Downunder in Sydney. The standout speaker was Blaine Bettinger. Catching up with so many geneabloggers and  genimates was an added bonus.

There were so many genimates at DNA Downunder in Sydney

12. A blog post that taught me something new was I am always learning something new from genimates' blogs. The last thing I mastered with the help of Jonny Perl's blog post, https://dnapainter.com/blog/cluster-auto-painter-unravel-your-dna-test-results/, was the Cluster Auto Painter tool. 

13. A DNA discovery I made was that, five years after doing my first DNA test and  attending countless presentations I am finally gaining an understanding of what it is all about. As someone who never studied science I have been on a deep learning curve.

14. I taught a genimate how to I hope that I managed to teach something to a few of the genies who attended the presentations and webinars I delivered. 

Panel Presentation with Kirsty Gray and Janet Few at THE Genealogy Show

15. A brick wall I demolished was ... my sledgehammer isn't too sharp so, while I added a couple of generations to Mr GeniAus' tree I didn't even put a crack in any of my brickwalls.

16. A great site I visited was...  it had to be the Fulneck Moravian Settlement near Pudsey in Yorkshire. Even if you have no ties to the Moravian Church the village  is still worth a visit. The original buildings which mostly stand unaltered date from the mid 18th century. 

Entrance to the Fulneck Moravian Settlement

17. A new genealogy/history book I enjoyed was I had to look at my Librarything account for an answer to this one. Murder, Misadventure and Miserable Ends: Tales from a Colonial Coroner's Court was not strictly genealogy but it was a valuable read as it gave me an insight into the early history of the colony of New South Wales and the grisly activities of the Coroner's Office.  

18. It was exciting to finally meet  so many UK and Irish genimates in the flesh at two events I attended in the UK, THE Genealogy Show and Rootstech London. These events gave me an opportunity to press the flesh with people I had previously only known online. BTW I'll be back in Birmingham in June to present three talks at THE Genealogy Show.
 

Catching up with Genimates, Robert and Nathan at THE Genealogy Show

19. I am excited for 2020 because... There is so much family information hiding out there for me to find.  Actually this last stanza of Robert Frost's poem "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" describes this well:

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,   

But I have promises to keep,   

And miles to go before I sleep,   

And miles to go before I sleep.

20. Another positive I would like to share is ...  my geneactivities continue to enrich my life. Thank you to all my genimates for your support and generosity.

Accentuate the Positive Geneameme 2019

Once again I am asking you to reflect on your geneayear. I ran a version of this meme each year between 2012 and 2017 but somehow forgot to post it last year. 

I am back again asking you to take some time to reflect on the past year and rejoice in your successes.

Accentuate the Positive Geneameme 2019

I invite you to take part in this activity by responding to the following statements/questions in a blog post. Write as much or as little as you want and complete as many statements as you wish. If you wish to take part and don't have a blog email me your responses and I will post them here on the GeniAus blog.

Once you have done so please share your post's link in a comment on this post or to me via email to jillballau@gmail.com. I will, in January, compile a list of links to your contributions here on this blog.

Remember to Accentuate the Positive 
(Please delete the items that are not relevant to your situation.)

1.  An elusive ancestor I found was

2.  A great newspaper article I found was

3.  A geneajourney I took was

4.  I locate an important record

5.  A newly found family member shared

6.  A geneasurprise I received was

7.   My 2019 social media post that I was particularly proud of was

8.   I made a new genimate who

9.  A new piece of technology or skill I mastered was

10. I joined

11. A genealogy education session or event from which I learnt something new was

12. A blog post that taught me something new was

13. A DNA discovery I made was

14. I taught a genimate how to

15. A brick wall I demolished was 

16. A great site I visited was

17. A new genealogy/history book I enjoyed was

18. It was exciting to finally meet

19. I am excited for 2020 because

20. Another positive I would like to share is ...