The Thoughtful Ancestor

Earlier this year I was delighted to find that one of my submissions for the Connections2025 Conference had been accepted.

My topic is: The Thoughtful Ancestor: leaving a large footprint for future generations

Image by bobschwenkler from Pixabay

The Synopsis: Researchers spend enormous amounts of time, effort and money on their projects but, if they have not made arrangements before they are dead, the fruits of their labour are likely to end up on a rubbish dump. 

The purpose of this presentation is to make attendees reflect on their practices and to guide them in making decisions to ensure that their work is preserved for future generations. 

In this presentation I hope to cover: Evaluating your collections, Cleaning up your files, Documenting your wishes, Appointing a successor: person or institution, Writing up a clear summary of your collection, Leaving funds for curation.

I'm aiming to make this a practical presentation with many suggestions for leaving a large footprint. In addition to a physical footprint I will mention the emotional legacy we leave for our descendants. 

I feel a serious case of nerves approaching as I strive to put together a talk worthy of the event. When I peruse the program I see that I am in the company of esteemed and experienced presenters.

On my recent return from overseas I created a Powerpoint file to use as a mind map/plan for my presentation. It's time to give up dabbling and get moving as my file is due to be uploaded in less than than a month. I am now in serious research/preparation mode. 

My presentation is after lunch on the last day of the conference so the audience members are likely to be suffering from information overload. I will have to make it light and lively to keep them engaged.

There are a few speakers I would really like to hear at the event but as we are scheduled at the same timeslot I will have to miss Andrew Redfern and David Ryan. I hope there is some audience left for me!

Roll on March. 

Accentuate the Positive 2024 Geneameme

Back in 2012 when I decided to publish the first Accentuate the Positive Geneameme I said:

"At this time of year many geneabloggers take stock of what they have achieved or not achieved in the previous twelve months and set themselves goals for the coming year. I have been reading several of these posts this week.

I feel that a lot of my geneablogging friends are too hard on themselves; several have reported on their successes this year but quite a number have lamented that they haven't achieved as much as they set out to do or that they haven't blogged with the frequency they envisaged.

You are a bunch of highly motivated people who have made great strides in the genealogy sphere. Let's share the good news."

For the 2024 challenge I was going to be lazy and use the prompts from 2012 but on reading them realised there was no mention of AI, DNA or Zoom in the 2012 list. Blogging has also waned in popularity and Twitter has gone off the rails. I have therefore modified my questions. 

I invite you to take part in this activity by responding to the following statements/questions in an online  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, later in January, compile a list of links to your contributions here on this blog.

Remember to Accentuate the Positive - please delete the statements that are not relevant to your situation.

1.  Google provided an answer to

2.  I was the recipient of genearosity from 

3.  This headstone gave me some extra information

4.  An useful record I discovered was

5.  A newly found family member who shared

6.  A geneasurprise I received was

7.   My 2024 post that I was particularly proud of was

8.   DNA helped me to 

9.  I was pleased I upgraded

10. Although Face to Face events have returned Zoom has 

11. I dipped my toes into

12. I connected with 

13. By dipping my toes into AI I was able to

14. I was honoured to

15. I found this presentation most useful

16. A great repository/archive/library I visited was

17. I got the most value from this book

18. It was exciting to finally meet

19. A geneadventure I enjoyed was

20. Another positive I would like

Genimate Judy is returning downunder

Over the past few years I've had the opportunity to hear Judy G Russell, The Legal Genealogist, speak on genealogy topics on three continents. I managed to nab Judy for an interview at Rootstech in 2016 where she spoke to me about her genealogy journey and her first trip downunder. 

I have been fortunate to have several opportunities to socialise as well as learn from Judy.

Judy enjoyed an Aussie Pub meal with genimates on her first visit to Sydney 2016
Back L-R: Rosemary, Judy, Helen, Melissa, Lilian
Front L-R: Kerry, Alona Jill

After one of Judy's presentations in Sydney I wrote this:

It is rare that I lavish praise on genealogy presenters but Judy is excellence in presentation personified. She knows her subject, she looks professional and acts professionally (although we casual Aussies encouraged her to discard her jacket in the 36c heat), she oozes passion and enthusiasm, injects humour into her presentations, involves her audience : she delivers on all counts.  I am sometimes concerned at the quality of presenters that are sent down under, Judy (and a couple of others are exceptions). https://geniaus.blogspot.com/2016/02/judy-sailed-in.html

I was so thrilled to hear that Judy, who was a keynote at Congress 2018 in Sydney, would be presenting again at Connections2025 (aka known as Congress) in Brisbane.

This recent media release for the organisers of Connections2025 tells more of  Judy's story.