Founded 1991
1500 Shenandoah Road
Alexandria, Virginia 22308
Telephone: (703) 768-4101 |
2019 Writing Contest Winners
 The winners of the 2019 writing contest have been announced and they are:
¨ 1st place was “Clara’s Life Before and After” by George McKittrick
¨ 2nd place was “Clues from Grandpa” by Janet Palfey
¨ 3rd place was “My Mother as an Artist” by John Cross.
Congratulations to all the winners, and thank you to everyone who submitted their entries. Another big thank you to Amy Lynn Breedlove who managed the contest and those “unknown” judges who graded the papers.
Remember that MVGS members are able to read these winning stories in the next three editions of the Society newsletter.
"How to Get a Good Digital Photo from Old Photos"
 15 October MVGS monthly meeting
Meeting Discussion: The photographic portion of this presentation covered such topics as understanding DPI and Resolution; where can you get photos of relatives from the past; scanning and printing photos; how to get good images from a computer screen; how to get good pictures using a cell phone from a photo in a picture frame; copying documents using your cell phone; how to scan large documents and photos; and how to get good tombstone pictures. He also presented an introduction to RootsMagic, an award-winning genealogy software which makes researching, organizing, and sharing your family history easy.
Gary Petranek retired from IBM after 41 years. He has been the Co-Director of the Washington DC Family History Center in Kensington, MD for the past 13 years. He has been doing genealogy research for 20+ years and has been an avid photographer “my whole life.” Gary hosts a RootsMagic user group once a month at the Family History Center.
MVGS 2019 Conference a Success
The Mount Vernon Genealogical Society held their 4th annual ancestry conference at the Hollin Hall Senior Center on 28 September 2019 with 70+ attendees. The agenda started with an 8AM registration followed by a 9:15AM .jpg) kickoff presentation by Claire Kluskins from NARA discussing "Finding Records of Claims Against the Federal Government." Claire also presented a second subject brief on "Pension Fraud" later in the afternoon.
The conference theme was "Finding Roots - Researching in Your Own Back Yard," so speakers reviewed facilities and organizations near Alexandria, VA. These included Washington D.C. Library of Congress and Daughter's of the American Revolution; Maryland Historical Society in Baltimore and the Library of Virginia in Richmond; Fairfax County Court House records in Fairfax, "Genealogy and Maps" and "How Much is a Helpin" was a presentation on getting to know ones ancestors through food traditions.
After the keynote address attendees divided up into three groups to attend the briefing of their .jpg) choice from track one.
At noon everyone reassembled in the main hall for a colorful and tasty box lunch consisting of juice, condiments, chips, grapes and their choice of sandwich.
The tables were arranged to promote conversation and exchange of ancestrial stories and challenges.
The remainder of the day was spent in choosing two more presentations from two additional conference tracks, completing shortly after 3PM.
Library Catalog Always Online!
 The Mount Vernon Genealogical Society library catalog has now been ported to the website as a fully functional interactive on-line application. The cataloging system software in the Research Center was no longer supported by the developer.
You now have access to all the information in our library holdings from anywhere you have internet connectivity. A number of features, not found in the index system previously online, are now available to members and the public. Searches by “Subject”, “Location” and “Media Type” can now be made on almost 2800 holdings in the library. Further searches can then be done on “Title”, “Author” and “Call Number”. Once the desired list of records is found they can be “printed” to a PDF document by clicking on the “PDF List” icon. Additionally, each record can be viewed and printed by clicking on the “eye” icon. Clicking on the “Broom” icon will clear the information in the selection or search box. In addition to searching the database for individual records by "Call Number", "Title", and "Author", the entire database or any filtered selections can be sorted by "Call Number", "Title", or "Author" by clicking on the word at the top of each column.
Clicking on the “View Categories” icon provides another method of search for desired material. Categories of holdings can also be filtered by “Subject”, “Location”, and “Media Type”
The library catalog will always be current now because library accessions are available for viewing as soon as they are put into the online system. Previously the indexes were only updated periodically.
This additional Society benefit would never have been possible without the hard work of volunteers who planned and executed the library database conversion; thank you Jeanne Wilson, Anne Barber, and Gerry Ward.
You can find the library catalog HERE.
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October 20
Telling Your Story, Leaving a Legacy
Explore the idea of preserving your own story. Historians and families used to have letters and diaries to construct their family history. In a world gone digital, how will we pass on our experiences and life lessons? Come hear Anne ...
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October 21
German SIG: Virginia Room German Sources
Speaker: Chris Barbauschak, Virginia Staff Librarian Review of the Virginia Room’s holdings of German books, aids, and possible records.
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October 21
Writing Family History SIG:
Instructor: Paul Phelps Participants will learn that writing family history is a different and equally challenging proposition, but one with satisfactions and discoveries of its own. The idea is to get something on paper, even if it's just a ...
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October 22
Overview of Doing Genealogy Research in Ireland
Instructor: Paul McFarland. As of 3 Sep class is full, but there will be a waiting list in case there are cancellations. You may have been told that researching Irish genealogy is very difficult, if not downright impossible. Like ...
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October 26
Fairfax Genealogical Society Fall Fair
Speaker: Sharon MacInnes, Ph.D, CG ® For all the necessary information and registration forms click HERE
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