Jordan Jones, president, opened the 2016 National Genealogical Society Family History Conference on Wednesday. Prior to Connie Lester’s opening keynote, he covered a number of items.
He thanked the organizers and the various volunteers. A local family history society hosts the conference each year. The Florida State Genealogical Society hosted this year’s event and provided 80 essential volunteers. An additional 30 volunteers were here from other societies. Hats off to these many volunteers. Jordan mentioned that NGS is now 113 years old. Their mission is “to serve and grow the genealogical community by providing education and training, fostering increased quality and standards, and promoting access to and preservation of genealogical records.”
Jordan reviewed some of the society’s many educational offerings.
- They have a book series titled “Research in the States.” He announced two new titles available exclusively here at the conference, and thereafter on the online store: Florida and Texas. That brings the total number of titles in the series to 24.
- NGS announced a new title coming this summer: Genetic Genealogy in Practice. It is part of their “Special Topics Series.” The two existing titles of the series have proven very popular: Mastering Genealogical Proof by Tom Jones and Genealogy and the Law by Kay Haviland Freilich and William B. Freilich.
- NGS offers a series of cloud-based interactive educational courses.
- NGS sponsors research trips to important repositories like the FamilySearch Salt Lake Family History Library.
Jordan and Chuck Mason, NGS awards committee chairman announced a number of awards. You may know three of the recipients:
- Cyndi Ingle, creator and curator of Cyndi’s List received a presidential citation in recognition for her service to the community.
- Dick Eastman received a presidential citation for 20 years publication of the Eastman Online Genealogy Newsletter. More than 75,000 people read his newsletter.
- Drew Smith, one of the hosts of The Genealogy Guys podcast, received an award for outstanding genealogical librarianship.
At the close of the session, as is tradition, Jordan announced the location of the conferences year after next. The 2017 conference has already been announced for Raleigh, North Carolina. The 2018 conference will be in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Congratulations to Cyndi, Dick, Drew, and the many award recipients I left unnamed. You can read the announcement with the full list of awards and the announcement of Drew’s award on the NGS Conference website.
Image credit: Scott Stewart, 2013 NGS Conference
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