Imagine delivering a presentation in Australia about ‘genealogy research in newspapers’ — and speaking solely about Canadian publications.
Unless your presentation was called Genealogy Research in Canadian Newspapers, the audience would likely be disappointed and disgruntled. They would be right to assume you had no interest in them and couldn’t be bothered including resources that would be useful to them.
While preparing a presentation is the speaker’s responsibility, genealogical societies can do their part to ensure the presentation is a success.
After all, presentations that are customized for the audience make happier attendees, which helps attract people to the next conference, lecture, meeting or webinar.
Some societies, however, leave all guess work about the audience, their interests, and level of knowledge to the speaker, and hope all goes well.
A friend of mine spoke at a genealogical society’s monthly meeting a few years ago. I was surprised at her presentation topic. When I asked her what they had said when they first contacted her, she said, “Not much. They asked me what I wanted to talk about and told me how long to speak and when the meeting takes place.”
I asked if they share any information about the expected audience and what they would like to hear. She said, “No.”
That society did a disservice to the speaker and to their members and potential members who attended.
If only they had briefed the speaker.
The speaker’s good presentation could have become great.
Top five Here are the top five ways genealogical societies can help their speakers, from near and far, deliver better presentations.
Brief the speaker about the audience, their level of knowledge and interest, and what their expectations will be.
Provide guidelines and directives about the need for local, regional and/or national content in the presentation and handout.
Offer to direct the speaker to where they can find and learn about local, regional and/or national resources.
Recommend the speaker put emphasis in their presentation on the local, regional and/or national resources and to start the presentation and handout with the local and regional content, followed by resources from elsewhere.
Provide a head’s up about a local or national event, such as a municipal anniversary, local festival, holiday, or society anniversary so the speaker can understand references to such an event and, if desired, acknowledge the event in their presentation.
The Niagara Peninsula Branch of Ontario Ancestors plans to launch a monthly webinar series in 2020 and it has issued a call for presentation proposals.
The webinars will be held live on the second Tuesday of each month at 7:00 p.m. Eastern time.
The branch invites proposals on a wide range of topics. Presentation topics include United Empire Loyalists, Welland canal workers, land records, Black Heritage, and research records in Old Lincoln/Welland Counties.
Selected speakers, who will receive an honorarium, must provide Old Lincoln/Welland Counties (Niagara Peninsula) specific examples in their presentations as applicable. Speakers may submit up to three proposals for consideration.
Submission details and an online form can be found on the Niagara Peninsula Branch website. The submission deadline is November 15, 2019.
Years ago, my daughter and I attended a Backstreet Boys concert in Montreal. The Bell Centre was filled with more than 20,000 screaming girls. For the performers, Montreal was probably just another stop in a long, international tour.
For the audience, however, this was a once in a lifetime event. And the Backstreet Boys didn’t disappoint.
When Nick Carter said, “Je t’aime, Montréal,” I thought the screaming would blow off the roof.
With one simple sentence, the Backstreet Boys won over their audience and made the evening memorable for their fans.
From away While I’ve never heard any screaming or swooning at genealogy conferences, I have attended many great presentations by genealogists who lived in the area where they spoke and by genealogists who travelled from another country, province or city.
The speakers from away, who won me over were those who learned about their audience beforehand and tailored their presentation and handout for us.
Unfortunately, I’ve also attended presentations that ticked me off. The speakers annoyed me because they gave the impression they had no idea where they were and couldn’t be bothered adapting their presentation for the audience.
The smallest lack of consideration for the audience can take a great presentation and ruin it.
Know your audience One speaker who won over his audience was the late Mel Wolfgang. I had the great pleasure of meeting and introducing Mel at the Ontario Genealogical Society (OGS) conference in Kingston in 2012.
Mel knew his Canadian audience, perhaps in part because he lived in upstate New York and had attended McGill University in Montreal. He understood Canadians, or more importantly, he made us think he did.
Throughout his presentation about newspaper research, he included Canadian resources, along with American ones. He knew how to pronounce the names of Canadian cities and knew where they were located. He also knew enough history about our country to refer to it.
Learn about the country’s history At an OGS conference in Toronto in 2016, Judy G. Russell was a terrific speaker from away.
Although one of her presentations was on a case study that included only American resources — and she told me she had warned OGS about it — she began her presentation with, “I know, I know. You whooped our ass in 1812,” and she immediately won over her audience. She knew who her audience was, and she acknowledged us — and the War of 1812 — throughout all of her presentations.
Look at your presentation from your audience’s perspective In comparison, another speaker, who was scheduled to speak about newspaper research to Canadians at a different venue, hadn’t given a moment’s thought to including Canadian resources.
I had reached out to her/him to learn more about the presentation for my blog and to ask if s/he planned to include any Canadian content.
The answer to my question was brief: “I haven’t thought of adding any Canadian newspapers.”
When I politely suggested the speaker think how people in another country would react if I spoke to them solely about Canadian newspapers in a Researching in Newspapers presentation, s/he said, “I hadn’t thought about it that way.”
To help speakers who come from away, I’ve put together a list of ways to make a better presentation in another country, province, state or city. It’s a list I use for my own presentations whether I am scheduled to speak in the United States, Toronto, Ottawa, or even downtown Montreal, near where I live.
Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net.
Top 10 Here are the top 10 ways to deliver a better presentation away from home.
Learn about the city and country you will be speaking.
Be sincere and say something nice about the city you are visiting, even it is just about the great weather that day, the architecture, or the friendly cab driver.
Unless your topic is about genealogy research specific to where you live, limit the number of times you mention your country or home town to two or three mentions.
Include a lot of local resources in your presentation, whether they be at the municipal, regional, provincial or national level. When appropriate, list the local resources before those where you live.
Before preparing your presentation and writing your handout, ask other genealogists and the conference host where to find the local or national resources. We’re a friendly group and are willing to help.
Don’t make references to your country’s history and assume we all know about it. If you refer to Abraham Lincoln, tell us he served during the American civil war during the early 1860s. Don’t assume everyone knows the time period and context.
Replace most of your anecdotes and examples with ones from the host city or country.
Customize your PowerPoint presentation to include mostly local examples.
Review your presentation and handout from the audience’s perspective. Ask someone in the host location to review it for you, and listen to the feedback.
Convert the currency. When referring to the cost of a genealogy program, book, or DNA kit, give the cost in the local currency. Don’t give the cost where you live because the audience doesn’t live there. If the product is available through a local or national supplier, find out the exact price and the name of the supplier.
If you are a speaker from away and plan to speak in Canada, I recommend you take advantage of the lists of many Canadian resources on Dave Obee’s website, CanGenealogy.com, and in my Genealogy Research Toolbox. Cyndi’s List can help you with presentations delivered almost anywhere in the world, including Canada.
Genealogical societies can also do their part. Tomorrow, look for part two in this series, called 5 ways for genealogical societies to help speakers ‘from away’ deliver a better presentation.
Ontario Ancestors announced in Saturday’s e-Weekly Update that Jen Baldwin will be the keynote speaker at next year’s conference in Hamilton, Ontario, taking place June 5 to 7.
One of Ms. Baldwin’s presentations at the conference will focus on The Spirit of the Next Generation: Why Age Doesn’t Matter in Genealogy.
Based in Colorado, Ms. Baldwin is the data acquisition manager, North America, and project manager of the Catholic Heritage Archive for Findmypast. She lectures, writes and consults on a variety of genealogy-related topics, and was part of the research team for Genealogy Roadshow, season two on PBS.
Her focus areas include the Western United States, gold rush history, fraternal societies, and using technology and social media in family history. She is the author of course materials for the National INational Institute of Genealogical Studies and numerous Legacy QuickGuides.
Ms. Baldwin has been working in the realm of professional genealogy since 2010, but has been pursuing her own family history since she was ten years old.
Genealogists who hoped to one day soon see a big increase in the number of DNA matches in France had their hopes dashed Friday when members of France’s National Assembly rejected all amendments in a bill to legalize consumer DNA tests.
Assemblée nationale, Palais Bourbon, Paris, France. Source: Wikimedia Commons.
The members even went a step further by toughening the law. An amendment was adopted to ban advertising for “recreational” genetic testing.
Since advertising of consumer DNA kits on television and online is already banned in France, there has been no clarification on how broad the term, advertising, should be interpreted in the new amendment and whether this will ban all forms of promotion, such as those found on blogs, websites and YouTube.
Friday’s vote does not affect the €3750 fine, which has never been applied, for people who buy DNA tests.
In response to a question on Twitter, genetic genealogist Debbie Kennett (@DebbieKennett) said, “The French can’t stop people ordering overseas and no one is ever prosecuted.”
If you’re like me and didn’t register early for the International Society for British Genealogy and Family History’s webinar yesterday on Using the Kirk’s Archival Records and missed it, you’re one of many.
Soon after I published Friday’s blog post about the webinar, registration was full.
That’s the bad news.
The good news is the recording of this webinar and the full line-up of the 2019-2020 webinars, as well as access to the quarterly publication, is available to society members. Membership is US$25 or about CDN$33.
If you want to watch the next webinar for free on October 26 when Alec Tritton presents Parish Chest in England & Wales, you’d better register now. It may, however, already be too late. The first two webinars were completely sold out, and that may be the case with this third one of the season. Few places were left by yesterday.
When you do register, avoid disappointment by joining the webinar several minutes before it starts. Webinar host Christine Woodcock said, “We allow 150 percent capacity for registration in anticipation that about 35 percent of those who register don’t attend.”
Two youths in 2018 toppled 150 monuments in Glenwood Cemetery in Picton, Ontario, a small town near Belleville. Most of the vandalised gravesites dated from the 19th century.
The monument companies estimated it would take about $250,000 to do the repairs — a cost that would have bankrupt the cemetery if the community hadn’t come forward and helped raise money.
About half of the damaged monuments have been repaired, and they hope to have all them restored by the fall of 2021.
To coin a phrase, it’s a monumental task.
Unfortunately, the vandalism in Picton was not a one-time event. It happens in cemeteries across the country.
Ontario Ancestors has decided to step up to help.
The organization, legally known as the Ontario Genealogical Society (OGS), will create a fund dedicated to help support community efforts to repair damage to Ontario cemeteries incurred by acts of vandalism and for rehabilitation projects within cemeteries that are considered to have historical or cultural significance.
The society said in an announcement Friday that it has become increasingly difficult for cemetery organizations to come up with the funds required to make the repairs. They sometimes employ the use of volunteers and secondary organizations, such as Scouts Canada, to assist them. Often these other organizations resort to fundraising on their own to support the efforts.
To support the small secondary organizations in their efforts, the cemetery committee of Ontario Ancestors proposed the creation of the Cemetery Vandalism and Rehabilitation Fund.
The fund will be seeded with $5,000 to get it going and will be replenished through a separate donation program run by the society.
The cemetery committee and the OGS board of directors will work to establish guidelines and an approval process whereby organizations in need can submit their requests for review through the society’s website at ogs.on.ca.
According to society President Steve Fulton UE, “OGS is excited to be able to play a role in the preservation of local cemeteries across the province alongside ‘the boots on the ground’ people who are dedicated to our ancestors and their final resting place.”
Joe Wilson, chair of the cemetery committee, also expressed his appreciation for the establishment of this fund. He said, “It’s not the cemetery itself, but what is contained within it that needs to be protected. I am proud to be a member of an organization that is devoted to the advocacy and preservation of Ontario’s cemeteries.”
For more gems like these throughout the week, join the Genealogy à la carte Facebook group. When you submit your request to join, you will be asked to answer two quick questions about your family history research.
UPDATE: As of 9:15 a.m. Eastern time, October 4, 2019, Christine Woodcock, who hosts the webinar series, announced registration is full.
The International Society for British Genealogy and Family History will host a free webinar, Seek and Ye Shall Find: Using the Kirk’s Archival Records, presented by archivist Margaret Fox, on Saturday, October 5, at 11:00 a.m. Eastern time.
Ms. Fox, formerly with the National Records of Scotland, will give this in-depth and detailed presentation showing the wealth of genealogical information and social history that can be gleaned from the Church of Scotland’s archival collection. She has an intimate knowledge of these records as she was part of the team that digitized them over a decade ago.
Register to watch the live webinar. A link to the webinar will be emailed to you. Join the webinar early because seating is limited and it can can fill quickly.
Set your PVR for two genealogy programs on television tomorrow and Tuesday.
A New Leaf, based on a format similar to Who Do You Think You Are?, but with everyday people, debuts Saturday, October 5, on NBC. In my part of the world, the half-hour program airs at 11:30 a.m. Eastern time, but check your local listing.
Each week A New Leaf will follow people “on the cusp of key life inflection points,” who using family history, genealogy, and sometimes AncestryDNA analysis will go on a journey of self-discovery and learn from the past while looking to the future. The program is hosted by Daisy Fuentes.
The sixth season of Finding Your Roots with Henry Louis Gate, Jr. begins Tuesday, October 8, at 8:00 p.m. on PBS.
The first episode, called Hollywood Royalty, features Isabella Rossellini, Anjelica Huston and Mia Farrow.
The following week, Melissa McCarthy and Eric Stonestreet will learn about their family history. After that, fans will have to wait until January 2020 for new episodes.
While watching Finding Your Roots, take note of the way Dr. Gates reveals the celebrities’ family history. It’s a good lesson in how to tell a good story and draw in an audience.
Imagine sharing your family history with relatives and getting the kind of reaction seen in the program’s trailer.
