https://www.hispanicheritagemonth.gov/about.html   "Each year, Americans observe National Hispanic Heritage Month from September 15 to October 15, by celebrating the histories, cultures and contributions of American citizens whose ancestors came from Spain, Mexico, the Caribbean and Central and South America. "The day of September 15 is significant because it is the anniversary of independence for Latin American countries Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. In addition, Mexico and Chile celebrate their independence days on September 16 and September18, respectively. Also, Columbus Day or Día de la Raza, which is October 12, falls within this 30 day period." All this according to the official site,  https://www.hispanicheritagemonth.gov/about.html . Many of us never learned the history of Americans who were not colonists or immigrants from elsewhere, but there were many people living in what is now the USA when colonists arrived, and many in what w

Courtesy Pixabay In the past ten or twelve years a new fiction genre has gained popularity--genealogical crime mysteries. Some rely on historical research to solve modern day mysteries while others use modern research resources such as DNA to solve cold cases, and some, both. Some of the new literature is nonfiction as people present their search for family through adoption and other family dynamics. As a result there is a wealth of entertaining reading material available.  By now, most of you are familiar with Nathan Dylan Goodwin and his Morton Farrier, Forensic Genealogist series which has its tenth book in progress. Nathan has also written two books in his Venetor series which focuses on solving cold cases with DNA. Nathan is presently researching for the third book in that series as well. At this point you loyal readers are expecting me to list other authors and, if I do, I am sure to neglect somebody's favorite so I suggest you go online to your local library or Amazon books

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Treasure_hunter.jpg Have you ever started a crazy-seeming project? Labor Day weekend is our annual work party up at our cabin outside the Mt. Rainier National Park, where we cut, split and stack the winter's firewood, and do general fix-up and cleanup jobs.  Dad, Ted Cowan, cutting wood ca. 1979 For me, it was an attempt at some family tree repair, but without any internet. My daughter brought up her mother-in-law, and I had prepared for the conversation by creating some screenshots of her part of the family tree. That was somewhat productive, because I realized I had followed her step-mother's line rather than her mother's -- because her stepmother's obituary mentioned her as a daughter by her unusual name, so I just knew I was right! But this was the first time she had seen my (incorrect) work.  A few days ago, I drove up to to Seattle to spend the afternoon with her, taking a fresh look at the tree. One of the first hints for h

Picture courtesy Freepix and Vecteezy This month SKCGS celebrates FIVE years of blogging! We've covered many topics from basic techniques to more involved methodology.  Members have contributed marvelous family stories and pictures.  You have truly made this your blog! Several of our blogs have featured online resources, either as a topic or as a source of information.  One of our more frequent of these is "Chronicling America", the free  online digital newspaper collection site at the Library of Congress .  The Library of Congress has programs aimed at middle and high school students as part of their National History Day competition.  One of the resources for research is, of course, Chronicling America and LOC is presenting: Chronicling America: "Turning Points in History" Wednesday, September 6, 2023 1 - 2 pm EDT Explore Turning Points in History and learn to use Chronicling America, a freely-available collection of historic American newspapers at the Library