By Barbara Mattoon The Society offers many opportunities to learn and develop genealogy skills in both large and small groups. We endeavor to offer activities at times and locations that will allow the largest number of members to participate.  March will  kick-off with the F amily T ree M aker U sers G roup meeting on Saturday March 2, at the Auburn Library from 10:15 – 11:45.  Winona Laird will teach us how to use Error Reports in FTM.  Please RSVP to Dave Liesse at ftm-group@skcgs.org as soon as you know you can attend.  We are outgrowing our space at the Auburn Library and may have to find an alternate location.  If that happens, we want to be able to let you know where to find us. ANNOUNCEMENT                          ANNOUNCEMENT                       ANNOUNCEMENT   Our long-awaited DNA Special Interest Group...

By Dorothy Pretare Almost everyone has some family history items.  A few people may have only family stories or a photo, but others may have a Genealogy Room with full file cabinets, bookcases, boxed, etc. Many of us have spent years of hard work, time, and money to research our families.  Let’s identify 1) types of family history stuff and their possible locations, 2) your hopes and possible options, and 3) some steps to help ensure your hopes/wishes will be honored. Types of family history stuff and their possible locations Family history items can take many forms, including loose papers; photographs and slides; family heirlooms (like the family Bible, jewelry, household items, tools, etc.); video and audio recordings; notebooks; digital files; posted online family trees; DNA results, etc. Do you know the locations for all your stuff?  Those items may be in file cabinets; bookcases; stacked on your desk or on the floor nearby; cardboard boxes or plastic tubs...

By Harold Nielson The recent bitter arctic cold wave, described as a Polar Vortex by the weather service, has had every one's attention. Record cold temperatures from Montana, the Dakotas, Minnesota, Michigan, all the Great Lakes Region, stretching all the way to New England. The news reported 22 deaths from the cold these past few weeks. This weather is not new to us older folks who can remember cold winters and blizzards of years gone by. I remember when we lived in Leadville Colorado from 1974-1978 when the winters were bitterly cold at 10,200 feet. It was not unusual to have snow from November still on the ground in March and April. Cold temps of 20-35 degrees below zero were not uncommon. I remember laying out in the street in front of our home changing the starter in my '68 Ford. It was 25 below and I didn't stay out long at a time, but I got the job done. When our son had his tonsils out, a good snow of 12-15 inches with wind that drifted the snow in around ou...

By MaryLynn Strickland In my early days of researching online (from 2001), I made contact with people far and wide through message boards (remember those?)  Once in a while I would encounter someone who inserted her entire family file into a message that went on and on. . . and on.  But usually people would ask, or offer, to share a GEDCOM. What was that?  From the FamilySearch Wiki, it is the acronym for GEenealogical Data COMmunications.  GEDCOM is a data structure created by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints for storing and exchanging genealogical information so that many different computer programs can use it.  It is identified by the file type “.ged”. (Stay with me here; this technical part is brief!). “The GEDCOM Standard is a technical document written for computer programmers, system developers, and technically sophisticated users.”  The GEDCOM Standard Release 5.5, 2 January 1996 [Revised 10 January 1996]. Copyright © 1987, 1...

by Joy Etienne, sole niece of an 8th AA radio operator BAM.   Fire in the empty bomb bay.   BANG.   The B-24 nose turret explosion. Chaos high above Oise still enjoying the painterly French summer light made famous by Vincent Van Gogh in another era. Black, molten flak lacerates the shiny skin of the Ford-built Lib.  BOOM. The wings fly off. Thursday 7:35 pm  Sunon Square Dance goes down in flames.  The German 88 meter anti-aircraft canon in Cramoisy got the squadron  leader. My 4F uncle, Tech Sgt John Harold Leahy, who went by Bill, the radio gunner in the bomb bay, grabbed the fire extinguisher before passing out. June 27, 1944 while supporting our D-Day troops bombing German supply lines in Creil, he and   Sgt Walter Schum, left waist gunner from Altoona, PA, Lt Walter Strychasz, bombardier from Cleveland, OH and Lt Arlee Reno, navigator from New Mexico died for a righteous cause. Missing Air Crew Reports & more MACR...

by Kathleen MacLeod Hanzeli What do Alec Baldwin and his brothers, Humphrey Bogart, Barbara Bush, George H. W. Bush, George W. Bush, Chevy Chase, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Christopher Lloyd, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Sarah Palin, Edith Roosevelt (Mrs. Theodore), Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Lillian Russell, Joseph Smith and Dr. Benjamin Spock have in common?  They all descend from the same ancestor who landed on these shores on 6 September 1620, on the bark Mayflower.  Most of us can claim descent from a Mayflower traveler, but the above person is unique and I didn’t know he existed until one day recently, my eleven year old grandson said to me, “Nana, my friend from school’s ancestor fell off of the Mayflower!” My first instinct was to respond, “What?  No one fell off the Mayflower.  If he had, he’d be dead and have no descendants.”  But with a little research, I discovered that the story was true, and my grandson can claim a good friend as a descendent amo...

By Valorie Zimmerman 2018 was a great year for South King County Genealogical Society, and we anticipate 2019 will be even better. We began the year by launching our new website at http://skcgs.org . Our mail list at Rootsweb was down for awhile, but is back. Our Seminar was tremendous, and we're planning another for 2020. We have had some great speakers at our regular meetings, we've placed for our formerly traveling library at the Kent Family History Center , have renewed our contract with the King County Library System to present our book collection to south King County at the Auburn Library , and have many thriving special interest groups. We had a very successful Intermediate Genealogy class following our 2018 meetings, taught by Winona Baird. Winona also began offering our Research Workshops in 2018. Our Board of Directors meets monthly at the Auburn Fire Station; all meetings are open to SKCGS members. Volunteers staff Genealogy Help tables monthly at three so...