The Washington State Genealogical Society honors volunteers who have provided outstanding service to the genealogy community at its Annual Meeting in May each year.  The South King County Genealogical Society is proud that Janet O’Conor Camarata was honored this year. Janet served SKCGS as President from 2013 -2015, and as Publicity Chair for nine years. She founded our popular Technology Users Group, and this year co-founded our new Genetic Genealogy/DNA Users Group.  She continues to frequently lead both groups as well as delivering genealogy education lectures statewide and beyond. Our Bylaws Committee; Dorothy Pretare, Marilyn Schunke and Valorie Zimmerman have spent many hours this past year reviewing and rewriting our Bylaws and producing our first Standing Rules.  The adoption of these proposed bylaws will totally change the governance and operation of our Society.  Your Board of Directors has recommended the adoption of the bylaws.  If they are ado...

By Janet O’Conor Camarata Farmland, Grundy County, Missouri Fulfilling a Promise Placing the Headstone for William Terry Myers  1861-1937 One sunny summer afternoon in 1986, two men and a young boy stood over an unmarked pauper’s grave in a small country cemetery south of Albany and north of Evona in Gentry County, Missouri. It was a drier year than usual, and the grass was already struggling with the heat, humidity and lack of rain. It was a little greener in the south western corner of the cemetery as the course, deep rooted grass was shaded by one lone elm tree on the knoll, next to the boundary fence.  The cemetery was surrounded by small farms in a chain of treeless rolling hills. In the distance could be seen a line of willows crowding the edges of Sampson Creek as it flows into the East Fork of the Grand River. Cemetery photo provided by Blair B. Carmichael. Attribution-ShareAlike CC BY-SA Claude Fish, Lynn Myers and Lynn’s son, Brian stood qu...

By Valorie Zimmerman and MaryLynn Strickland While gathering contact information from Washington state genealogy societies, historical and heritage groups, and museums, a gem became obvious: The Jefferson County Historical Society , which has some fascinating places to visit also has a Research Center, which they say, “ .serves as both the primary research facility and the repository for the Society's archival collections. Staff and volunteers are on hand to assist researchers.” See their website for more information: http://jchsmuseum.org/Sites/ResearchCenter.html .  This group is also active on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jeffcountymuseum . Even more exciting: you can access part of their collection now, sitting at your computer! See https://cdm16785.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/ to search. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Here are a few more interesting societies.  We do not wish to overlook anybody but space does not allow ...

By Stuart Jay Koblentz Haley 1929 Cord L29, car that belonged to Frank Lloyd Wright Photo used by permission of Cheri Sayer . . .In My Merry Oldsmobile Come away with me, Lucille In my merry Oldsmobile Down the road of life we'll fly Automobubbling, you and I Hi! Cyndi asked me to share what I know about using information about automobiles to help date people in pictures. For many people, we have family pictures with our ancestors and family members gathered around the family car. We may (or may not) know who the people are, but most people don't know the year or make of the vehicle in the picture. But if you can look at visual cues, and know how to search on on any search engine that provides an image tab, identifying these vehicles can give a look into a window in time about family members. For a large number of people, all old cars in family pictures can look alike. But they aren't. These tips may help point you into the right direction: Loo...

By MaryLynn Strickland 1 Are you looking for the Clements family who immigrated to Minnesota in the 1880s?  Or maybe the Pheil family who left Germany for Virginia in the 1700s?  Are you frustrated encountering all those McBees you aren’t related to while you seek the ones you need? Or are you a wealth of knowledge about the Wood brothers who lived in Franklin County, Vermont?  Have you connected with unknown cousins because of DNA matching, giving you previously unknown surnames to research?  If you answer yes to any of the above, you need to be using the society’s Surname List. One of the popular items at early society meetings was a long narrow box, like a library card index drawer, filled with surnames that had been collected for many years.  You could browse through the box and take down contact information.  One drawback to the surname box was that only one person could access it at a time and there were a lot of cards!  Another drawbac...

1 While unofficially marking the start of summer, Memorial Day is a national holiday devoted to honoring American war dead in all conflicts.  Many of us will remember and honor other loved ones.  What could be a more important day for genealogists? I had the privilege of visiting Arlington National Cemetery last weekend.  Nearly 5000 people are expected to visit on Memorial Day.   American flags will decorate the graves and niches of the 400,000 fallen heroes and their family members resting there.  Local ceremonies will be held on Monday at Tahoma National Cemetery at 1 pm, at Renton Memorial Park at 1 pm, and at the Auburn Veteran’s Memorial at 11 am. The Kent Historical Society will be open 12:00 – 4:00 pm Monday for a special observance of Memorial Day. ------------------------ Reminder:  Military records on My Heritage.com and Fold 3 are free to research today. I am pleased to announce that MaryLynn Strickland has accepted the posi...

By Cheri Sayer The Highline Historical Society has a well-established presence in South King County, and soon it will have a new home and it’s very own Museum!  Founded as the Burien Heritage Society in 1994, it soon merged with the Friends of the Highline School District and became the Highline Historical Society.  They have been an active society, with a small exhibit space at the SeaTac City Hall for quite a few years.  The Highline community has been the largest area in the State of Washington without a local history museum, so this effort has been a long-time goal of the Society.             The community of Highline is not a governmental entity, but a school district, known locally as “401” or the Highline School District.  The Society defines Highline as being bounded on the north by Seattle city limits, on the west by Puget Sound, and on the south at 252nd Street, just at Salt Water State Park.  Hwy 5 forms most of the...