Day 3 RootsTech 2022

Knowing I have the rest of the year to look at my playlist, today was a very relaxing day especially as I got up very early (7am in Tasmanian time) to take part in:

Dealing with ethical dilemmas in an online world

Genealogists running the session included Lynn, Jill, Judy, CeCe , Kerry, Daniel and Andrew.

A poll was available at the beginning of the session but as I was a few minutes late joining, I didn’t get to fill it in. The data from the poll was used to lead the discussions.

Topics discussed were:

  • Copyright with photos and records
  • Terms and Conditions on websites we use as genealogists
  • Find a Grave – when and who to add memorials to this site
  • Investigative Genetic Genealogy – law enforcement access to DNA from large databases

Also mentioned in the chat was bullying and gatekeeping, knowledge from amateur or professional genealogists and joining societies and Facebook groups.

Each topic could have been an hour on its own and this was mentioned by many of the 400+ participants in the chat.

When I was teaching and blogging prior to 2011, Edublogger created guide for copyright and images. It has recently been updated for 2021. Even though it says educators, it is relevant to anyone blogging or using social media.

Pexels / Pixabay

Diaries, journals and calendars: Documenting your ancestor’s day to day life – Melissa Barker

Many different types of diaries, journals and calendars

  • Adolescent or teenager diaries – interesting that the example used was one diary used over a 4 year period – could compare what you were doing in previous year on that date
  • War diaries – I have used these for WWI when some of my relatives were in diaries kept by the battalion or similar
  • Work diaries – rarer and hard to find
  • Daily calendars rather than diary or journal – often includes images

These help as a primary resource about what was happening in the family and maybe your family’s part in history.

Try finding them at home, archives and museums. Often mentioned under Manuscript collections. Could also be found in neighbours diaries etc.

I am very lucky in that my parents, whenever they went on a trip away, kept a diary of their travels, including our three month trip around Australia as a family. Dad’s mother also wrote a diary, which dad now has, of her journey to Adamsfield in Tasmania.

Readers: Have you got any diarists in your family? How have they added to your family history?