Preparing for RootsTech London 2019

With less than a week to go before RootsTech London 2019 opens at London's Excel Centre, I thought I would give a brief update for those who are planning to be there, plus some extra information for those who may still be undecided or are unable to join us in person.

Entry to RootsTech Exhibition Hall is FREE

Firstly, for those who are still undecided, the good news is that the RootsTech London Exhibition Hall is completely FREE!  This is fantastic news for anyone who likes to wander around the various stalls but is not too bothered about attending talks. There are in fact quite likely to be some free talks being given on the various sponsor stands (Ancestry, FindMyPast, FamilySearch etc.) in any case. You can register for FREE tickets here.

One of the most exciting things I am looking forward to in the Exhibition Hall is the Ministry Of Defence's stand, where they are offering to retrieve Second World War service records (Army and RAF only) within a three-hour turnaround.  This service will still cost £30 (i.e. the normal fee), but a three-hour turnaround is far faster than their usual service.  It is very exciting news for many of us, but especially our overseas visitor friends. Ideally, you will need your ancestor's death certificate and date of birth (or service number if you have it).  You can read more about this service here.

You can see a map of the full RootsTech Exhibition Hall layout here (scroll down to the bottom of the page for layout and list of Exhibitors).

All Keynote and some other Sessions are being Live-streamed for FREE

Secondly, for those who live too far away, and attending is not an option, did you know that many of the talks will be live-streamed (for FREE)?  The link to the RootsTech London Live-stream Schedule can be found here.  This schedule includes all three Keynote Sessions (Dan Snow on Thursday; Kadeena Cox, Nick Barratt and Steve Rockwood on Friday and Donny Osmond on Saturday).  Even for those of us planning on attending, these FREE live-streamed sessions can be very useful, as it means that we can concentrate on attending other sessions while we are actually on site.

Premium Virtual Pass (£49) for those unable to get to London

There is also a Premium Virtual Pass (for £49), which allows you to watch a further 20 sessions from the comfort of your own home, including talks by well-known genealogist Nick Barratt, FindMyPast expert Myko Clelland and DNA specialist Angie Bush, to name but three.  These talks will be available around 15-20 days after the conference.  Tickets for this Virtual Pass can be obtained here.

Discounted Conference Passes now Available

If you're planning on attending RootsTech but haven't purchased your ticket yet, you can now benefit from a discounted pass. The RootsTech One-Day pass has been discounted from £99 to £49, and the RootsTech Three-Day pass is down from £149 to £99.  The full range of current official pricing can be found here. 

HOWEVER, there was also a recent offer from Time Out for a 40% discount off all RootsTech passes, so it may be that you can get an even better price using the code HALFTERM40.  (I checked on my own account, and One-day passes were showing as being reduced from £69 to £41.40, using the Time Out discount code).

Preparing for RootsTech

As a RootsTech Ambassador, I have got to know many genealogists across the globe, some of who will be fellow Ambassadors at this year's London event.  Here are a couple of blog posts from fellow genies in Australia, who have written up their advice about how to prepare for RootsTech:

https://geniaus.blogspot.com/2019/10/the-conference-checklist-rootstech.html

https://jennyalogy.blogspot.com/2019/10/one-week-til-rootstech-london.html

Don't forget to download the Mobile App

If you ARE planning on attending RootsTech London, don't forget to download the Mobile App.  It is a great way of meeting up with friends and colleagues (although they, too, will need to have downloaded the App)  as well as track which events you plan on attending etc. You can download the App here.

Where to Find me

Finally, for my many genealogy friends and colleagues attending RootsTech, I do hope that I get to meet up with you at some stage. You can probably find me much of the time in the Media Hub or maybe helping out on the AGRA stand, which by chance is just opposite the Media Hub!  I am also hoping to attend quite a few talks, and have interview slots booked with Dan Snow, Donny Osmond and Nick Barratt. I will be hoping to blog about some of these over the course of the Conference, so watch this space!

Hope to see many of you there!!

Rosemary Morgan London Roots Research

RootsTech is coming to London in October 2019 - Win yourself a free ticket!

To go straight to the Prize Draw, click HERE.  To read more about this event, my blog posts from previous events and further details about the prize draw, please see below:

RootsTech is a US (Salt Lake City) based genealogy conference which I have been fortunate enough to attend twice previously, in both 2013 and 2015.  On both occasions, I was fortunate enough to have been selected as an Official Ambassador. See here for my previous blog posts on these two previous visits:

RootsTech 2013 Day 1 Highlights

RootsTech 2013 Day 2 Highlights

RootsTech 2013 Day 3 Highlights

RootsTech and FGS 2015 - a British Overview

Day 1 at RootsTech 2015 and the DNA story

Day 2 at RootsTech 2015

Day 3 at RootsTech 2015

This year, RootsTech is coming to London from 24th - 26th October at the Excel London Convention Centre. To find out more, please follow the link here.  I am very excited to also confirm that I have once again been selected as an Official Ambassador.

It is in this capacity as Official Ambassador that I am able to offer one of my readers a FREE TICKET to this Three-day event. Further details of what is included in the PRIZE (and what is not included), as well as details of how to enter, can be found here. 

The Prize Draw will be LIVE from 6 p.m. (UK time) on Tuesday 6th August until 6 p.m. (UK time) Tuesday 13th August.  The winner will be selected at 6 p.m. (UK time) on Wednesday 14th August. I will then announce the winner on this blog, on my London Roots Research Facebook Page and on my Twitter account. 

Rosemary Morgan
London Roots Research

Day 3 of RootsTech 2015 and my interviews with Myko Clelland, of FindMyPast, Paul Howes and Tessa Keough

The KeyNote Session on Saturday was a double-whammy, with A J Jacobs, creator of The Global Family Reunion, followed by Donny Osmond. You can watch the entire session here.

The session started with the announcement of the Grand Prize Winner of the RootsTech 2015 Innovator Showdown, which was Storyworth, a service which is designed to help people record their family stories.

A J Jacobs described how he came to be organising the world's largest family get-together, the Global Family Reunion on 6th June 2015.  We all had "I am a Cousin" signs under our chairs so that when A J Jacobs came on stage, we would hold them up to welcome him. He also described us how he "lived the bible" for a whole year.  I found his presentation very amusing, and am disappointed that a prior engagement on 6th June 2015 will preclude me joining in the Global Family Reunion festivities.

Donny Osmond, who needs no introduction, regaled us with his family stories - as well as a bit of singing.  He can still sing!  He was also very amusing.

While Donny Osmond was backstage being photographed with the genealogy bloggers, I was busy interviewing Myko Clelland,  Partnerships and Outreach Manager at FindMyPast.  My interview with him is below:

Myko confirmed quite a few new partnerships that FindMyPast is looking into. In particular the partnership with FamilyTreeDNA could be very interesting to the UK genealogy community, who have not yet fully embraced the possibilities afforded by the use of DNA tests in genealogy research.

Later that day, I attended the Ancestry sponsored lunch, where they, too, were talking about DNA. Honestly, everyone seemed to be talking about DNA, it seems to have finally "come of age".  I learnt all about Ancestry's DNA circles, and how they have recently improved their algorithms, which should produce fewer "false positives".  As AncestryDNA has only just launched in the UK, I don't think many UK genealogists yet know about Ancestry's DNA circles.  As the AncestryDNA test is an autosomal test,  which looks at your entire ancestry within recent generations, what Ancestry try and do with the results, is to match up people who "might" share the same ancestors, in a similar way to the way the shaky leaf hints suggest people who "might" share your tree when looking at historical records.  Some of the question and answer session was a little bit beyond me, to be honest, although now my AncestryDNA results are in, I'm hoping to be joined into a DNA circle very soon!




The other main announcement coming from AncestryDNA, is that they hope to be launching in Australia and Canada soon.  This will also help to widen the database of people who have tested with AncestryDNA, which currently stands at 700,000.

Later that day, I had the pleasure of interviewing Paul Howes and Tessa Keough, both members of the Guild of One-Name Studies.  Here is a photo of me doing the interview (courtesy of Jill Ball):

My interview with Paul and Tessa can be seen below:

Thank you to Myko, Paul and Tessa for taking time out of their busy schedules for my interviews.

Rosemary Morgan
London Roots Research

Day 2 of RootsTech 2015 and my interview with Tahitia McCabe, from Strathclyde Genealogical Studies

Day 2 of RootsTech 2015 was Friday 13th February - traditionally a superstitious date if ever there was one.  Luckily I didn't see anything bad happen on that day!  In fact only good things happened as I hope this post conveys.

The Keynote session with Laura W Bush and her daughter, Jenna Bush Hager, was a real treat, as I mentioned in my earlier post.  

The interview of Laura Bush by her daughter, Jenna, showed that even a very well-known family such as theirs can enjoy talking about some very day-today issues.

Sadly, the Laura Bush / Jenna Hager session was not made available on the livestream and so no recording is available.  

However, the rest of the session, featuring D Joshua Taylor, director of family history at FindMyPast is available here. As well as detailing many new datasets recently added or about to be added, Joshua described several new Partnerships, including:

• a partnership to share records with the New York Genealogical and Biographical Society (NYG&B)
• a partnership with FamilyTreeDNA, to offer DNA testing services to the FindMyPast customer base.  (The link is now visible on the FindMyPast.com website.)
• working with StoryPress "to help capture and share family stories" in combination with FMP data and family trees.  Joshua believes that everyone shouldbe able to have their own "Who Do You Think You Are?" family story

Joshua then told his own family story, tracing his family back to his ancestor, William Heaps, who was sentenced to transportation to Australia, and escaped from prison, for stealing cheese, and relating this to his own love of cheese. He then showed how he had used StoryPress to make his own Family History Story.

On the right are some of the RoostTech ambassadors backstage with Joshua after his KeyNote session.

Later the same day, I attended the FindMyPast lunch during which Ian Tester, Director of Partner Products, provided further details of how FindMyPast's WhoDoYouThinkYouAre? Story  can help you tell your own WhoDoYouThinkYouAre? Story.

Tahitia McCabe and yours truly(photo courtesy of Jill Ball)

Towards the end of the day I interviewed Tahitia McCabe, Knowledge Exchange Fellow, University of Strathclyde Genealogical Studies Programme. Luckily we just about completed the interview before the evening's "entertainment" of bagpipes started, which would have completely drowned us out!

Here I am with Tahitia in the media studio, at the start of the interview. During the interview Tahitia mentioned the University of Strathclyde Summer Institute of Genealogical Studios' summer courses, details of which can be found here. Personally, I'm rather tempted by the 5-day "Practical Applications of Genetic Genealogy" course.

My interview with Tahitia can be found here:

Thank you to Tahitia for taking time away from her Strathclyde booth to grant me this interview.

Rosemary Morgan
London Roots Research

Day 1 of RootsTech 2015 & the DNA story

One of the key topics that I decided to pursue at RootsTech this year, was the topic of DNA. This was partly for selfish reasons as I have now tested with two of the three main companies (FTDNA and Ancestry DNA) and I wanted to try and better understand my results.  But it was also because I believe that the launch Ancestry DNA in the UK earlier this year will have the effect of encouraging a much wider pool of genealogists and family historians in the UK to test for DNA.  Up until now, I have pretty much ignored DNA in my professional genealogy work, leaving this to the "DNA experts".  But I do not believe that this is necessarily a good move any more.  I now see DNA testing as just one of the pieces of evidence that could be used to piece together a person's family history background, especially where brick walls are concerned, and that we professional genealogists should ignore it at our peril.

Day 1 of RootsTech started early for me, at 7 am, for a VIP breakfast with FindMyPast.  I was so pleased to discover, via a private Twitter conversation with Myko Clelland, that I was on the invitation list, even though I hadn't actually seen an official invitation (but I won't hold that against them).  At the breakfast, FindMyPast made a few key announcements, one of which was a new partnership between FMP and FamilyTree DNA, the full press release of which can be seen here.  So this was a great start to my DNA day at RootsTech.  Unfortunately the details were, and still are at the time of writing, fairly sketchy and we don't really know exactly what this partnership will mean. However, as long as FMP will be marketing some sort of DNA test with FTDNA (which they suggest is the case), then this, along with the move by Ancestry UK into DNA, has to be good news.

The breakfast also included a question and answer session with Annalies Van Den Belt, CEO, FindMyPast, where D Joshua Taylor, Director of Family history at FindMyPast posing her some of the more common questions which are asked of FindMyPast in the US.  In accepting the breakfast invitation I had missed the Blogger's private visit to the Exhibition Hall, which I would have liked to attend, but then you can't do everything.  However, a friend and colleague, Tessa Keough has written a lovely blog post all about a first timers' experience of the RootsTech Exhibition Hall which you can read about here.

At 8.30 am, I then moved on to the RootsTech Opening KeyNote session, which can be viewed again here.  The session started with D Joshua Taylor, President of the Federation of Genealogical Societies (FGS), and Director of Family History at FindMyPast, appearing alongside fellow Genealogy Roadshow hosts Kanyatta D Berry and Mary Tedesco, updating the audience on the Preserve the Pensions (War of 1812) digitisation project:

Dennis Brimhall, CEO, FamilySearch, then continued the session, wowing us with various statistics about the growth of the RootsTech phenomenon and thanking many of the FamilySearch partner companies, including Ancestry, FindMyPast, MyHeritage and a newcomer to the mix, Family.me. (Note to Brits:  no sign of our very own third provider TheGenealogist - perhaps I should contact them for next time!).  Dennis Brimhall also described the brand new FamilySearch Discovery Centers, which had just been launched after successful beta testing, and which you can find out more about here.  As well as the site in Salt Lake City, which I had already visited, FamilySearch is planning to develop similar centers in Seattle, Philadelphia, and also in London (via a partnership with FindMyPast). These centers are really aimed at bringing Family History discovery to a wider, and probably younger, audience, by appealing particularly to families.

Denis Brimhall, CEO, FamilySearch, talking about Family History Discovery Centres

The Keynote session then continued with Mike Mallin, Chief Product Officer, MyHeritage, who talked about how MyHeritage can help people discover their own family histories, giving some very relevant examples from his own family and elsewhere.

Finally Mike introduced Tan Le, founder and CEO, Emotiv, to tell us her amazing story, of escaping from Vietnam, age 5, with her sister, her mother, and her grandmother, and of early and later family life in Australia.  As I said previously, Tan Le's story was very moving, and at the end of the presentation, Bloggers were permitted to go backstage for a photograph with her:

From L to R: me, Caitlin Gow, James Tanner (behind), Jill Ball, unknown person (behind), Tan Le, Lynn Broderick (behind), Sharn White, Pauleen Cass (behind) and Linda Robbins

Now turning to the DNA side of things.  I had already set up an interview session for later that day, with CeCe Moore and Angie Bush, genetic genealogists.  I was therefore keen to do my background research!

I had already attended (virtually) two very interesting talks at the APG Professional Management Conference in January, one by Angie Bush and the other by CeCe Moore.  As I am a bit of novice when it comes to DNA, these talks actually blew me away with the complexity of the DNA science that they have successfully used in the US to discover the parentage of both adoptees and those with unknown parentage.

I had also attended CeCe Moore's talk on the first day of the FGS conference (FGS Society Day), the day before the official start of RootsTech, entitled "Bringing Your Society into the 21st Century with a DNA Interest".  Although this talk was mainly aimed at encouraging Family History Society's to start DNA Interest Groups (DIG's), CeCe did go over some of the DNA basics in that talk.  However, for a really good introduction to basic DNA, I would strongly recommend Diahan Southard's talk, entitled Getting Started in Genetic Genealogy, which I didn't attend live, but which can be viewed on the RootsTech website here.

In order to do my background research I also attended CeCe Moore's talk entitled "Exploring Family Stories with DNA from PBS' Finding Your Roots with Henry Louis Gates Jr".  This was potentially a very interesting talk, but as I haven't watched the PBS show she described, some of it was a bit lost on me I'm afraid.

Finally, towards the end of the day, I interviewed CeCe Moore and Angie Bush.  Before you watch this, however, I'd like to make just one small clarification regarding 23andMe launching in the UK: although I mentioned in this interview that 23andMe had only just launched its DNA tests in the UK, their non-health related DNA tests have in fact been available to people in the UK for several years. It is the "health-related" element of the DNA test that 23andMe has recently launched in the UK.

Rosemary Morgan
London Roots Research

RootsTech and FGS 2015 - a British Overview

Like many of the other RootsTech bloggers this year, I chose not to blog from the Conference itself. There was just so much to see and do, what with having two Conferences combined (RootsTech and FGS), a much much bigger exhibit hall than previously, and so many genealogy friends and colleagues to network with - including a large number of Australians visiting this year.

I had originally intended to post all my RootsTech blog posts last week, but having arrived home, I promptly fell ill with a nasty cough / cold virus which totally knocked me out.  So I'm afraid I'm about a week late with these posts.  This one is just an introduction and overview.

In the two years since I last attended RootsTech, I seem to have become more well known in genealogy circles, despite not being a very active blogger.  I guess its my quite large following on Twitter.  Several people I spoke to said "oh yes I know your name" which was very nice, even though sometimes I didn't always recognise theirs.  A case in point was Hilary Gadsby, from Wales, who had travelled out on her own to RootsTech for the first time; an enthusiastic genealogist, with ancestral roots in Hampshire, Hilary and I followed each other on Twitter, but she hadn't really appeared on my radar before; here is Hilary's blog, GeneMeet.

I also enjoyed meeting Jenny Joyce, a professional genealogist whose blog is the aptly named Jennyalogy, whom, I was rather embarrassed to discover, I didn't follow on Twitter (I do now, Jenny!). It was lovely to meet both Hilary and Jenny, as well as reconnect with many other old friends.

I intend to post several new blog posts over the coming days.  In particular I conducted video interviews with:

• Angie Bush and CeCe Moore, Genetic Genealogists in the US
• Tahitia McCabe, Knowledge Exchange Fellow, University of Strathclyde Genealogical Studies Programme
• Myko Clelland, Partnerships and Outreach Manager, FindMyPast
• and Tessa Keough and Paul Howes, both members of the Guild of One-name studies, who were there partly promoting the Guild

The Keynote Sessions were spectacular, as usual. Tan Le's story and her storytelling skills were simply amazing.  I would recommend watching her session.  You can find it here (at 59 mins in).

I really didn't think I would particularly enjoy seeing either Donny Osmond or Laura Bush, but they both blew me away, and especially Laura Bush when her daughter, Jenna Bush Hagen interviewed her on the couch. Wow, I have some way to go in my interviewing skills!  It's a shame that this was the only Keynote session which is not available on the live recordings.  The other recorded sessions, including Keynotes and some classes, can be found here.

The major players, Family Search, Ancestry, MyHeritage and FindMyPast, all had major announcements to make at RootsTech and I will be reporting on some of those in forthcoming posts, especially the announcements which relate to the UK genealogy community.

I will also be taking an in-depth look at what's new in the world of DNA in genealogy, with all the main players (Ancestry, FamilySearch and FindMyPast) again announcing something new in this field.

I enjoyed the socialising much more this time at RootsTech, but maybe that was because I knew more people and so I felt more comfortable.  Notable evening events included the Australian pizza evening on the Tuesday, to which selected Commonwealth guests were invited and the RootsTech Official Ambassadors' dinner on Wednesday:

Finally, I must thank the wonderful Pat Richley-Erickson (aka DearMYTLE) and her husband Gordon for hosting an amazing After-Party for Official Bloggers.  The photo below shows DearMYRTLE conducting her regular Saturday evening Hangout on Air, while being observed by many of the 40 RootsTech blogger guests:

Rosemary Morgan
London Roots Research

RootsTech and FGS 2015

After my unsuccessful attempt to get to RootsTech 2014 earlier this year, I am pleased to announce that I fully intend to be at RootsTech 2015 (Feb 12th -14th 2015) and I have been invited to be an Official Ambassador.  For those of you who don't know I had to cancel at the last minute in 2014 due to illness.  The new role of Official Ambassador reflects the wider variety of media used by such "Ambassadors", who don't just blog, but are active in promoting RootsTech across a range of media, including Blogging.

This year, RootsTech is combining with the FGS Conference so I shall expect an even wider selection of talks than in previous years.  For anyone who is interested - and maybe still considering attending in person - the current list of RotsTech speaker sessions can be found here, with exact dates and times still to come.  The FGS speaker schedule can be found here.

However, if you are unable to attend Salt Lake City in person, the main Keynote sessions - as well as some of the smaller ones - will be able for online viewing as in previous years.

There are five Keynote speakers already announced (more announcements can be expected soon):

• Laura W Bush, previous US First Lady, and her daughter, author, Jenna Hager

• A J Jacobs, author and journalist who is currently helping to build a family tree that connects the whole world

• Donny Osmond, singer, actor and TV host

• Nathan Furr, PhD, Assistant professor of innovation and entrepreneurship at Brigham Young University and a visiting scholar at INSEAD and ESSEC

So watch this space for more reports, both before and during the event itself!

Rosemary Morgan London Roots Research

Not now going to RootsTech 2014

Well there I was, on Monday 3rd February, all packed up, taxi booked, checked in to my flight and ready to leave for Salt Lake City!  I had got over the bad cold I'd had earlier in January - or so I thought!  But during Monday, I developed a nasty hacking cough, and was starting to feel slightly unwell.  By 3 am on Tuesday 4th I was feeling so ill I knew I couldn't get on an aeroplane and would have to cancel.  I was gutted!

Luckily there are ways of enjoying the RootsTech experience remotely.  I did this in 2012, and it was this experience which encouraged me to attend in person in 2013.  This year, sadly, I have had to downgrade to the "remote blogger" status.  I won't be doing any live interviews (obviously), but if I'm well enough I shall endeavour to summarise each day's events, based on the live stream plus info from Twitter posts.

There are other remote "official RootsTech bloggers", including Thomas MacEntee (geneabloggers) and Jill Ball (geniaus), who are both on the Unlock the Past 4th Genealogy cruise in southern Australia, along with fellow UK genealogist Chris Paton (BritishGENES).  However, I suspect that these guys have their work cut out following what's going on "down under" and Tom is giving loads of talks!

So for the rest of us, what's in store?  The live stream sessions start at 8.30 am US MST (3.30 pm UK GMT) and continue until 6 pm US MST (1 am UK GMT).  If you can't watch all the sessions live, don't worry they will be uploaded for later viewing shortly after the end of each session.  You can see the full list of the live stream classes here.  But remember, the Keynote Sessions will also be live streamed (8.30 am MST / 3.30 pm GMT).

Where will the live stream posts be?  Go here where you will already see the video stream link: www.rootstech.org.

Rosemary Morgan
London Roots Research

Preparing for RootsTech 2014

As I pack my bags for my flight to Salt Lake City tomorrow, I thought I'd write a short post about what's in store for my readers over the next week or so.  The weather currently looks bright, with blue skies, and I'm starting to get excited.

Image courtesy of WeatherBug.com webcam, Salt Lake City

As an Official Blogger I hope to be blogging regularly about some of the main events, especially the Keynote Speaker events.  But for those of you not coming to RootsTech (the large majority I imagine), you can watch many of the RootsTech sessions online, from the comfort of your own armchair.  You will find the list of classes being broadcast live on the Internet, on the Deseret News blog.  The Keynote sessions (from 8.30 am to 10 am) will also be broadcast "live".

For UK viewers, the time difference actually works slightly in our favour, as the Conference runs from 8.30 am to 6.00 pm (MST or US Mountain Standard Time) which is 7 hours back from the UK (Greenwich Mean Time).  So the sessions will be running "live" in the UK from 3.30 pm through to 1.00 am - not so good if you are a morning person I suppose! However, these broadcast sessions will also be available for viewing later, hopefully shortly after the end of each session.  So you won't need to stay up late into the night (unless you're a genealogy addict of course!).

For my readers who are attending the Unlock the Past 4th Genealogy Cruise in Southern Australia, the time difference will make it a bit more difficult.  Sydney, Melbourne and Hobart are all 11 hours ahead of the UK, and therefore 18 hours ahead of Salt Lake City (Adelaide is half an hour different to these cities - how weird is that?).  Anyway, for those in Southern Australia, the RootsTech "live" sessions will be running from approximately 2.30 am to 12 pm, on the following day (i.e. from Friday 7th to Sunday 9th). This time difference will definitely suit the "early birds" better!  But as I said before, these sessions will also be available to view later.

For anyone who is still confused (or located elsewhere in the world), there is a handy time difference calculator here. (I've put Salt Lake City time in London here as the example).

The link to "live" broadcast sessions (as well as the "catch up" recordings) should be available from a direct link from the RootsTech website, although the link isn't there yet, as I write this post (Monday).

As well as the main RootsTech conference on Thursday 5th, Friday 6th and Saturday 7th February, with the three Keynote Speaker sessions, I shall also be attending the Innovator Summit on Wednesday 4th February, as well as several social events, including both the FindMyPast and the Ancestry catered lunches and Friday Night at the Library, where the Family History Library stays open late until 10 pm, especially for Conference attendees.  So do watch this space for further blog posts.

The only thing that might prevent me from posting regular blog posts is my health.  I am currently suffering from a bit of a cough virus, and I'm really hoping that the long flight tomorrow doesn't aggravate this and knock me out completely!!  So, as well as all my "techie" items (laptop, iPhone, iPad, Kindle and regular camera), I am now also packing a First Aid kit of my favourite cough / cold medicines.  I know I'm not going trekking into the jungle but I do like to have my own familiar brands of cold / cough remedies with me.

There are nowhere near as many UK genealogists venturing over to RootsTech this year, compared to last year (partly, I suspect, due to the change of date, back from late March to early February).  But I do know of one or two.  I have already made plans to meet up with fellow London-based family historian Amelia Bennett, and I hope to be interviewing her during the Conference for my blog. 

I will of course be meeting up with the other Official Bloggers, or at least those attending in person (as some will be blogging remotely). I would also love to meet up with any other Genealogists, family historians or genealogy bloggers who would like to meet me in person, whether they know me through Twitter or elsewhere.  So if you're there at RootsTech and want to say "hi", do please come along to the Media Hub in the exhibition hall - you can't really miss it.  This year it will be located close to the middle of the exhibition hall (see map), next to the Demo Theatre and the BackBlaze stand.

RootsTech Exhibition Hall, 2013

Finally, I hope to be reporting on some of the exhibitors in the Exhibition Hall this year, which I didn't do much last year. So watch this space!

Do come back and visit here regularly over the next week - I will do my best to update you on what I'm up to and what is going on in the RootsTech world.

Rosemary Morgan
London Roots Research

Disclosure:  As an Official blogger for RootsTech 2014, I have received a complimentary registration for the conference.  This does not influence my views or opinions of the conference or the sponsors in any way. 

RootsTech 2014 Official Blogger

Now that I've booked my flight to Salt Lake City, I can reveal that I have once again been invited to be an Official Blogger at RootsTech 2014 (6th - 8th February), and that I shall also be attending in person.  Yes, this year there are a few Official Bloggers who will be blogging remotely.  In particular both Thomas MacEntee and Jill Ball had previously committed to participate on Unlock the Past's 4th Genealogy Cruise in Southern Australia in February 2014, when RootsTech announced the February date for RootsTech 2014.  So although they are listed as Official Bloggers, they will be not in fact be attending in person.  The full list of official bloggers can be found here.

The RootsTech team have recently completely relaunched their website, and to my mind, it is much improved.  So if you haven't looked at it recently, you might wish to take another look.  You can find it here.

It seems that the people at RootsTech have listened to some of the feedback that we gave them from last year.  We complained that many of the classrooms were too small, so they have moved the conference into a bigger space, with larger classrooms and more exhibition space:

Some of us complained that there were not enough sessions for the advanced genealogist, so this year, I believe, there are more sessions marked up as advanced.  Finally the Schedule Builder is now available on the main RootsTech website, as well as an app for downloading on an iPhone, iPad or Android device. This will, hopefully, enable more people to use this very useful functionality.

Another recent announcement is that the Opening Night Social will now be free of charge and those of us who purchased tickets for this event have had our fee refunded.  This may also be as a result of the feedback from last year.  Anyway, it's great that it's now free!

Finally, the latest announcement from RootsTech is the identity of the Opening Keynote speaker, on Thursday 6th February, who is Ree Drummond, an award-winning blogger and New York Times best-selling author.  I must admit to not being familiar with Ree Drummond, but I look forward to hearing her speak, as the RootsTech Keynote speakers are usually great value.  The full list of Keynote speakers can be found here.

I will be blogging regularly in the lead up to RootsTech, as well as during the conference itself, so watch this space for more information in due course.

Rosemary Morgan
London Roots Research

London' s Brompton Cemetery records now online at DeceasedOnline

On 20th June, I was fortunate enough to be invited, by DeceasedOnline, to the launch of the Brompton Cemetery's burial records online. 

The Chapel and some monuments at the Brompton Cemetery

The event was very well attended, with the Mayor of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea making the welcome address. The Friends of Brompton Cemetery, the media including the BBC, and numerous genealogists and historians, were all present, including genealogist Nick Barratt, who gave a talk about the importance of death records for family history research. There was also a special guest, Janet Ellis, a keen family historian, who had found her ancestors' burial records at the Brompton Cemetery within minutes of them going online at Deceased Online. You can read her story, which was picked up by the BBC, here.

The Brompton Cemetery was originally set up in 1837, with the first burial taking place in 1840. Originally set up as a private enterprise, it was nationalised 10 years later and is the only cemetery in England to be run by central government. This might explain why the original burial records, along with other records relating to the Brompton Cemetery, are at the National Archives at Kew, and not, as is more often the case with burial records, at a local authority archive.  Originally coming under the auspices of the Board of Works, the Brompton Cemetery is now managed by the Royal Parks. 

The grave of Emmeline Pankhurst at the Brompton Cemetery

The 39 acre (16 hectares) site lies on the western border of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, between Fulham Road and the Old Brompton Road, next door to Chelsea Football club.  There are 206,000 people buried there, with around 50,000 monuments, and it is still a working cemetery, with 70 - 80 burials a year.  The cemetery was popular with the Military and for those with an international connection.  It is still popular with the Russians and Poles.  Some of the famous people buried here include Emmeline Pankhurst (see photo left), the famous suffragette, Sir Samuel Cunard, and Bernard Levin. In fact, the Find A Grave website lists 92 famous people buried here.

The founder of the Brompton Cemetery was the architect, Stephen Geary, who also founded both the Highgate Cemetery and the Nunhead Cemetery.  These cemeteries, along with Abney Park, Kensal Green, Tower Hamlets and West Norwood, are known as "The Magnificent Seven" cemeteries of London.  They form a ring of suburban garden cemeteries around London, opened between 1833 and 1841 as London was growing in size and traditional parish church burial grounds were overflowing.  

A selection of the monuments at the Brompton Cemetery, London

Deceased Online is in discussion with all of the local authorities responsible for the London Magnificent Seven cemeteries; several were in attendance at the Brompton Cemetery launch party on 21st June, and seemed very keen to look at the Deceased Online website. Let's hope, for the sake of genealogists everywhere, that the talks come to fruition.

The Friends of Brompton Cemetery are very active and their annual Open Day is on Sunday 21st July, where there will be Guided Tours taking place all day. They also offer Guided Tours every Sunday during the summer months and on two Sundays a month during the winter. I strongly recommend a visit if you're in London and have never been.

Personally I was intrigued to find out more about the Brompton Cemetery, as my own gg grandfather, Edward Clifford, the Mathematician who sadly died following a carriage accident on Christmas Eve (which I wrote about here), was actually living in the "hamlet" of Brompton Vale, Kensington, on the night of the 1841 census.  So I thought that he might have also been buried there, even though he actually died in Charing Cross Hospital, Strand.

In the event, I didn't find Edward Clifford in the Brompton Cemetery records, but I did later find that both of his "in-laws", the parents of his "wife" (they never actually married), my gg grandmother, Emma Frances Ray, were buried there:  Stuart and Elizabeth Ray died in 1855 and 1866 respectively.  I already had their death certificates, but it is nice to know where they are buried. Unfortunately I only discovered this after my visit, so I need to go back and look for the graves.    

Deceased Online doesn't just cover London. Their coverage is throughout the UK, including many parts of Scotland.  The London coverage currently include cemeteries in the London Boroughs of Brent, Camden, Harrow, Havering, Islington, Merton and Newham, and the Royal Borough of Greenwich as well as the privately owned Manor Park Cemetery, and now of course, the Brompton Cemetery.  

To use Deceased Online, you need to register as a new user here, all searches are free of charge, and there is a nominal charge to download an actual record.  There are currently no subscription options available.  To search for London records, I suggest using the Advanced Search and selecting "London" in the Region box. Happy Hunting!

Rosemary Morgan
London Roots Research

Surrey Parish Registers (1538-1987) now on Ancestry

I had known for a year or so that Ancestry were busy digitising the Surrey Parish records from my local archive, the Surrey History Centre.  I also knew, from my visit last week, that Ancestry had a supplied a bank of brand new computers so that visitors to the Archives could access the new databases when they came on stream.  What I didn't know was when they would be put online.  The staff last week were simply saying "later this year".

So it was with some surprise that yesterday morning, just as I was leaving the house for a rare family day out, that I received an email informing me that the Surrey Parish registers were now "live" on Ancestry.  Here is the Ancestry announcement, explaining the full scale of the Collection (2.6 million records) and giving some examples of famous people who can be found in the records.  The Surrey County Council announcement of the release can be found here.

The records online so far include four main databases, the organisation of which will look familiar to anyone who is used to using Ancestry's London Collection:

• Surrey, England Baptisms, 1813 - 1912
• Surrey, England Burials, 1813 - 1987
• Surrey, England Marriages, 1754 - 1937
• Surrey, England Baptisms, Marriages and Burials 1538 - 1812

Although a note at the bottom of each of the above pages suggests that the records are incomplete after 1900, with more to be added during 2013, an Australian client of mine managed to find her great grandmother's burial in Claygate in 1937 earlier today.  So it's definitely worth checking even if you're interested in later records!

This large batch of Parish records should help many people with London, especially south London,  ancestors.  Although Ancestry's London Collection has been online for a few years now, and has more recently been complemented by the Westminster Collection on FindMyPast, the lack of Surrey records online has been a major stumbling block for some of us with London ancestors.

The new collection includes not only many rural parishes, from the middle and the south of the County, but also many of the old County's northern parishes which we would nowadays think of as London.  These include parishes such as Kingston, Richmond, Wandsworth and Wimbledon, which we normally associate these days with London. A detailed map of Surrey showing the location of the various parishes can be seen here, courtesy of June Rudman and the West Surrey Family History Society.

Surrey History Centre is holding a special Surrey Parish records launch event on Saturday 6th July - more details here.

Finally, it is not only the Surrey Births, Marriages and Burials which are going online.  The full Surrey Collection, to be available online by the end of 2013, is listed here and includes:

•  Electoral Registers
•  Land Tax Registers
•  Freeholders' Lists
•  and much more

Rosemary Morgan
London Roots Research

Highlights of Day 3 at RootsTech 2013

The excitement at RootsTech 2013 continued into Day 3, starting with the Keynote speakers:  

• David Pogue, personal-technology columnist of The New York Times and regular columnist for Scientific American.  
• Ori Soen, Chief Marketing Officer of MyHeritage
• Ori was assisted by James Tanner, genealogy blogger at Genealogy's Star.  James stepped in at the last minute to help with the MyHeritage presentation when their founder and CEO, Gilad Japhet had to pull out for personal reasons.

David Pogue gave us a wonderful start to the 3rd and final day of the conference, with some great jokes and comedy sketches relating to personal technology and gadgets.  

He also described the current technology trends, from Web 1.0, where the website creator provides the content (e.g. The New York Times website), to Web 2.0, where the audience create the input (e.g. Facebook, Wikipedia, Craigslist), and the next big wave, "augmented reality", which according to Wikipedia is "a live, direct or indirect, view of a physical, real-world environment whose elements are augmented by computer-generated sensory input such as sound, video, graphics or GPS data".  Examples of augmented reality include apps such as:

• London Tube's "Your New Eye", which shows you where the nearest tube station is and even where the underground lines run under the road. (Sounds cool - trying it out tomorrow in London!)
• Word Lens, which instantly translates words visible through the camera lens, into Spanish, Italian or French (and vice-versa)

•  and Ocarina, which turns an iPhone into a flute-like musical instrument, which he proceeded to demonstrate: 

David also showed us that he is not just a technology geek, he is a talented composer, singer and musician to boot! I had already noticed the grand piano on the stage, but had not anticipated such an amazingly humorous performance from a technology journalist - WOW is all I can say!

I couldn't resist recording one of the songs he sang (Sounds of Silence) and posting it below (apologies for the poor quality of my recording - you should be able to watch a much better quality when RootsTech post the Saturday recap videos here in due course). David also sang My Way, but unfortunately my phone ran out of storage space half way through!

After his Keynote, David Pogue was interviewed in the media hub by Jill Ball, Australian genealogy blogger at Geniaus; she talked to him about his early career working in musical theatre and his move into technology journalism. You can watch her interview here. 

In the second, MyHeritage presentation, Ori Soen described how MyHeritage was founded by Gilad Japhet in 2005, from his own home, and has now grown to be the second largest family history company in the world.  Their 75 million users use the site to build their family trees, and automatically connect to other trees and records using the MyHeritage "smart matching facility".

James Tanner, a blogger at Genealogy's Star and a MyHeritage user, went on to explain that the MyHeritage matching facility works by not only matching user-contributed trees, but also a wide range of genealogy records, which from April, users will also be able to save as attachments to their trees.  

In terms of databases, MyHeritage was one of the first sites to complete the transcription of the 1940 US census last year, and in April it will also upload all the other US censuses, from 1790 to 1930.  One of the main strengths of MyHeritage, however, is its large user base outside the US and Western Europe.  Based in Israel, it has particularly strong coverage in Eastern Europe, Asia and Africa, so is ideal for those whose family backgrounds include  those regions.

Finally James Tanner announced that the first 500 people to sign up to a MyHeritage account after the Keynote session, would receive a free 6 month subscription to the MyHeritage PremiumPlus account (which is worth £7.95 a month in the UK).  Needless to say the MyHeritage stand was extremely busy for the next hour or so!

My video interview on Day 3 was with Geoff Swinfield and Di Bouglas, of Geoff Swinfield Genealogical Services.  As RootsTech first-timers I was keen to get their thoughts on what they liked best about RootsTech, how it compares to Who Do You Think You Are? Live in London and what it offers the British genealogist.  You can listen to their interview here:

Well that was the end of RootsTech 2013.  I hope you have enjoyed reading my Daily Highlight blog posts and watching my video interviews. I hope to be able to return next year for more of the same.

This was a picture taken from the aeroplane as I left Salt Lake City.  Next year, I definitely hope to combine RootsTech 2014 with some Utah ski-ing. It looks so tempting!

Rosemary Morgan
London Roots Research