April Genealogy Events and a Look Back at Trivia Night

The month of March has gone by in a busy blur, and we now look forward to an Irish SIG meeting and a new class for you to attend, either in-person or via Zoom, coming up soon. Registration is open for our annual Family History Conference featuring John Dougan and Christina Miller from the Missouri State Archives. Remember that early registration ends on Saturday, 4 April! By registering before that date, you save some money and help us plan more efficiently. In addition, one of the events we look forward to most each year is our annual research trip to Salt Lake City, and registration is now open for that. Read on for more!

David Rencher, Irish Research Specialist, to Speak at October Irish SIG Meeting!

For anyone doing Irish research, knowing where to look and what is available, especially in Europe, can be confusing. What records are there? Where are they located? How does a researcher access them? The October meeting of the StLGS Irish Special Interest Group (SIG) will feature all the answers to these questions presented by one of the foremost authorities in the U.S. on Irish research, David Rencher. Best of all, this meeting will be open to everyone and will be absolutely free! Read on for all the details.

October Genealogy Meetings and Time to Vote for StLGS Officers

Leaves are starting to fall and it's finally feeling a bit more like autumn. As our year winds down, we hope you will continue to join us for our remaining 2024 meetings and classes. For those of you who are members of StLGS, voting is now open for the election of officers for 2025. Our recent bylaws revision provides for co-presidents to share the expanding job responsibilities of leading our very active society. Also up for election this year are vice president of membership and secretary. Luckily, we have some talented and caring volunteers running for each position, and, although they are unopposed, they would appreciate your support by voting. More information about everything is below.

Open House Brings Out a Crowd!

For the first time in many years, St. Louis Genealogical Society hosted an open house on Saturday, 23 March 2024, and it was a great success! It was wonderful to see so many new faces as well as some old friends who stopped by to chat. Our hardworking volunteers provided coffee, cookies, and soft pretzel bites to munch on and were available all morning to greet visitors, give tours of the office, answer a myriad of questions, and encourage people to explore our website, attend our meetings, and be part of the exciting genealogical community in St. Louis.

January 2024 StLGS Genealogy Meetings and Classes

Happy New Year! Before we tell you about the exciting meetings and classes we have planned to kick off 2024, we want to say a huge THANK YOU! to all of you who generously donated to St. Louis Genealogical Society during the past year. The outpouring of donations and words of encouragement we have received from you mean the world to all of us who volunteer for the society. Everything we do throughout the year is for the betterment of our members and friends, and we thank you so very much for recognizing that. Now, read on to learn what we have waiting in the wings as the new year begins. . .

July StLGS Meetings, Events, and More!

Happy Fourth of July! We hope you have had a good holiday weekend, have stayed cool and dry, and celebrated the birth of our country safely and happily. Now that the holiday is over and summer is in full swing, we also hope you will make some time for attending some upcoming genealogy meetings. Our monthly meeting will be hybrid; you can attend in person at our office or via Zoom. However, the Irish Special Interest Group meeting this month will be via Zoom only. We are also announcing the Fall Speaker Series, now open for registration, and a new membership category for young people. Read on for more!

St. Louis Genealogical Society February Meetings and Classes

Our new year of genealogy meetings and classes is off and running. If you weren't able to join us on Zoom for our January panel discussion of "Ask Louie" questions and answers, you can still watch the recording that is posted on our website on the Monthly Meetings page. Our panel of genealogy professionals answered a number of questions that may help you with your own research. Our February monthly meeting, also on Zoom, will focus on an important record set—probate records—so you won't want to miss it!

April 2021 Genealogy Meetings, Classes, and Events

Spring is here! We know the temptation is to get outside, but on those days when it's cloudy, cool, and rainy, or even if it's a sunny day but you just want to continue your genealogy journey, we have you covered! Our 2021 virtual schedule continues, with more interesting online webinars and classes, and, of course, the excitement is building for our annual Family History Conference, which also will be online again this year. Get out your calendars and be sure you have these April (and early May) dates jotted down!

Free Genealogy Webinars are Just a Click Away!

Twelve months of mostly being at home has given many of us the chance to explore new ways of learning using our computers or tablets. Have you discovered the benefits of free webinars yet? Did you know you can watch thousands of digital recordings without any fees at all? Yes, sometimes there are advertisements, but they are relatively unobtrusive and easily passed over. By now, many of us also know that there are instructions online for just about anything we want to do. In fact, just last week, like magic, a two-minute YouTube video saved this writer a trip to the store and the price of a new pneumatic door closer when just a few squeezes of a piece of metal with a strong pair of pliers was all it needed. OK, that was fixer-upper stuff—what about our favorite hobby? Are there free webinars available on genealogy? Indeed there are, and here are some places you can start to look for them.

Looking Forward to the StLGS Winter/Spring 2021 Schedule

We hope you are having a healthy and happy holiday season and staying safe. After you are finished celebrating Chanukah, Christmas, and Kwanzaa, it will be time to get back to genealogy! In a more normal year, StLGS would have the whole 2021 schedule ready for you by now, but due to the uncertainty of the times, we are taking it a bit more slowly this year. We have no idea when it will be safe to gather in person, but we are looking forward to bringing you the very best experience possible by continuing our successful livestreamed and digitally recorded virtual meetings and classes. Take a look at what's coming up . . .

One Last Event and a Sneak Peek at the Exciting StLGS 2020 Calendar

Jewish SIG Meeting is Last StLGS Event of 2019

Because of the holiday season, StLGS does not schedule monthly meetings in December. However, there is one Jewish Special Interest Group (SIG) meeting coming up on Sunday, 8 December that is free and open to all, regardless of whether you have Jewish ancestors. This workshop, from 10:00 a.m. until noon, features "The Photo Detective," Maureen Taylor, internationally known for her expertise in historic photos and their preservation, who will present tools and tips for photo identification, family history and research, and photo preservation. She will focus on twentieth-century photographs and immigrant ancestors in this special workshop co-sponsored by the Brodsky Library, the St. Louis Jewish Community Archives, and St. Louis Genealogical Society.

The Jewish Federation is handling registration for this event, and pre-registration is requested. You can contact Kathy Schmeltz at 314-442-3761 or at kschmeltz@jfedstl.org or register directly on the Center for Jewish Learning's website. (See the blog post from 11 November 2019 for specific directions.)

January Monthly Meeting: Ask Louie

Please join us in January when our exciting 2020 schedule of meetings and events begins. Our first monthly meeting of the new year will be on Saturday, 11 January, at 10 a.m. in the auditorium at the Headquarters building of the St. Louis County Library, 1640 South Lindbergh Boulevard. We'll start the year with a panel discussion where you can "Ask Louie." Bring your genealogy questions or email them ahead to programs@stlgs.org, if they are a bit complicated. Our panel of experienced genealogists will try to help you break through a brick wall or two. More information is on our website's Monthly Meetings page. We hope to see you at the January meeting.

Annual Trivia Night: Saturday, 7 March 2020

This popular fundraiser will take place on Saturday, 7 March, at the Maplewood/Richmond Heights Community Center. Always a fun-filled occasion, this evening event has rounds of interesting questions, a fabulous silent auction, and bonus rounds with excellent prizes. Registration is now open, and we do hope you will invite friends or just come by yourself and make new ones. Go to the Trivia Night page on our website for more information and/or to register.

Much More to Come in 2020

To see all of the meetings and events planned for 2020 and/or to download an events flyer, visit the Calendar of Events page on our website. Save the dates for our Family History Conference, our Summer Speaker Series, the upcoming Technology Institute, and the annual Salt Lake City Research trip.

The Special Interest Group schedules and flyers for 2020 are now available as well. Check them out on the SIG web pages:

German SIG
 Irish SIG 
Jewish SIG