Announcing our 2021 Program Schedule

2021 SGSC PROGRAM CALENDAR
SWEDISH GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY OF COLORADO

Presenter:     Jill Morelli, Certified Genealogist, lecturer, and writer

Jill is a Certified Genealogist® and lectures, writes and researches about her discoveries as a family historian of her Scandinavian and German ancestors. Her articles have appeared numerous times in Swedish American Genealogist and the National Genealogical Society Quarterly. She is a member of the National Genealogical Society, Genealogical Speakers Guild, Association of Professional Genealogists and numerous societies and is past president of the Seattle Genealogical Society.

Presentation:  Using Swedish Tax Records to Answer Tough Genealogical Questions Tax records are a little used, but excellent resource, for solving the “unsolvable” 18th century problem of record loss/gaps and end of the line extensions. Tax records fill in when clerical surveys are not extant.

Presenter:  Thomas MacEntee,  professional genealogist specializing in the use of technology and social media to improve genealogical research and as a means of interacting with others in the family history community. MacEntee is a popular National speaker, including at RootsTech and is known for his sites Genealogy Bargains and Abundant Genealogy.

This one-hour presentation will cover why the  majority of genealogists begin their research online and often become frustrated with the lack of results. The cause might not be a lack of records at the specific site but the manner in which they are performing the search!   Participants will learn basic online searching for the major genealogy websites. We’ll progress to understanding specific search parameters for specific sites. Next, we’ll discuss whether it is worth the time to track searches as well as how to keep track of all the best ways of searching for a specific site. Finally, we’ll explore different wildcard characters and search methodology to get the most out of a website.  Here are the topics that will be covered:  Basics of Online Searching, Uncovering the Secret Records for Online Genealogy Sites, Should You Track Your Searches, Creating Site-Specific Cheat Sheets for Searching, How to Leverage the Power of Wildcards, Tips and Tricks for Smarter Searching, Resource List.

Presenter:     Kjell Andersson, SGSC Member, Research & Mentoring Chair, has had Swedish ancestry research as his main hobby since 1975.  He joined the  Swedish Genealogical Society of Colorado (SGSC) in February 2008 and there he is the Research &  Mentoring Chair and member of the Board.

Kjell is a dual citizen (Swedish and U.S.) with a telecommunications executive background. Before moving to U.S., he was Executive Vice President and General Manager at Ericsson Radio Systems AB in European standards, and responsible for global sales and marketing, product development, production, supply and distribution in  in 60 countries.  He moved to Colorado Springs in 1997. Since then he has been Chairman and CEO of multiple American telecommunications companies.  Today he is retired and lives with his wife Birgitta (Titti) in Colorado Springs. Kjell holds a Master of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from The Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm  1968 and a Diploma in Management from CEDEP, Fontainebleau, France.

Presentation: If you have ever wanted to see a Fika session, this is your chance to see how it goes.  With Zoom, we’ll get a close up look at how Kjell finds things for SGSC members in Swedish Records.  We’ll also  see how he launches members on their Swedish research journey or helps them break through a  brick wall. He is one of the best at Swedish Genealogy and those of us who have done Fika have benefited greatly. (SGSC Research Sessions are held at the Fika Coffee Shop in Parker and are free for members).

Constance Knox founded Genealogy TV (on YouTube) in 2018 and is a lifelong genealogist.  She will speak on how to use your AncestryDNA results.

Presenter:  Neil Stuppel Price is an  archaeologist specializing in the study of Viking Age Scandinavia. He is currently a professor in the Department of Archaeology and Ancient History at Uppsala University, Sweden.

He was awarded a major 10-year grant and a new job title from the Distinguished Professorship  of the Swedish Research Council to carry out this project:  “Much of the recent research into the Vikings and their time has focused on the complex process of state formation and Christian conversion that eventually gave rise to the modern Scandinavian nations. Far less attention has been devoted to the very beginnings of this trajectory: who really were the Viking raiders in a specific sense, why did they do what they do, what kind of societies produced them, and why did they start to expand so violently into the world at precisely this time? The answers to these questions concern the very origins of the Viking phenomenon. They are of crucial interest for understanding what made Sweden what it is today, and the  problematic ways in which this knowledge of the past is received in contemporary society.  Under my direction, the ten-year programme will explore these issues with a core research group based at Uppsala University and the Swedish History Museum, working in collaboration with a team from Tallinn and Tartu universities in Estonia.”