Illinois State Genealogical Society Blog

This week's Follow Friday resource is a new blog - Chicago History - which contains great photo and articles about Chicago. © 2010, copyright Illinois State Genealogical Society

Congratulations to ISGS board member and fellow genealogy blogger Julie Tarr on the second anniversary of her blog, GenBlog . If you haven't yet paid a visit, stop by and check out not only the Illinois genealogy resources listed at her site, but her general posts on family history. © 2010, copyright Illinois State Genealogical Society

Wondering how you can lend ISGS in publicizing upcoming events such as our Fall 2010 Conference - You Have Family, You Have History - in Peoria? If you frequently send emails, did you realize you can utilize valuable space at the bottom of your email messages to help get the word out? In the image above, I've added a brief note about the conference at the bottom of my email messages, just above my signature.  Here is the text with the link: Join us! Peoria, IL October 23, 2010 for the Annual Fall Conference "You Have Family - You Have History" co-hosted by the Peoria Genealogical Society! http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~ilsgs/fallconf/2010regfinal.pdf To learn how you can automatically have a message appear at the bottom of each email you send, see this free  cheat sheet entitled Guide To Email Signatures (opens in PDF format) which explains the method for each of the popular email applications including Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo Mail and more. © 2010, copyri...

A recent story on the CNN website suggests that a member of the ill-fated Donner Party carried several documents related to Abraham Lincoln on their journey.  It appears that muster rolls from the 1832 Black Hawk War - portions with Lincoln's handwriting - were transported to California by James Reed and were considered family heirlooms. Talk about serendipity - who would have ever considered such a connection between this group of pioneers and a US President?  It just goes to show you that there are connections and genealogical information to be found in a variety of places and sources. See the full story here and play the video below for more information on this fascinating story. © 2010, copyright Illinois State Genealogical Society

Did you know that the National Archives - Regional Archives in Chicago is open the 2nd Saturday of each month? The hours are 8:00 am to 4:15 pm for the following dates in 2010: Saturday, August 14, 2010 Saturday, September 11, 2010 Saturday, October 9, 2010 Saturday, November 13, 2010 Saturday, December 11, 2010 This is in addition to the Archives' regular hours of 8:00 am to 4:15 pm, Monday through Friday.  The archives are located at 7358 South Pulaski Road in Chicago. Click  here  for detailed directions when making your trip. If you are  interested in working original records or microfilm held by the Regional Archives, you are encouraged to contact a reference archivist ahead of time by phone at +1 (773) 948-9001 or email at chicago.archives@nara.gov . Also, if you are a Facebook user, make sure you visit the National Archives Chicago page and click the Like button at the top to add their announcements to your News Feed. * * * Thanks to the Glenvie...

Great news for fans of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum (ALPLM) in Springfield, IL! The ALPLM now has its own blog entitled From Out of the Top Hat . As stated on the About page: A cartoon shows Abraham Lincoln looking askance at a book with the caption: “My God, another book.” The reference assumes the reader knows that there are quite a few Lincoln books, roughly 17,000 titles to date. The same exasperation might be expressed as: “My God, another Lincoln blog.” There are quite a number of blogs, active and inactive, regarding Lincoln and the Civil War. Why is another needed? The simple answer is that whereas most blogs are the creation and expressions of individual opinion, this blog is institutionally based and serves a broad purpose. By tapping into the collections of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, the blog hopes to tease out meanings about Lincoln, his times, and his legacy. The bloggers for this site are Dr. James M. Cornelius,...

The village of Chatham in Sangamon County, IL is providing a cemetery database on its website which will allow genealogy researchers to locate grave site information for the Chatham Memorial Cemetery and the Chatham Community Cemetery. Read this recent article in the State-Journal Register describing the project.  You can access the Cemetery Search page here . Via State Journal-Register © 2010, copyright Illinois State Genealogical Society