SNGF: Favorite Legacy Family Tree Webinars From Past 3 Months

Randy Seaver's Saturday Night Genealogy Fun challenge tonight is to answer the question:  What were your favorite Legacy Family Tree webinars over the last 3 months? I have a paid subscription to Legacy Family Tree Webinars.  The majority of the webinars I watch are through that subscription. 

Mine in no particular order are:

• DNA: Proof, Citation & Privacy by Elizabeth Shown Mills (27 Dec 2024)  An ESM webinar.  What's not to love...
• Lost and Found: Locating Ancestral Origins with FAN Club and DNA by Mary Kircher Roddy (18 Dec 2024)  Cluster research. Gets them every time.
• The Everleigh Sisters: A Case Study in Conflict Resolution by Karen Stanbary (22 Jan 2025)--I loved this one because I have a few persons I'm researching who love to lie about themselves.
• Applying Research Standards to the Census by Diane MacLean Boumenot (19 Feb 2025)  Always good to have a solid research plan and guidelines to keep you from constructing your own brick wall--signed..the voice of experience.

I also attended the TN Genealogical Society's Virtual Spring Seminar today where I heard excellent presentations by Annette Burke Lyttle and Gena Philibert Ortega on the theme of "The Occupations of Our Ancestors." There were also door prizes and Q and A after each of the 4 presentations.  I was happy that despite the storms, my internet and electricity held the connection. 

My 2024 Research Year In Review

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January
I'd found a cancelled land transaction for land in Lawrence Co Arkansas of a Wm C Cook in December. My order from the document retrieval service arrived. I transcribed the Homestead Application and started my timeline research on the Wm. C Cook family 1858-1888. I also found that Elisha Luna's widow had filed for his bounty land on his War of 1812 service. This was great because it helped to add to the evidence of proof of her maiden name. I subbed to Ancestry's ProTools and reviewed them.

February
This month's focus was on Jefferson Gideon Cook. I identified his wives and which one was the mother of each of his children. Obtained a copy of the deed for the house which George Solifelt left Tennie Hill. Found that Tennie's husband, Henry F Hill had been previously married and identified his wife. Still looking for that divorce. Worked on my daughter's paternal lines--her recent English immigrant(1880s) and her Germans who settled in Franklin County Indiana. Had hoped AncestryDNA would show them in communities since many have tested but that hasn't happened. RootsTech 2024 started.

March
Reviewed RootsTech 2024 Highlights. The research focus of this month was deeds. Found a lot about the area where Wm C Cook would have been at the time of the Williams vs Putman state supreme court case. (TN) This included mentioning William Harrison and Elizabeth Cook and identifying neighbors to add to the FAN. Found a Pope Family Probate file which identified by name and age those enslaved by the Pope family of Bedford & Williamson Co TN and Granville NC.

April
Another month of Deed research. I found so much more information about Wm C Cook and his children by reading those deeds. FamilySearch's Full Text Search is such a great help. Narrowed down the possible time frame of Anna Putman's death and also found Adkin Upshaw's Estate return in the Elbert Co GA records. Celebrated 20 years of blogging about my genealogy research this month.

May

This month was filled with Tax List research. I discovered that a page had been missed during the microfilming of the Bedford Co TN tax lists and was able to get a copy of the missing page from the clerk's office. Found that there was an outbreak of Cholera in Shelbyville in the year 1833. Posted a Quicklinks of the Bedford Co TN Newspapers available to view on FamilySearch.

June

Published the Wm Clifford Cook Family Timeline 1858-1888. Corrected an error I found in an obituary where the paper had confused the father and the son of a Cannon family. Located documents from Wm G Hight's estate in Franklin Co Arkansas.

July

Ordered a Kindle and published an article on how I use it to help with my genealogy research. Blogged about a DNA Cluster which links to a Jones & Williams family. Found Wm C Cook and son J.P Cook as witnesses on a Pope deed.

August

More William Harrison deeds. Bounty land records of Nancy Harrison Hight Culverhouse. Found the Cook brothers listed among those who owed money to J P Taylor. Really enjoyed reading through the listing of items that my great-uncle Will B Jakes put as security for a loan.

September

More on the Hight, Putman, and Harrison Deeds. Sorted through the records of my maternal great-aunt, Ovena Acuff

October

This month's focus was finding more records using the FamilySearch Full Text Search. They had started adding a lot more and I was finding items in the Court Minutes--Road Work Orders, Poll Tax Exemptions, and Jury Duty. Also wrote about our Cook(e) Y DNA project.

November

Found a Brandon & Williams Deed in Bedford Co TN records involving the Kings. Blogged about another error that was made during the microfilming which could cause confusion about the content of this particular film.

December

I wrote about another of my Granny's Charlotte Street neighbors and found a court minute entry registering the stock mark of the Ogilvies. Found several more Bedford Co TN deeds of the Cook family.  

While I still have many research questions, I've answered some and made progress toward answering others. I look forward to making many more discoveries in 2025.  I can't end this year in review without acknowledging The Best of Elizabeth Shown Mills series hosted by Legacy Family Tree Webinars.  The webinars are a members-only exclusive and so worth it.  I review them often.  They are very helpful when I am stuck in a rut and need motivation or a change of perspective on how to approach my research opportunity.  I am forever grateful to Elizabeth and Legacy Family Tree Webinars for making this educational opportunity available.

Checking in: A Few Thoughts on Various Genealogy Topics

I am thoroughly enjoying Legacy Family Tree Webinar's Best of ESM Series which is a perk of their webinar membership.  Each lecture is thought-provoking and motivational in so many ways it's hard to explain.  That said, I'm not going to try but I will recommend that you look into a webinar membership to have access to that series and many more wonderful webinars.  There are so many opportunities for education when it comes to genealogical research methodology and techniques--many of them free.  Just Google your interest.

I've also been revisiting some of the record books from my earlier research armed with my more recent discoveries. Names of previously unknown ancestors and family associates help to pull things together and provide a clearer picture of our family stories.

I also need to revisit the YDNA results of my Cook(e) line.  My brother tested for us and over the years I upgraded it to the BigY.  If only YDNA testing was as popular as autosomal testing.  The cost is what prohibits many from testing. Hopefully that will change and more folks will want to have representatives from their family lines test--especially some of the more common surnames doing that. This would be a good way to prove or disprove a lot of the older research where DNA testing was not available as evidence.  In the Cook(various spellings) YDNA project we most closely match descendants of Shem Cooke of Amelia VA and later of Granville Co NC.  Our group is Rlb and is broken down into further grouping however there is a group of testers who also claim descendance from that same Shem Cooke who are J2.  One of us is obviously wrong (or there is a split after Shem maybe?) but which one remains to be seen.