November 2022: Our final meeting of the year was a hybrid meeting accommodating a local audience as well as several members who attended via Zoom. Our guest speaker was Cheri Daniels, Director of the National Sons of the American Revolution Genealogical Research Library at the SAR National Headquarters in Louisville Kentucky. For over 25 years, she has worked in various types of libraries, including 11 years at the University of Kentucky, and 10+ years as the manager of the Library and Archives at the Kentucky Historical Society. At our meeting, Cheri presented an Introduction to the SAR Library. She stressed that researching your ancestors at Kentucky's only national lineage society library has never been easier with both on-site and remote resources at your fingertips. Cheri covered the resources available to both groups, tips to track down your patriot ancestors, and why this library should be added to your resource toolbox. She supported her program with wonderful graphics and gave us a tour of the SAR website. Following the presentation, we held an election of officers for 2023. Stepping into the role of President will be Sarah Baston. Johnna Waldon will assume the duties of Vice President, and Tom Beatty will remain as Treasurer and Communications Director. Our newsletter production will remain in the able hands of Tori Lantrip, assisted by Tom Beatty. Our annual dues will remain at $15; a dues reminder will be included in our Winter newsletter. Best wishes for a great holiday season to all of our members, and we'll get together again in January 2023.

October 2022: So what if you planned a party and no one showed up? Although we have a membership of over 30 people from all corners of the country, only three people attended our October Zoom meeting. We had planned to hear from Program Director Johnna Waldon, but when the attendance was so low, we decided to shelve her program for another time when more people might attend. Genealogy societies around the country report that meeting attendance and memberships are shrinking. What's the solution? We'll discuss this topic next mnth at our November meeting, a hybrid event featuring an in-person meeting at the Scott County Public Library as well as a Zoom component for our non-resident members. We were fortunate that member Jerry Bedford attended our October meeting. He told us about plans to film a story of the reenactment of the 1877 journey of African-American pioneers to Nicodemus, Kansas. A teaser has already been produced and is available on YouTube. A big hearty thank you to Jerry Bedford for alerting us to the upcoming production.

September 2022: We transitioned into the Fall season with an excellent program by Rusty Heckaman, KDLA Research Room Supervisor, titled, The Births and Deaths of the Records of Birth and Death in Kentucky: Vital Record Keeping 1852-1910. Although that's a long title, it addresses the many changes in vital statistics records in Kentucky over the years. It is easy to assume that everyone has a birth certificate in our modern age of information. It is also easy to apply this assumption to vital records beyond just those of birth, such as marriage or death. While vital records are so ubiquitous to have acquired status as an assumed reality today, they are a relatively modern development. Reviewing their history will highlight the years in which vital records were kept in Kentucky, the extent to which they were recorded, and why, while also illustrating other potential sources for records outside of those legislated by the state. Randy explained that the records are a unique challenge and frustration to many who embark upon the search with the assumption about the ever-present existence of certificates for birth or death. But when approached with the right context and understanding they are a vital source for genealogical researchers. Using a vast number of graphics, Randy covered the ups and downs of record keeping in Kentucky, much of which was pioneered by Georgetown native Dr. John L. Sutton. This was a thorough presentation that helped explain the value of vital statistics records.

July 2022: At our July meeting, we welcomed professional genealogist Linda Colston. She presented a program on the strengths and weaknesses of DNA testing, specifically as they relate to autosomal testing, and how they impact genealogical research. In her experience, DNA testing is only useful to a certain point and then it must be confirmed by genealogical research because DNA only reveals who you are related to and to what degree but not how. Linda noted DNA Painter’s Shared cM Project as a particularly helpful tool to compare results from your DNA chart. Other tools, like AncestryDNA’s Tim-ber algorithm, use shared DNA results to account for complications such as those caused by endogamy and pedigree collapse. Linda also touched on the Shared cM Project. Sample analysis shown above. Thanks to Linda for her excellent presentation.

June 2022: Once again, Johnna Waldon, our program coordinator, returned to the microphone and presented an interesting program titled Victorian Death Customs to our Zoom audience. In addition to legal rights and barriers, the social customs of women in the Victorian era influenced even the death and grieving process. Johnna told us about death folklore and Victorian death customs, and presented examples of how people in the late 1800s viewed spiritualism and the afterlife. Mourning rites changed over the years, and again Johnna provided excellent examples to stress the prevailing customs. One of those customs involved postmortem photography, a method to include a recently deceased person in family photographs. Though it's a stretch to imagine something like that occurring today, it was popular in some turn-of-the-century family mourning practices. Again we thank Johnna for another inspiring program.

May 2022: Our program coordinator, Johnna Waldon, presented an informative program titled, Cracking the Code: Cemetery Symbolism. Using numerous graphics Johnna unlocked the vast information that can be found on headstones besides names and dates. She clarified the often misunderstood types of cemeteries and headstones. She also showed examples of many gravestone symbols and how they can be used to discover unknown facts about our ancestors. Johnna left us with an excellent handout covering many topics she presented during the program. She also left us with a new term to remember...taphophile, someone who is interested in cemeteries, funerals,and gravestones. As family historians, most of us are likely taphophiles.

April 2022: Our April meeting was our annual Show-and-Tell meeting where members presented artifacts or stories passed down through their families. We heard an interesting story from Barbara Knox about a family recipe for "Transparent Pudding," which is still being prepared in the family. Barbara also shoed a small pie tin used for the recipe. Frances McGraw talked about the life of her second-great-grandfather, Colonel R. R. Perry. Tom Beatty showed knives that had belonged to his two grandfathers. Doris Reed displayed a necklace that had belonged to her husband's stepmother, and Anissa Davis owns the DAR Regent Pin that belonged to her great-grandmmother. These small objects and stories that have a strong family connection are worth photographing and recording to be passed down to our future descendants.

March 2022: Ten eager SCGS members joined our March Zoom meeting to hear David Bryant, Librarian at the Lexington Public Library, discuss the resources available to assist genealogists with their research. David's program focused on the vast digital content at the Lexington Library, and he showed many examples that held valuable information in researching family members who lived in Lexington and the surrounding counties. Among the many resources is the Kentucky Pioneer and Genealogy Records Magazine digital collection which focuses on tax records, early military and militia records, family cemeteries, newspapers, and transcriptions of early vital records. The Library also holds numerous digital newspaper collections to help family historians in their research. People searching for military information on their ancestors might find the records of the United States Army Armor School at Fort Knox of value; they contain yearbooks of basic training graduates from Fort Knox. David's program was interesting and relevant to genealogists at all levels of experience.

February 2022: Small attendance, but a wonderful program! Focusing on Black History Month, our Program Chair, Johnna Waldon, contacted Julia Taylor, Local History Librarian at the Scott County Public Library, to find out what resources were available locally to help patrons search for records pertaining to African American genealogy. Julia presented a in-depth program outlining the myriad Kentucky Room resources on this important topic. She covered materials available for circulation, as well as in-house reference materials and local digital archives. Julia's presentation will be available soon on our website.

January 2022: We saw quite a few happy faces as we turned the calendar to 2022 to start another year of our Zoom meetings. This month we discussed the ongoing family Bible project, which has been held up due to participant illness. We will have a total of 300 items to sell. Currently we are working on forming an advertising committee. In other news, Find-a-Grave has made changes to when you can make "memorials" and the transference and management of them. This is an attempt to rectify the common problem of non-relatives creating memorials and not transferring them to kin and reclamation from inactive accounts. Officers plan to discuss revamping our website with local computer science students. Members were encoursged to pay their dues by April 15; delinquent members will be dropped from the Society.