Novice genealogists and anyone interested in researching their roots are invited to the Southington Genealogical Society’s free workshop on Tuesday, August 27, 2019 at 7pm at the Orchards, 34 Hobart Street in Southington. Club members Richard Eppler, Lauren Galayda and Sheila Lafferty will present “Where Do You Go from Here? Tips and strategies when you’re feeling overwhelmed with your ancestry research.” The program will help beginners understand public records, organize their findings, and look at other places for information. Experienced genealogists are urged to attend and share their knowledge with the group.

There will be an opportunity for questions and answers.

The meeting will be held at The Orchards at Southington in their second floor community room. There is no admission charge and no obligation to become a member. No reservations are necessary. The facility is handicapped accessible with an elevator.

The Southington Genealogical Society is a non-profit organization located in central Connecticut that promotes the accurate recording, research and preservation of family history. The society regularly meets on the fourth Tuesday of every month, except December, at The Orchards at Southington, 34 Hobart Street, Southington, Connecticut. For more information, contact the society at southingtongenealogicalsociety@gmail.com and southingtongenealogicalsociety.org

On Tuesday, July 23, 2019, the Southington Genealogical Society will be showing a prerecorded webinar, “Misbegotten Children: Tracing Family Lines of Illegitimate Children” with permission from Legacy Family Tree Webinars” and Peggy Clemens Lauritzen.

The meeting will be held at The Orchards at Southington in their second floor community room at 7:00 pm. There is no admission charge and no obligation to become a member. No reservations are necessary. The facility is handicapped accessible with an elevator.

“Nearly all families have children with seemingly missing fathers. Yet, there may be clues and resources to help us determine their ancestry. Illegitimacy can be both a surprise and an embarrassment as we discover more and more about our family’s history. Treated with care and sensitivity, we can use many available resources to help us in our research.”

Peggy Clemens Lauritzen, AG, was involved in genealogy before she was even born. The daughter of avid genealogists, she was spending time in courthouses and cemeteries while other children were playing on swings and going to the beach. The love of her family’s history has never left her. With her experience as a former Family History Director, she is a frequent speaker at genealogical societies, workshops, seminars, and webinars where she loves bringing genealogy to life. Some of those would include The Ohio Genealogical Society, The Ohio State University, Brigham Young University, and many other state and local genealogy societies.

The Southington Genealogical Society is a non-profit organization located in central Connecticut that promotes the accurate recording, research and preservation of family history. The society regularly meets at 7:30 pm on the fourth Tuesday of every month, except December, at The Orchards at Southington, 34 Hobart Street, Southington, Connecticut. For more information, contact the society atsouthingtongenealogicalsociety@gmail.com and http://southingtongenealogicalsociety.org

Next Meeting “Getting the Most Out of HeritageQuest Online” with Marian Wood on Tuesday, June 25, 2019 at 7:00 pm at 7:30 pm at The Orchards, 34 Hobart St in Southington, CT. 

Learn to search for your ancestors in the FREE HeritageQuest databases, accessible from home with your local library card. Tips and tricks for researching in the U S Census special schedules (veterans, mortality, agriculture, and more). Also look for your ancestors in city directories, Revolutionary War records, wills/probate records, and other useful databases, all free and available online through HeritageQuest.

Marian Wood is a textbook author, an avid genealogy researcher for 20 years, and a frequent speaker at genealogy conferences and clubs. With a B.A. from City University of New York and an M.B.A. from Long Island University, she is also the author of a popular genealogy book, “Planning a Future for Your Family’s Past.”

There will be an opportunity for questions and answers.

The meeting will be held at The Orchards at Southington in their second floor community room at 7:00 pm. There is no admission charge and no obligation to become a member. No reservations are necessary. The facility is handicapped accessible with an elevator.

The Southington Genealogical Society is a non-profit organization located in central Connecticut that promotes the accurate recording, research and preservation of family history. The society regularly meets on the fourth Tuesday of every month, except December, at The Orchards at Southington, 34 Hobart Street, Southington, Connecticut. For more information, contact the society at southingtongenealogicalsociety@gmail.com and southingtongenealogicalsociety.org

The Southington Genealogical Society is pleased to sponsor a genealogy program by Steve Courtney entitled “The Letters of Mark Twain and His Best Friend, Joe Twichell of Southington” on Tuesday, May 28, 2019 at 7:00 pm at The Orchards, 34 Hobart St in Southington, CT.

“I do not want others to write, but I do want you to do it,” Mark Twain wrote to his friend, the Rev. Joseph Hopkins Twichell, at a time of family tragedy. “…You have the touch that heals, not lacerates.” For 42 years the Hartford clergyman — born and raised in Plantsville — served as the author’s confidant, friend, fellow joker, sharer of long walks, partner in vigorous conversation and source of literary inspiration.

Steve Courtney, who has spoken at the Southington Genealogical Society about his 2008 biography of Twichell, will present tales from his most recent book, The Letters of Mark Twain and Joseph Hopkins Twichell (University of Georgia Press, 2017). This major work, co-edited by Peter Messent, Harold K. Bush, and Steve, includes the complete correspondence, brought together for the first time. Of the more than 300 letters the two men wrote to each other, more than half have never been published.

The idea that Twain’s best friend was a preacher is a surprising one, and the letters show that they battled on many fronts, both political and theological. “Oh, the human race!—what a ridiculous invention it is,” Twain wrote to Twichell. The minister wrote back: “Mark, the way you throw your rotten eggs at the human race doth greatly arride me.” But their friendship remained strong — after a  lively argument, Twain would write, “Joe, our whole tribe shouts love to you and yours.”

Hal Holbrook, the actor and legendary performer of the one-man show Mark Twain Tonight!,describes the book as “two friends talking…”You get more of Mark Twain the unguarded person from these conversations between two friends than from the biographies. They traveled the footpaths of Europe together, their wives and children enriched their friendship, they could say what they wanted and know they’d get away with it.”

Steve Courtney has been a journalist and historian for 42 years, and won the 2009 Connecticut Book Award for Joseph Hopkins Twichell: The Life and Times of Mark Twain’s Closest Friend (University of Georgia Press). He is also the author of “The Loveliest Home That Ever Was”: The Story of the Mark Twain House in Hartford (Dover Publications); and ‘We Shall Have Them With Us Always’: The Ghosts of the Mark Twain House (Paige Compositor Press). He co-edited, with Peter Messent,The Civil War Letters of Joseph Hopkins Twichell: A Chaplain’s Story (University of Georgia Press). He served as publicist for The Mark Twain House & Museum for four years, and founded its Writing Program and Twainian lecture series,The Trouble  Begins at 5:30. He now works as a consultant at the museum.

The meeting will be held at The Orchards at Southington in their second floor community room at 7:00 pm. There is no admission charge and no obligation to become a member. No reservations are necessary. The facility is handicapped accessible with an elevator.

Next Meeting:

The Southington Genealogical and the Southington Historical Societies are pleased to sponsor a program entitled “The World War I Memorials of Connecticut” with Richard Franklin Donahue on Tuesday, April 23, 2019 at 7:00 pm at The Southington Historical Society, 239 Main St, Southington, CT.

As the First World War ended, American communities hurried to memorialize the great  efforts of their sons and daughters.  Changes in cultural and civic ideals since the American Civil War led to extensive public discourse about what memorials should and should not be.  Government leaders, artists, historians, and the monument industry itself promoted ideas from simple tablets to  monoliths rivaling those of Egypt and Rome. Memorials throughout Connecticut exemplify  this entire  range of monumental styles.  The citizens of Southington wasted no time in this process and had a plan in place by the end of 1918.  Within a year, the town dedicated a unique flagpole as a  “Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Memorial “with an enormous celebration and parade.

Having visited and cataloged more than 225 monuments throughout the 169 towns  in Connecticut, Richard Franklin Donohue will display images  of  the monuments and  share stories of their design, placement, and the people memorialized on them.  The Southington Memorial and those of the surrounding towns will be featured along with images of several of Southington’s World War veterans.

Richard Franklin Donohue is the Town Historian of his hometown of Cromwell, Connecticut.  His original research has formed the basis of museum exhibits, travelling lectures, and living history programs on topics ranging from 18th-century slavery to Civil War-era subscription balls to early 20th-century marine engines.  As President and Program Director of the Cromwell Historical Society for nearly fifteen years and a teacher in both public and private schools for twenty-five, he strives to enhance his town’s interest and participation in local and national history.  In addition to his work with history, Richard is a tenor soloist specializing in Middle English Carols, Bach arias, and German Lieder and is the director of the 1876 Singing Society at Mystic Seaport.

The Southington Genealogical Society is pleased to sponsor a genealogy program by Jill Martin entitled “Beginning Legal Research for Genealogists” on Tuesday, March 26th, 2019 at 7:00 pm at The Orchards, 34 Hobart St in Southington, CT.

This session will teach you how to perform  basic legal research in a law library, and find cases and statutes on the state and federal level, providing a new set of resources to search for family history and to understand the laws your family lived under.

Jill Martin is a professor and chair of the Legal Studies Department at Quinnipiac University, and is admitted to the practice of law in Connecticut and New York.  .  She completed the BU program, and has attended IGHR and the National Institute of Genealogical Research.  She has also presented at University and genealogical societies. She has presented at the New England Regional Genealogy Conference for a number of years,  on New York genealogy, citizenship, and using legal resources, and will be presenting a similar program at NERGC this April.

The meeting will be held at The Orchards at Southington in their second floor community room at 7:00 pm. There is no admission charge and no obligation to become a member. No reservations are necessary.

The next SGS meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, January 22  at 7:00 p.m. at the Orchards. The Society will be showing the following recorded webinar from familytreewebinars.com.

“Strategies for Using Family Search.org” by Shannon Combs-Bennett

Webinar Description: As one of the go-to resources for research Family Search is an amazing site that few take the time to explore. Learn how to get more information from this website through search techniques, wiki resources, and more.

Speaker Bio:Shannon Combs-Bennett, owner of T2 Family History, is a speaker and author based out of Virginia. She enjoys teaching about a wide range of topics from DNA to methodology. Currently Shannon is the Creative Director for The In-Depth Genealogist. You can learn more about her at http://t2familyhistory.com.

The meeting will be held at The Orchards at Southington in their second floor community room at 7:00 pm. There is no admission charge and no obligation to become a member. No reservations are necessary. The facility is handicapped accessible with an elevator.

The Southington Genealogical Society is a non-profit organization located in central Connecticut that promotes the accurate recording, research and preservation of family history. The society regularly meets at 7:00 pm on the fourth Tuesday of every month, except December, at The Orchards at Southington, 34 Hobart Street, Southington, Connecticut. For more information, contact the society at southingtongenealogicalsociety@gmail.com and http://southingtongenealogicalsociety.org