As I mentioned earlier, this year’s NGS conference seemed to have fewer new product introductions than most of the past conferences I have attended. However, I did find a number of things that interested me and will mention them here.

Probably the biggest announcement was that of the complete transcription of the original 1880 United States Census on CD-ROM, released by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the Mormons). This collection of fifty-six CD-ROMs contains approximately fifty million names and is accompanied with a National Index. This is the first national index to the 1880 Census. I have been told that the index allows the user to search by names, localities, and lots of other parameters. The full set of fifty-six CD-ROM disks sells for $49.00. I’ll let you work out the math on that one for the cost per disk. I hope to write a full review of this huge new resource in this newsletter within the next week or two. Information is available at: www.familysearch.org.

The LDS Church also has released the Pedigree Resource File, Volume 1, Disks 1 through 25. This is a huge collection of pedigrees submitted by individuals from around the world. A Master Index of all 25 CD-ROM disks is included. Again, I hope to write a review of this resource soon. Information is available at: www.familysearch.org.

The New England Historic Genealogical Society announced the release of Clarence Torrey’s New England Marriages Prior to 1700 on CD-ROM. This has been a standard reference book that probably is familiar to every person researching early New England ancestry. This book is believed to contain records of 99 percent of all marriages of New Englanders prior to 1700. The CD-ROM version will contain the entire book plus a complete bibliography of source citations. Each entry will be followed by a list of sources that Torrey consulted for that marriage. Macintosh users will want to know that this CD-ROM disk will work on the Macintosh in its native mode, no emulators required. This new CD-ROM was not on display at the conference as it is at the manufacturing house right now. It is expected to become available within three or four weeks. Information may be found at: www.newenglandancestors.org.

The New England Historic Genealogical Society also announced the release of a huge collection of Bible records from their manuscript collection. This CD-ROM disk will contain thousands of birth, marriage, and death records; much of the data is not available in vital records or elsewhere. The Society is working feverishly at making many of its unique sources available on CD-ROM. Like the CD-ROM of Torrey’s New England Marriages, this CD-ROM disk will work on the Macintosh in its native mode with no emulators required. Again, this new CD-ROM was not on display as it is at the manufacturing house right now; it is expected to become available within three or four weeks. Information may be found at: www.newenglandancestors.org.

Genealogy Toolbox took the opportunity to announce two CD-ROM disks:

War of 1812 Military Bounty Land Warrants 1815-58, a twenty-seven CD set containing actual images of warrants issued to War of 1812 veterans and their heirs, principally in the public domain land areas of Arkansas, Illinois and Missouri. Each CD-ROM disk is indexed by name, image number, and warrant number.

Record Cards of Letter Carriers Separated From the Postal Service 1863-99 is a set of eight CD-ROM disks listing the location of the post office, name of the letter carrier, date of appointment, reason for leaving the service, and date of separation. Each CD-ROM disk is indexed by name, location, and image number.

Genes & Things, Inc. was displaying a beta version of GeneWeaver, a program to track health-related information for families. GeneWeaver will be an excellent tool for tracking inherited medical conditions as well as the possibility of twins and triplets being born into a family, or even inherited items such as hair color, eye color, and more. I suspect the tracking of inherited medical information will be the "next big thing" in genealogy, and GeneWeaver is well positioned to take the lead in this field. Again, the company was showing a beta version at the conference, so you probably will not be able to buy this program until late summer. Information is available at: www.geneweaveronline.com.

Heritage Trail Press displayed their collection of old newspapers on CD-ROM. They already have Oregon newspapers from the nineteenth century available today and are promising still more in the future. Details may be found at: www.OregonHistory.com.

If you have Irish ancestry, you will want to know about a brand-new CD-ROM disk called The William Smith O’Brien Petition as compiled by Ruth Lawler. This CD-ROM contains the transcript of petition signatures as signed by over 80,000 people from every part of Ireland and from Liverpool, Manchester, and other parts of England, between 1848 and 1849. This source was only recently discovered and has not been available either in book form or on microfilm. It is a unique historical and genealogical source from the period of the Famine. Following the failure of the 1848 rising, O'Brien was sentenced to death, and this petition was collected to gain clemency for the rebel leader. As a consequence, his sentence was commuted, and O'Brien was transported to Australia for life. This publication contains:

• Over 80,000 names, addresses and occupations

• Over 10,000 names from England

• Over 70,000 names from Ireland

• Scanned images of all 167 petition headers

MyTrees.com, also known as Kindred Konnections, has added a significant new feature: they now supply data quality statistics on every search hit from their database. You now get statistics on:

• Generations: The number of generations in the selected pedigree beyond the search individual.

• Ancestors: The number of ancestors in the selected pedigree beyond the search individual.

• Completion: The percent of major fields (e.g. birth, marriage, death--dates and places) filled in with data for the selected pedigree.

• Documentation: The average number of characters (bytes) of notes and historical information per record (individual and family) in the selected pedigree.

Details are available at: www.mytrees.com.

One of the niftiest devices I came across was a product from Memory Medallions that can attach to tombstones. These 1 3/8-inch disks contain information about the deceased individual. This information would be supplied by family or friends and processed by the company for placement on the medallion. A visitor to the tombstone can then read this memory medallion, using an inexpensive scanner connected to a laptop or hand-held unit for instant on-site review, or else they can save the information and then add it to a larger database, such as a genealogy profile. The developer demonstrated reading the data on both a laptop PC and on a handheld Compaq iPAQ that uses the Windows CE operating system. He also said that a Palm version is possible. Imagine, if you will, walking through a cemetery holding a handheld computer and reading data about various individuals as stored in the memory medallions. The chip inside the medallion can hold enough data for one color picture and five to ten pages of single-spaced text about a person. You can read more about the Memory Medallions for tombstones at: www.memorymedallion.com/.

There were a number of new books on display at the NGS conference. I probably only saw a few of them, but I did notice these:

The Oregon Burial Site Guide by Stanley R. Clarke and Janice M. Healy is the definitive guide to Oregon cemeteries. Each county is cross-indexed, and a statewide index is also included. The articles in this book include primary and "also known as" (AKA) names; township, range and section, and coordinates on USGS maps; directions on how to find sites as well as donation land claim information when applicable. Information may be obtained from Stoney Way Ltd., P.O. Box 5414, Aloha, OR 97007-5414.

Uncle, We Are Ready! Registering America's Men, 1917-18, written by archivist John Newman and published by Heritage Quest, is an extensive guide to researching World War I draft registration cards, which gives valuable genealogical information for over 24 million Americans born between 1872 and 1900. It is the first book-length study of the WWI draft registration process and includes a detailed history and explanation of the draft, as well as a complete series of research sources available. Information is available at: www.heritagequest.com

Alaska Sources – A Guide to Historical Records and Information Resources, by Connie Malcolm Bradbury and David Albert Hales, is reported to be the most definitive resource on Alaskan genealogy ever written. This book was so new that I think the ink was still wet. Again, it is published by Heritage Quest. Information is available at: www.heritagequest.com.

One unique item was The Game of Roots II produced by G&E Hill, Inc. This is a customized game in which your ancestors become part of the path to winning. You submit information about your ancestors and include pictures wherever possible. In return, you receive a game board that is reminiscent of Monopoly except that your ancestors replace Boardwalk, Park Place, and the other properties. Information is available at: www.gehill.com/.

The Molecular Genealogy Research Group was at the NGS conference, accepting blood samples and four-generation pedigree charts from attendees. This organization is sponsored by Brigham Young University and plans to obtain 100,000 samples and charts. Once completed, they expect to be able to define migration patterns and to even verify the origins of genealogies. That is, if you believe you have Hungarian ancestry, the Molecular Genealogy Research Group expects to be able to prove or disprove that theory, even without knowing the names of the Hungarian ancestors. Keep an eye open for more news about this fascinating project.

I found a "sleeper" of a product at the booth of 123genealogy.com. This was a CD-ROM called PowerPoint Backgrounds for Family History. If you give talks about genealogy using PowerPoint slides, I suspect you will be interested in this CD-ROM. Many of the backgrounds are rather simplistic, consisting mostly of banners along the top, side or bottom of each slide. However, you will also find scanned images of old tombstones, sailing ships, cowboys, old houses, eyeglasses, naturalization certificates, as well as people attired in the fashions of a century ago. These are appealing images to "dress up" your PowerPoint slides. The disk has ninety backgrounds and eight-four images. The images are really twenty-eight distinct images, each displayed on three different background colors. The CD-ROM sells for $20.00 and is so new that it is not yet listed on the company’s Web site. I expect that will change soon. I hope to write a review of it soon. Keep an eye on www.123genealogy.com

A "cute" product was the fictitious pedigree chart of the Rock Family and the Stone Family. This chart included such notables as Falling Rock, who married Rolling Stone, Rock Hound, who married Rose Quartz, and many more. Available from: Carlberg Publishing, 1782 Beacon Ave., Anaheim, CA 92804.

I must say that I enjoyed ferreting out all these new products at the NGS conference.