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    Northwest Missouri People from Kansas Newspapers

    I will never catch up with Monica. Not only is she years ahead of me, she’s a lot faster. SHE has a system and sticks with it. I, also, have a system. It just keeps changing and evolving, so I end up doing the same stuff over and over again — lately usually because of something she’s sent me. So, for now, it’s her fault.

    Today she sent me her transcription of Kansas newspaper articles that mention people from the Northwest Missouri counties. How kewl is that? Pretty kewl! Rather than let it sit in my “to-do” pile until I figure out what to do with it, since the information spans several Missouri counties and surnames, here it is.

    Please note: Monica sent a Word document, complete with index. Since I don’t use Word, it seems the page numbers in the index might be one off here and there.

    . . . [Yes! There’s more!]

    21 June 2015 | Category: Documents, MOGenWeb | Leave a comment

    Trust, but Verify? No — Don’t Trust AT ALL!

    It’s not just me. You’ll find complaints about bogus family trees all over the web.

    It’s one thing to make a mistake. It’s quite another to import an entire GEDCOM from Rootsweb or Ancestry, or copy information from an old book — or a new one, for that matter — and assume there are no mistakes in them. And then blame the original author when your tree is now a hot mess.

    I received a mailing list post recently that I’m still laughing about. The writer complained that she and a cousin had spent a great deal of time cleaning up their family trees because they had relied on erroneous information from an old genealogy book about their family. The upside is that, at some point, they realized there was a problem and set out to actually do some research.

    One of the Ancestry commercials that makes my spine tingle . . . [Yes! There’s more!]

    17 June 2015 | Category: Pet Peeves | Leave a comment

    Move Over Harry Potter! My Wand Scanner Has Arrived!

    VuPoint Magic Wand Portable Scanner

    It’s not often that I find things that I consider new and exciting. I’m sure many of you have already discovered this awesome little gadget — it’s not “new” by any means — but if you haven’t, run, don’t walk, to Amazon or the goodie store and get one!

    My friend has had one of these for a long time, but I never bothered to get one. Then, last week, I finally decided to order a new battery for my laptop and needed to buy something else for the free shipping. LOL!

    It arrived yesterday and I’m THRILLED! I wonder if you can get a holster so you can carry it around with you ALL the time?!

    My new smart phone takes awesome pictures, and I’ve been using that to snag documents. The downside of that is, of course, that you don’t . . . [Yes! There’s more!]

    10 June 2015 | Category: Toys and Goodies | Leave a comment

    NWMGS 2015 Genealogy Conference

    NWMGS

    The Northwest Missouri Genealogical Society is holding its 2015 conference on July 25th this year.

    From the NWMGS site:

    July 25, 2015 is the date of our second annual Genealogy Conference at Remington Nature Center. We are pleased to announce that this year we will have four different speakers focusing on a wide array of topics. Those who register before June 30th will receive a $5 discount, and NWMGS members enjoy an additional $5 discount. At-the-door price is $50.

    The entire schedule and details can be found on the registration form.

    We hope to see you there!

    9 June 2015 | Category: Websites | Leave a comment

    It’s not RAOGK, but . . .

    Besides “do you have anything on my Smith family,” one of the most frequently asked questions is “Do you know anyone who can do the research for me?” Usually, no. But you might be able to find someone at RootsBid.

    RootsBid is a new website, certified by FamilySearch, that can help you find someone to help you with that long-distance research task you’ve been sitting on. Registration is free, but getting your information probably won’t be. Other registered users bid on how much they’ll charge to complete your request. Of course, it’s always possible that the RAOGK refugees will throw in some bids for cost. But just reviewing some of the current requests, someone will be spending a lot of time on a few of them, so, naturally, those bids will probably be higher.

    The site is so new, there’s not much there yet. But as . . . [Yes! There’s more!]

    6 June 2015 | Category: Websites | Leave a comment

    No More Messing Around

    If you can’t access the site from a search engine or Facebook, it’s because your IP CIDR has been blocked. This won’t be an issue for most “real” visitors, because most of the IPs resolve to Europe or Asia. However, there are a few bad actors using IPs in the US and while I apologize for the inconvenience, I am determined to eliminate them, too.

    I spend way too much time dealing with unauthorized login attempts and site harvesters. I have many security measures in place, so — knock on wood — none of my sites have been compromised. Yet. However, these Bad Kids still consume server resources and bandwidth, as they usually target several sites at once, and the bots can hit the sites hundreds of times in just a few minutes — not to mention the time it takes to review logs and block individual IP addresses, which . . . [Yes! There’s more!]

    5 June 2015 | Category: Pet Peeves | Leave a comment