Overcoming Brick Walls  - strategies and anecdotes for overcoming research dead-ends - Mini-talk: Anne Delong - Backing up your files: - strategies.

If, during your research, you have come across a particularly frustrating dead-end, it would be most helpful if you send a brief description to our experts, well before the January 3rd meeting (at least by December 30), so they can prepare a concise response.

James Thomson - Using Maps in Genealogy - Maps, both print maps and digital maps,are an essential tool for family history research. James discussed theuse of such maps, and where to find them. James provided handouts to those in attendance, now posted in the members only area.

“Victory at Vimy” – Story of the birth of a nation What the world witnessed that Easter Monday morning – April 9, 1917 – was a near miracle of ingenuity, co-operation and courage among volunteers of the Canadian Corps. That day, 80,000 of them – fighting for the first time as a national army – swarmed up that strategic ridge in north-central France and in a matter of hours accomplished what no Allied army had, in nearly three years of blood-letting in Europe. They seized Vimy from an entrenched German army. Some say those young citizen soldiers also breathed life into a fledgling nation – Canada. In a talk/visual presentation, based on his book Victory At Vimy: Canada Comes of Age, April 9 – 12, 1917 Ted Barris reconstructs the blow-by-blow moments of that historic four-day operation, that some say changed the momentum of the war. It put Allied troops in control of the strategic Vimy heights for good. For the first time, it sent the most powerful army in Europe into full retreat. It also firmly established the four Canadian Infantry Divisions as the most effective fighting force on the Western Front.

Mini-talk: Two of our members bring mementos and memories of the Vimy Memorial opening in 1936.

Paul Jones - "I am not a Jones, but what am I?" Paul related his saga about researching two generations of 'father unknowns' and his true surname, involving 25 years of research, and including family oral history (often proven wrong), along with some usual and not so usual documents. Finally, a puzzling Y-DNA test, and an autosomal DNA test yielded solutions. Paul had agreed to archive his talk (for a limited time), in the branch's 'members only' area.

Mini-talk: Methods for backing up records, by Anne Delong, is also archived after Paul's talk, in the same (above) 'members only' YouTube link.

Trina Astor-Stewart, Executive Director for Whitby Historical Society at Lynde House Museum in Whitby, spoke about the importance of Lynde House from an historical viewpoint and the genealogical relationships of the Lynde family in this area as representational of some early settlers to Southern Ontario. One of the most loved homes in Durham Region, Lynde House has been moved twice in order to preserve it and its story for future generations. Thousands of people lined the streets for each of its moves, most recently in 2015 from Cullen Gardens. The stories surrounding Lynde House during the war of 1812 provide a romantic portrayal of the times and now that it is being operated as a museum housing thousands of artifacts, the tales this house can tell grow daily. Come and discover more and find out why this house and the lives of those who lived here make an impact on us even today.

Mini-talk: Deborah Wilbur - "The Princess Mary 1914 Christmas Gift" to WWI soldiers, with family artifacts.

Sher Leetooze (author and historian) Using Other Visuals: - Ilustrating Your Family History with Substitute Sources for Family Photos
"If your family is anything like mine, there are few photos of anyone beyond grandparents or great grandparents.  How, then, do we illustrate a family history without them?  In this presentation, Sher provided some suggestions to solve this dilemma, including the use of personal items that may have been handed down in the family, maps of the ancestral area, and many more ideas easily accessible to most people.  Most of Sher's ideas have been used in her own family history book." A slightly editted video of this meeting is archived here: https://youtu.be/KHmUI_gjwhg (Apologies for the high volume level.)