BLACK GENESIS

The Antebellum Southern Plantation Records can offer multifaceted views into many white and African American Southern families. 

This resource documents families' personal and business correspondence, conditions of plantation life (including the elusive names of slaves and descriptions of slave relationships), and much more. 

Learn about the genealogical value of the Southern Antebellum Plantation Records - how they are organized, how to search the collection, and apply it towards your genealogical research. 

The case studies will highlight the personal documents of a white Southern family and the indirect documentation of an African American family.

Many researchers encounter mysterious persons living in the household of a relative; or a letter signed by an unknown ‘cousin.’ 

As a researcher, it is important to investigate and understand the relationship between these strangers and your person of interest. 

This lecture will discuss cluster research methodology.

Time and money are a researcher’s most precious commodities. 

Don’t waste valuable library time on ordinary collections and databases when you are sitting on a gold mine of unique resources! 

Learn to maximize your experience at your local and destination libraries. 

Earthquakes, hurricanes, floods and droughts impacted the lives of our ancestors. Learn how weather events may explain disease, death, migration, property loss and much more.

Manuscript collections can be a goldmine of information for family history researchers. Learn about where to find collections, how they are organized, how to use a finding aid, and the variety of interesting items that can be found in the collections. 

We all have mounds of old unidentified family photos sitting in boxes. This lecture will offer step-by-step direction in organizing, preserving and cataloguing these precious collections for future generations. Learn how to identify, digitize and share collections using family trees and social media.

Recreating neighborhoods can provide rich and insightful details about an ancestor’s life and surroundings. This lecture will demonstrate ways to build a map using Sanborn Fire insurance maps, census records, and city directories in Google Maps.

Think about researching and organizing documents beyond genealogical software. Learn about new ways to visualize and analyze research by creating timelines, charts, spreadsheets and diagrams.

Learn about the basic steps in starting African American research, genealogical resources and strategies.

Learn about the institution of apprenticeship, the governing laws, and how it affected free people of color. This lecture will analyze contracts and use additional resources to follow free people of color.

During the Great Migration, many African American families left the South for the promise of a better life in the North. Learn about the motives for migration, patterns and methods for tracking your ancestor.

Keeping track of hundreds of slaves with oftentimes only first names or nicknames can be an overwhelming task. This lecture will offer suggestions on organizing and analyzing information of plantation slaves before and after the Civil War. 

Oral history can dramatically enhance your genealogical research. Not only can it provide you with names, dates of life events, and places, these narratives can reveal motives for migration, explanations of brief marriages, or descriptions of an ancestor’s personality. Oral histories can offer information that traditional records may not provide.

Locating the last slave owner is essential in African American research. Explore records that will help transition your research from 1870 into the Antebellum Era.

Well-known for their anti-slavery views, Quakers began to migrate to the slave-free territories in the 19th century. As they migrated out of the South, Quakers emancipated and traveled with their newly freed slaves. Once settled, the sect continued their abolitionist cause by supporting the Underground Railroad – transporting runaway slaves to free states. In turn, free blacks established their own settlements, while still maintaining ties with the Quaker community.

Countless African American families experienced the traumatic displacement and loss of family members during slavery. In the wake of Emancipation, African Americans from all of over the country desperately searched for their missing family members – using such resources as the Freedmen’s Bureau and newspapers. Between 1865-1872, the Freedmen’s Bureau worked to reunite families by writing letters and inquiring within distant communities. Between 1863-1910, newspapers ran ads and even had specialized columns for former slaves searching for family.

These sources are rich in genealogical detail. They poignantly describe biographical information of the missing relative and applicant; reveal name aliases; offer distinguishing clues such as where and when the relative was last seen; provide a history of slave ownership; and identify migration patterns.

For many, researching before 1870 is a hurdle in African American research. Learn about sources and strategies to trace ancestors back into the Antebellum Era.