OUR HOURS at
4 Elm Street, Manchester, NH
(603) 622-1554
Wednesday 9 am - 9 pm
Friday 9 am - 6 pm
Saturday 9am - 4 pm
1st and 3rd Sunday 1pm - 4 pm
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Holiday Hours
Open on Wednesday, November 11
Don't forget to commemorate our Veterans before heading in.
The Library will close at 3:00 PM on Wednesday, November 25
Closed on Friday, November 27
Regular Hours on Saturday, November 28
Joyeux Action d'Grace
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A Note from the President
As Janine Penfield, our able e-newsletter coordinator, reminded me, 'Where did October go?'
Since this is the first newsletter since our Annual Meeting and Fall Conference, I must report that our Conference Committee and Library Board did another stellar job of bringing in excellent speakers, picking a good venue, and providing an enjoyable and knowledgeable experience for the 75+ attendees. Many thanks to them, our three speakers (Jennifer Zinck, Lucie LeBlanc Consentino and Ed McGuire) and the Puritan Backroom and Function Center. It was an honor and a treat to have our Co-Founder and Honorary President (and Member #1) Roger Lawrence with us briefly as well. Roger was able to sign copies of his work that ACGS just published with his gracious permission and rights.
Proposed by-laws changes were presented at the Annual Business Meeting and accepted. The biggest change was the elimination of term limits.
We are already through our first month with a newly-seated Board of Directors, and moving forward. Sometimes, the pace is ever so slow to my liking, but I have to remember that it is still in the right direction and we are all volunteers.
On a more solemn note, long time member, volunteer and Past President Albert Hamel passed away earlier this month. I again send our love and sympathy to Connie and the family on his passing.
ACGS just signed its Participation Agreement for NERGC 2017 in Springfield, Massachusetts, and as usual, our Society should be well-represented at this conference with ACGS volunteers in various positions.
I always ask folks to consider volunteering their time and talent to our awesome Society - they are our lifeblood. I have a new request today, and it is a little more in line with our efforts to stay modern and current, I would like to see our Facebook page Likes* hit 1,000 by the end of this year, and to see increased traffic to our Website, as well. And of course, you are always encouraged to come and visit us in person at our physical location. It is the heart of what we are all about, and I know you'll be pleased with your visit and experience here.
Until next month...
Jim Gaudet #5381
President
*872 as of 30 Oct 2015
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Did You Know? All members are invited to all Board Meetings!
Mark your calendar for the third Sunday of the Month
10:00 - noon
Coffee and donuts
Excluding July and December. Call ahead when there's inclement weather.
The Library is not open for research during the meeting.
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Upcoming Class at the Library
Saturday, November 21
10:00 - 12:00
Using the Census: A goldmine of information
We'll cover US censuses from 1790 to 1940, States' census records for the few that tallied them and Canadian census records from 1825 to 1921 and the information sought for each one.
Free for Members, non-members $10.00
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At ACGS, Volunteers are the Heart and Soul of our Society
Front Desk Librarian
Looking for a volunteer position that complements your research schedule? ACGS is always looking for Front Desk Librarians. You can commit to as little as one 3 hour shift per month, or more. Benefits include access to research any day of the week.
Interested members or inquiries please send email to
[email protected], attn: Jackie Watson with
Librarian Front Desk
in the Subject line.
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Shop Early for Christmas with a Gift of Membership!
An Individual Membership is only $35.00.
Your recipient can become a new member or renew their present membership.
Click here for an order form
or call 603-622-1554
or visit the Library during regular hours.
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Research
Services
Update
Effective
September 1, 2015
One of ACGS's best benefits for members.
Members get 50% off any fees over the $10. research initiation fee.
Translations from French
to English are our specialty.
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New on the shelves!!
Repertoire St-Patrick Parish, Rouses Point, NY; Call number NY10-30
Repertoire Holy Angels Parish, Altona, NY; Call number NY10-31
Repertoire St-Edmund Parish, Ellenburg NY; Call number NY10-32
Repertoire St-Joseph Parish, Dannemora, NY; Call number NY10-33
Repertoire St-Alexander Parish, Morrisonville, NY; Call number NY70-1
Repertoire St-Charles Parish, Bellows Falls, VT; Call number VT16-1
Family of Paul T & Elizabeth Desfosses Massey, by Geneen Massey Call number FG793
Dictionaire des Familles de St-Didace, Maskinongé Call number Q38-26
Guide to Genealogical Research in the National Archives of the US
Call number Z5313.U5 U54 2000
Dictionary of the American Indian by John Stoutenburgh, Jr
Call number E77.S84
Your English Ancestry, a guide for North Americans, by Sherry Irvine
Call number CS415 .I78 1998
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| OUR NEWEST PUBLICATION!
Give a wonderful gift!
ENGLISH CAPTIVES & PRISONERS REMAINING IN NEW FRANCE
Their story of capture and survival in Quebec by Professor Roger W. Lawrence #1 Publication Date: Summer 2015
For more details and order form, please click here. Coming soon, Table of Contents online.
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** Acadian Corner **
It's never too early to begin planning a trip to the Maritime Provinces and important sites dear to Acadians. Monuments placed by Daniel LeBlanc's Acadian Odyssey Monument Project commemorate those locales where Acadians were boarded onto ships and sailed into an uncertain future by the English authorities. The most recent monument was erected at Baie Ste-Marie in Nova Scotia, the second in that province, the first being in Halifax. Click here to read the story of the unveiling.
To learn more about this project, with locations of these beautiful and informative monuments placed to date and of locales where future monuments would be appropriate,
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Have you listened to the Maple Stars and Stripes Podcast yet?
Sandra Goodwin's Maple Stars and Stripes Podcast
introduces French-Canadian researchers to language and cultural lessons along with interviews with different French-Canadian genealogical societies and researchers. It is a great way to learn about the big, great Franco world of North America.
MSS-039-Franco-Americans and the KKK
Listen while Sandra interviews Dr. Eileen Angelini who has been researching this little known turn of early 20th century history.
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Spotlight on Journals and Periodicals
So that our members don't have to join every French-Canadian or Acadian genealogical society, ACGS has a reciprocal relationship where we exchange our journal, The Genealogist, for other societies' publications.
This month we focus on journals representing Acadian and Maritime Research:
From New Brunswick - Generations, Fredericton, NB mostly English
Les Cahiers de la Societe Memramcook French
From Nova Scotia - Nova Scotia Genealogist mostly
English
Sur L'Empremier French
From Louisiana - Kinfolks
Terrebonne Lifelines
La Voix des Prairies
These journals are indexed in PERSI, the periodical index found on Ancestry and HeritageQuest.
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Presentations, research aids and class handouts from classes held at ACGS
Click
here to visit our class materials page!
Anytime is a great time to review genealogy notes.
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Next Brick Wall Sunday:
November 1
1pm - 4pm
It's better if you can come in to help us work on your brick wall.
Please send your brick wall to
[email protected] and put
Brick Wall in the Subject Line.
Or, just send it to our fee-paid Research Department - they seldom take a sabbatical!!
If there's inclement weather, call ahead.
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Library Tips
Are you just starting out to research your family tree? Have you found the parish your family lived in the United States? Have you found their parish(es) in Canada?
One quick start for your tree are repertoires for the parishes you've identified. A repertoire might lead you to other repertoires, on either side of the border. Here are the advantages:
- Families stay in one place at least for one or more generations - you can go back child to parent, siblings, cousins all at one time.
- Repertoires are created by genealogical society committees and many were adept at including the priest's annotations found in the margins regarding baptisms and marriages out of town, or where parents were from if not that parish. This information is often not included in civil records.
- Generally a history of the parish is part of the introduction, invaluable for placing your family in context.
Are they perfect? No. Some indexers took liberties with names or other data, however, once you learn which ones they are, you can adapt your research accordingly.
Are they complete for your family? No. Sometimes families moved away, then back again, so you will still need to analyze your data and broaden your research with censuses or other repertoires and databases to fill in gaps you might identify.
It is IMPORTANT to note that these are derivative or secondary sources. A good researcher will always seek out the primary or original document. Repertoires are excellent sources for pointing the way to those primary and original documents.
Here are just two examples of the multitude of formats used by genealogical societies for their repertoires. In the example on the left, you can see where a family is aggregated.
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SURVEY QUESTION 
Thanks to everyone who responded to our survey about the device where you're most likely to open our email.
The results are as follows: 85% open on a desktop/laptop device
10% open on a pad
4% said they open it on a smartphone
Interestingly, this editor hadn't noticed that one of the statistics provided by the newsletter provider is a breakdown of the same questions. ConstantContact reports that there was a 70% open rate on computers versus 30% on mobile devices for our October newsletter.
Based on these results, for the time being, we will not create a newsletter or email for a mobile device except in the case of a reminder for select events.
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Mystery Photo of the Month
Reader Mark R. sent in the following excellent information about this photo that's not so mysterious after all:
My guess is the officer in the center of the photo is Captain Arthur L. Stone, of Company F, Second Regiment, Massachusetts Infantry. The men were on their way to fight in the Spanish-American War. Stone was later rejected due to a bad knee. I also guess that the photo was taken by H. T. Adams.
My source is: Reminiscences of Company F, Second Regt. Massachusetts Infantry, U.S.V ...
By United States Army, Massachusetts Infantry Regiment, 2nd (1861-1864), pages 15-18
The "mystery photo" is on page 17 of this book:
The book contains everything you could want to know about this group. In part:
Soon after the blowing up of the battleship Maine on the 15th of February 1898, the members of Company F began to talk war and discuss our chances of going. This talk was indulged in whenever there was a gathering of members at the armory. April 24 there was issued an order from the Adjutant General's office, placing all regiments of militia in the State under twenty four hours' notice. This order was promulgated from the headquarters of the regiment, April 25, to the different companies. April 29th orders were received from regimental headquarters to receive enlistments for two years unless sooner discharged. There was a special meeting called on this date at the armory at which time nearly every man placed his name on the roll. Those who did not were men with large families depending on them and were advised by the officers not to enlist under the circumstances, although they wanted to go with the rest of the boys. This enlisting continued nightly until the 3rd of May, when the company left for the campground at South Framingham, Mass. During the meantime the boys were arranging affairs so as to be gone for an indefinite time.
CHAPTER II
LEAVING FOR SOUTH FRAMINGHAM
Tuesday morning, May 3, found the boys at the armory bright and early. There was a large crowd of both men and women at the armory to see the boys get ready to leave. At about 7.30 AM, the company was formed and marched outside the armory where pictures of the company were taken by HT Adams and others, after which the march to the depot began, escorted by D. G. Farragut Post No 116, G. A. R. The company was assigned to a car and immediately began to load. As the train pulled out of the station there was cheering and the waving of handkerchiefs by the immense crowd which had gathered to see the boys off. The company joined the rest of the regiment at Worcester and proceeded to South Framingham, which place was reached about eleven o'clock. The regiment was re-formed and marched to the old camp ground which to many of the boys was an old familiar place arriving there at about 11:30 AM, when the companies were dismissed to their different streets.
Lucie C. guessed correctly that while she couldn't offer any information about the identities of the regimental soldiers, they were organized on account of the Spanish-American War of 1898.
Thank you Mark and Lucie!
We invite our readers to contact us if they have a photo they want to have featured by sending
an email to:
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| Tree of Life Images at ACGS! We have some new ideas for memorializing your family!
All donations are gratefully accepted and our thanks go out to those members who faithfully tack additional dollars onto their membership dues. No amount is too small. The building and computer inventory take much of our budget, luckily our staff is all volunteer. Just as your desktop and laptops at home need upgrades, the computers at ACGS need to be at the ready for our library visitors, members, and research team. A great way to make a contribution to ACGS is to memorialize or honor someone important on your Family Tree with a leaf on the Tree of Life. Here are some examples of leaves on the tree. For more details: TREE OF LIFE
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| You can have a very simple memorial. Or have fun with the wording. |
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| A memorial to a long-time volunteer, Marcia Spears. |
Or send any tax-deductible amount to: ACGS Building Fund P.O. Box 6478 Manchester, NH 03108-6478 Does your company have a Matching Donation Program? You may be able to increase the size of your gift if they do. |
The American-Canadian Genealogical Society is now a Family Search affiliate library. This designation means that library patrons will have greater and more convenient access to the wealth of genealogical resources available through FamilySearch. Once the film arrives, patrons use the film readers at our Library to peruse it. If you are not a member and have ordered a film, you will not be charged for viewing it at the ACGS Library.
Ordering film: All films must be ordered online using FamilySearch Microfilm Ordering at https://film.familysearch.org. ACGS cannot order films for you. You must first create an account, which is free, sign in and you will find a video and printed tutorial which will be of great help in searching for a film and placing your order. You will be asked to select a default Family History Center, our Library is now on that list. When you place an order, you will receive an email message advising you that your order has been received and also when it has been shipped to your nominated Affiliate Library. You may see the progress of your order at any time by logging in to your online film ordering account. We will also be notified when your order has been placed. The online film ordering system will automatically send you an email when we receive and check the film into the ACGS film inventory.
A short-term loan is 90 days, for a fee of $7.50 and subject to renewal for a fee for another 60 days. An extended loan, for an unlimited time period, is also available for $18.75. The loan period commences from the date the film is shipped from Salt Lake distribution. If you have any questions regarding viewing your film at our Library you may contact us at [email protected].
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Don't forget to apply for your certificate and pin for the 350th Anniversary of the Arrival of the 'Filles du Roi' (King's Daughters) from the AMERICAN-FRENCH GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY (AFGS) in Woonsocket, RI.
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Are you a descendant of a Filles du Roi who married a
Soldats du Carignan?
You might also be interested in the VERMONT FRENCH-CANADIAN GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY's "The VT-FCGS Filles and Soldats Research Program" and add to your pin collection.
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There is also a Filles du Roi organization that offers an annual membership and certification.
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For other gift ideas, check out ACGS' Repertoire Catalog
Check
here to access and/or download a searchable .pdf of our offerings.
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|  Our Facebook Page Come join us on our Facebook page. Up-to-date Society information, upcoming events, and links to interesting genealogical information can be found. We hope that you'll join us! Over 500 Likes! 
If you have comments or suggestions, please send them to [email protected]. Thank you.
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Some of our members have signed up to
receive our journal, the American-
Canadian Genealogist, electronically in
Adobe PDF format. If you are currently
receiving a paper copy, please consider
switching over to the electronic format. The electronic version is not only very environmentally friendly it's friendly to our finances! Over three dollars per member is spent printing and mailing every issue of our journal.
and would like to switch your subscription to the electronic version, send an email to [email protected] and put Genealogist in the subject line. |
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Not on our email distribution? Sign up for this Newsletter by scanning this QR code with your smartphone
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