website, please email us at acgs@acgs.org and someone will get back to you with information to help.

We had our Fall Conference on November 5^th, and, although attendance was lower than it has been in years past, we still had a lot of fun. Our members enjoyed the half-hour coffee chat at the start of the day where they were able to talk to each other and catch up. We had three excellent presentations, and the raffle winners were drawn. The new Board of Directors was also announced from the election that was held: 

         President: Jo Zurwell

         Vice-President: Jeannine T. Lévesque

         Treasurer: Belinda Gaudette

         Correspondence Secretary: Julie Smith

         Directors: Steve Lefoley, Jeannine Lévesque, Julie Smith

The Recording Secretary’s position was not filled at the time of the election. Since the Fall Conference, a new member to the society, Alexis Peters, has been asked to take and has accepted the position and will join each Board meeting via Zoom as she lives in NC.

I am sad to say that Constance Bernier Hébert will be retiring from the ACGS Board of Directors as of the end of this year. She has served the Board and the Society for countless years in various officer positions and as director and has sat on a variety of committees over the years. I have known Constance only for a few years, since I joined the Society only in 2016, but I found an instant connection to her warm personality and willingness to help where she could. Plus, she shares the same name as my mother, Constance Reed Bernier (my maiden name), so of course I had to do a little genealogical research and found out that we are distant cousins on my father’s side of the family….Shocking, I know. Constance will continue to cover the library desk on her normal schedule, but I will miss her being on the Board and seconding almost every motion presented. Thank you, Constance!

ACGS will be celebrating its

50^th Anniversary in 2023!



The American-Canadian Genealogical Society is excited to be celebrating this momentous occasion with all its members! To help celebrate our 50th Anniversary, ACGS has planned a year of monthly webinars and a Two-Day Fall Conference, as well as four journal issues spread out over the year, and an in-person reception in September. We hope you join us for our year of celebration as we remember where we came from and look forward to where we are going in the future.

We know that inflation is touching all our lives, so we have worked on ways to offer all our members the opportunity to join our events at minimal costs. We have an Early Bird Special package for both the first half and the second half of the year. Please see just below in this newsletter for details on this package.

We have a wonderfully detailed page on our website dedicated to all the celebration events including speakers and topics and dates. Click 50^th Anniversary to see all the information.

We look forward to sharing this momentous occasion with all of you!

Happy 50^th Anniversary, ACGS!

Thank You,

Jo Zurwell, #10349 

There is an additional $5 off each monthly webinar from our regularly priced webinar of $25. This is a total savings of $55 for the first six webinars of 2023. This special is priced at $100, a bargain for all the great presentations we have lined up for our attendees.

If you do not wish to purchase a six-month registration, you are able to register for each webinar you wish to attend individually at the full price of $25 per webinar.  

Early-Bird Special Registration

Opens November 5th and Closes January 7th

For more details on the presentations, please visit the ACGS website:

• January 14, 2023 – Peggy Jude: DNA – Beyond the Basics – Adding to Your Solid Foundation
• February 11, 2023 – Margaret R. Fortier: Bay State Bonanza
• March 11, 2023 – Dave Robison: Creative/Effective Online Search Techniques – 1.3 Million Smiths – Yes!
• April 15, 2023 – Bonnie Wade Mucia: “Moi Aussi”- Finding & Proving Your French-Canadian DAR Patriot
• May 13, 2023 – Judy G. Russell, The Legal Genealogist^®: No Vitals? No Problem! Building a Family Through Circumstantial Evidence (Who in the World was Paul Knop?)
• June 10, 2023 – Kate Townsend at Family History Investigations, LLC: Beyond the Basics: Effectively Using Ancestry

The Publications Committee has been hard at work all year indexing more of our resources for the website.

The Website Update for 2022 includes the following searchable records in our ACGS Repertories search index in the Members-Only Portal:

Baptisms - 19,333

• RP160 - St Anthony of Padua, Troy, NY - 1892-2011
• VR004 - Hudson, NH Vital Records - 1644-1985
• 
  

Marriages - 29,755

• C01 - St Mary, Rollingsford, NH - 1856-1976
• C07 - St Thomas Acquinas, Derry, NH
• RP161 - St Anthony of Padua, Troy, NY
• Rp162 - St Albert of Northern NH - 1878-1998
• VR001 - Allenstown, NH Vital Records - 1888-1995
• VR005 - Hudson, NH Vital Records - 1734-1985
• 
  

Burials - 37,355

• BR004 - Bouffard Funeral Home, St Joseph Cem., Manchester, NH
• RP161 - St Anthony of Padua, Troy, NY
• VR002 - Allenstown, NH Vital Records - 1888-1995
• VR006 - Hudson, NH Vital Records - 1733-1985

We encourage you to look up your ancestors in this database, if they were not there before, they may be there now!

We Are Open

Wednesdays and Saturdays*

10am - 2pm 

We will have a research helper on hand for most days we are open to help our patrons with their research questions.

Wearing masks is now optional.

On Saturdays, please stand in front of the buzzer system camera (photo at right) and ring the buzzer. The librarian needs to be able to see who he/she is letting into the building and may ask your name if the image is not clear. The buzzer is located to the right of the double doors for the building.

*Please note:

The Library will be closed on the eve of the two holidays this month so our volunteers can spend time with their families.

This means we will be closed on Saturday, December 24, Christmas Eve, and Saturday, December 31, New Year’s Eve.

The hours will be as usual on the remaining Saturdays and all Wednesdays of the month.

Joyeux Noël/Merry Christmas/Happy Holidays to all!

ACGS Board of Directors

ACGS has announced the publication by download of a new repertoire:

St. Albert & Sacred Heart, Northern NH

Marriages, June 1878-June 1998.

This repertoire, available by download only, consists of some 1,040 marriages of the two parishes.



St. Albert’s of West Stewartstown, NH, was first established in 1888 as a mission of Sacred Heart Church in North Stratford, NH. The Catholic parishioners who became the nucleus of Sacred Heart were in the North Stratford area in the late 1800s.

The repertoire sells for $40.00, and may be purchased by clicking on the button below.

Did you know that each member of the ACGS is entitled to post three (3) queries per issue of the American-Canadian Genealogist? Queries should be specific rather than a request for "all data" on a particular individual, however, if space is available, we will print general queries. It is more productive if the query stays with one event per inquiry.

To have your query in our next journal that comes out in August, click the link below to send an email with your query(ies).