Family History Fair April 8 in Lawrenceville

A free “Family History Fair” will be Saturday, April 8 from 9 a. m. until 1 p. m. at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the Mormons), 3355 Sugarloaf Parkway, Lawrenceville. This annual event includes numerous classes over four one-hour time slots. One set is the two-part computer class offered twice by Ben Peoples and requires pre-registration at genresga@hotmail.com.

The others include beginning classes (Joye Woodruff), DNA research (Yvonne Schmidt), how to add meat to the bones of your family stories (Rosemary Cantrell), learning from tombstones and recording them properly and Sons of the American Revolution/how to join (both by Terry Manning), oral history interviews and where to go from there (Margaret Eves), using Evernote (Jennifer Dondero), United Kingdom research (Bridget Lohnes), and “Exploring Your Ancestors: 12 Major Steps in Your Journey” by Karen Molohon. To see the full schedule, check genealogyworkshop.wix.com/registration. For further information, call Joye at 404-915-5776.

SOUTH CAROLINA GRANTS

Brent H. Holcomb, prolific researcher and writer about all things South Carolina, has just published “South Carolina’s State Grants, Volume Six: Grant Books 25 through 28, 1788-1791,” the latest volume in his long running series of South Carolina grants from colonial times into early statehood. Each entry includes the bare essentials: names of who got the grant, acreage, location with county and creek(s), and applicable dates. Many include adjoining land owners whose names are within the entry, a great boon to researchers. The volume contains over 2,150 grants.

The book is available for $40 plus $5 postage from Brent H. Holcomb, P.O. Box 21766, Columbia, SC 29221. For other volumes in this series and any of the other hundreds of titles by the author, see scmar.com. Many of his books can be found at the Georgia Archives, which contains much more than Georgia sources, as well as other major genealogy libraries. Holcomb also publishes the “South Carolina Magazine of Ancestral Research,” a must-read if you are doing South Carolina research.

DNA TRANSFER FEE LOWERED AGAIN

The cost of transferring (actually copying results) from AncestryDNA or 23andMe to FamilyTreeDNA was recently lowered to $19. This is well worth doing or having one of your important matches at AncestryDNA do this so you can have their results in the other program. For details, see FamilyTreeDNA.com and in the upper left corner “DNA Tests” and in the drop-down menu, “Autosomal Transfer.” Having DNA results in both programs is the best use of one’s family members and their DNA, but don’t delay.