03 August 2013

How's Your Summer?



Sorry that things have been quiet here for a while but this has been a busy summer for The Ontario Genealogical Society and Ottawa Branch. I wish that I could claim that I had been away researching my family or busy working on my tree but it has been “official business” for the most part. Since the OGS Conference at the beginning of June, I’ve attended twenty meetings, most on line but a couple in person. So what’s going on?
            Probably the biggest item on the agenda is the OGS Governance Review. If you are an OGS member, you already know of the report of the Governance Review Committee and its recommendations to change how The Society is organized at the Provincial Level. The report itself is in the OGS Members Only portion of the website and your Branch Chair should be able to update you on progress. There have been calls for volunteers recently to help out with some of the Task Forces needed to move this along, with more to come. It is hoped that we will have proposed Bylaw changes out to the membership later this year for a vote to implement the new format at the Annual General Meeting in 2014. We can use your help to make this happen.
            Speaking of that, Conference 2014 in St Catharines will be a month earlier than normal, 1-4 May 2014 at Brock University. See: http://www.ogs.on.ca/conference2014/index.php for additional details as they become available.
            One of my meetings this summer was the initial get-together for OGS Conference 2017 which will be held here in Ottawa as part of the 150th birthday celebrations. We have the basis of a Committee but still need some key players, such as a Treasurer, Publicity and Social Media, as well as assistance with other teams like Program and Facilities. If you would like to be involved with us, contact me at Conference2017@ogs.on.ca .
            One of the other Calls for volunteers has been to form a new Conference Advisory Committee to advise host branches as they plan our annual Conference. The committee will share experience and expertise regarding past conferences and will work to develop continuity between conferences.  Anyone interesting in serving on the Conference Advisory Committee is requested to contact p@ogs.on.ca. For the complete Call for Members, please visit the OGS Committees Page: http://www.ogs.on.ca/home/structure4.php#adhoc .
            At Ottawa Branch, we managed to fill most of the Board positions at the AGM in June. Jim Stanzell is still recovering, so mail orders are a bit slow with John Patton and me trying to fill Jim’s shoes over the summer. Progress continues on indexing the Branch Library collection of family histories, scrapbooks and other key holdings. We have added a number of publications to the OGS e-Store, including our entire set of Carp Review notices as well as BMDs from Early Ottawa Newspapers CD-ROM, a number of the local cemeteries and census. Check out the availability at http://www.ogs.on.ca/ogscart/index.php.
            We recently added our first item to the OGS Pay-Per-View site. This is the four page Bancroft Times of 7 December 1894 from our scrapbook collection. All the names are indexed in TONI (http://www.ogs.on.ca/integrated/toni_database1.php) and the individual pages can be viewed at the City of Ottawa Archives or the mages purchased on-line for 50 cents apiece. For those of you not familiar with TONI (The Ontario Name Index), it as an ongoing project to index all genealogical and historical publications related to Ontario. The index is free to all and points to the source which may be a document in the OGS e-Store or PPV site or may be an item available free. Ottawa Branch has currently indexed 200 publications, including 81 family histories or scrapbooks.
            Things continue to move ahead over the summer as we strive to make life better for genealogists researching in Ontario. 'Many hands make light work'  If you’d like to be part of the team, contact me at vp@ogs.on.ca

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