Happiness is staying busy

I've been feeling a little like a chicken with its head cut off lately with so much work. I've been working on two ProGen assignments, editing group members' research reports and figuring out what to do for the big final assignment, continuing work on an ancestry project for my aunt's DAR application, and continuing what I can on CD 2 of the NGS HSC course. Fortunately, most of the assignments for the CD are things that need to be done elsewhere (visiting courthouses, making a cemetery map, ordering church record film/visiting church record repository, etc.) so there's only so much I can do here. I am still working on the Census Analysis and Migration assignment though.

So on top of all of this research and paper work, I'm very happy to say that next weekend is the start of the Institute for Genealogical and Historical Research (IGHR) at Samford University in Alabama! I know several of us registered back in January and it's almost time to head out. I'm flying down next Sunday and the course will last until the following Friday. There were a ton of courses to take, they all sounded great, but I opted for the course of Virginia and its military and migration. Virginia is such a feeder state that I felt it was imperative to know more about what was happening within its borders at a time when so many of my own ancestors were living there and what was going on that could have impacted their decisions to move out when they did. This will be my first year at IGHR and I can't wait.

Another bit of great news is that the Federation of Genealogical Societies (FGS) has extended the early bird deadline for registration to this year's conference in Knoxville, TN. You can take advantage of the savings as long as you register prior to June 21st. More info can be found here
http://www.fgs.org/2010conference/

The last bit I wanted to share was a great article for anyone interested in North Carolina research, especially during the Civil War. The article is from "The North Carolina Historical Review" (January 1984) and is entitled "Neighbor against Neighbor: The Inner Civil War in the Randolph County Area of Confederate North Carolina". It's a fascinating yet sometimes horrifying article about a pro-Union, anti-slavery majority in a Confederate state. I ordered this article to help me gain some perspective on my McMasters family who was living in Randolph County during the War and promptly left immediately after. It's no wonder. If things were bad for the inhabitants of that area during the War, it doesn't sound like it was any better there after. The appeal of land in a land in Indiana that hadn't been touched by the War would have a strong pull to a family in danger of losing everything they had and surrounded by anger and death. This article would be interesting to anyone with North Carolina ancestors, but also to those wanting to know more about the inner struggles going on during the War. We all have Civil War connections and getting a glimpse of what the people living through it dealt with on a day to day basis can be vital to understanding the context of their society. If you'd like to take a look, you can order the periodical from http://nc-historical-publications.stores.yahoo.net/the-north-carolina-historical-review.html or order it through your library's ILL