Distributed free of charge to interested subscribers and former members.

 

Quebec Genealogy: Beyond the Basics

This engaging workshop will show you the best resources and proven techniques for tracing your Quebec ancestors. Whether you're just beginning your family history journey or seeking to deepen your research, this workshop will show you how to identify and document your Quebec family story. We’ll start with the basics, church records, census records, naming conventions then we’ll explore less known records to give deeper insights into our ancestor’s lives, such as

· Immigrant records
· Notary records for marriage contracts, wills, employment contracts, etc
· Guardianship records
· Land grants
· Newspaper collections
· BAnQ numerique website for a wide variety of digitized records

Denis Fortier has been pursuing genealogy for about 15 years. He is currently a member of the VGS, Ontario Ancestors and UELAC. He serves as the Victoria UELAC branch genealogist. Denis was born in Quebec and most of his own family research centers on that Province. Branches of his family trace back to early settlers of New France, including Louis Hébert who is the very first settler to bring his family to New France (in 1617). Much to his surprise, Denis also discovered he had Acadian, Scottish, English and American Loyalist ancestors, all of whom settled in the Province of Quebec.

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Most of us know our ancestors only through fading bits of paper: sepia photographs or family recipes, public records, the occasional packet of letters. What does it take to build coherent stories out of such tantalizing fragments of lives? This workshop explores research and writing strategies for constructing family memoirs, drawing on examples from a project set in Miami in the 1920s.

Andrea Kaston Tange is a Professor of English at Macalester University. She has published widely on nineteenth-century British literature and culture, including articles in edited collections and in top-tier journals (such as Victorian Studies and Nineteenth-Century Literature). She is particularly interested in interdisciplinary work with a focus on material culture and daily lives.

Her first book—Architectural Identities: Domesticity, Literature, and the Victorian Middle Classes (University of Toronto Press, 2010)—was very well reviewed. She subsequently developed and co-edited a four-volume collection of primary documents on children and empire for Routledge press. Her most recent articles have centered on visual images and ephemera, and she has been branching out into public writing, including a piece on Victorian Christmas cards in Slate and several on Victorian photography for The Conversation.

Her current projects include a monograph—Imagined Encounters: Public Impressions and Private Lives in the Age of Empire—under revision for a major university press and a book-length work of narrative nonfiction that got its start when she inherited her great-grandmother's 1926 diary.

 

For more information or registration visit REGISTER HERE

 

With the publication of Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol”, the year 1843 was a turning point in the story of the celebration of Christmas, as well as the year in which Fort Victoria was first established on Vancouver Island. Several decades later, local author and editor of the British Colonist newspaper, D.W. Higgins, wrote an evocative tale entitled “My First Christmas Dinner in Old Victoria”, reflecting upon his 1860 holiday season in gold rush Victoria.

Join historian Kate Humble to explore holiday traditions in the early decades of colonial Victoria and contemporary Britain, with the twin tales of Dickens and Higgins as literary lenses. 

Kate Humble is an historian who is currently the Superintendent of National Historic Sites for Coastal British Columbia with Parks Canada. She did her graduate work at the University of Toronto, and has held public history and historic site positions such as the Curator of Fort Rodd Hill and Fisgard Lighthouse, the Operations Manager at Craigdarroch Castle, Education Curator at the Maritime Museum of BC and Manager of Visitor Experience at the Royal Armouries Museum, UK. Born and raised in Victoria BC, she has also worked with Discover the Past as a tour guide on matters both historical and ghostly since 2004.

 

For more information and registration visit REGISTER HERE.

 

 

Location: This is a hybrid event. You may either attend via zoom or in person at the VGS Genealogy Learning & Research Centre (limited seating, register early)

Note: Video recordings of this event will be available online for 30 days to registered attendees only

For more information or registration visit REGISTER HERE

 

 

Join four leading genetic genealogy experts for an exciting DNA Day seminar. Discover how to transform your family history research using the power of all three DNA testing types: Autosomal DNA, Y-DNA, and mitochondrial DNA. Plus, learn how to run your own DNA project at Family Tree DNA.

Don't miss this excellent opportunity to learn from these highly respected educators: Blaine Bettinger, Jim Brewster, Mags Gaulden, and David Vance.

Date: Saturday, April 26, 2025

Time: 9 am - 2:30 pm PT

Location: This is event is by zoom only

Note: Video recordings of this event will be available online for 30 days to registered attendees only

For more information or registration visit REGISTER HERE

 

I facilitate two Special Interest Groups. One is Family History 101 and the other is Eastern Europe.

Family History 101 started as a group to help people get started on their genealogy. All were welcome, the newbies, people who had “lost their way”, and the curious. This started out as a weekly meeting, but soon morphed into a monthly SIG. We have a steady group and have drop-ins. We always welcome members with new problems, or as I like to call them, new adventures.

Eastern Europe started up again last September. With the war in Ukraine, people have begun to re-think their ancestry. DNA has given us all a wider scope for our searches. This group tries to dig deeper into their heritage. There are lots of problems with languages, shifting borders, wars, finding documents.

Both groups are very interactive, helping each other. We all bring something different to share with others. We always look forward to meeting new people. Any VGS members who would like to join us are welcome to attend.

 

Learn more about all special interest discussion groups at SIG

- Sarah Hamster, SIG Leader