The Friends of the Virginia State Archives and the Virginia Genealogical Society are joining together to present a two-day program and spring conference (April 29-30, 2016) to be held at the Library of Virginia and focused primarily on the Library's collections.

On Friday, April 29, the Friends will hold their annual "Straight to the Source" program, featuring four Library staff experts.  Archives Reference Coordinator Chris Kolbe will bring his thirty-five years of experience to help "Straight to the Source" attendees understand the ins and outs of the complex probate process.  He will discuss Virginia wills, inventories, estate accounts, divisions, and chancery cases that document the transfer of property from a decedent to an heir and share tips on which of these records hold the most research information.  In a session titled "Reading is Believing," Virginia Newspaper Project director Errol Somay will provide information about the Library's Virginia Chronicle Newspaper Database and will describe features and tools that can help users navigate the database and improve search results.

After lunch on April 29th, Senior Reference Archivist Tom Crew will share his in-depth knowledge of Virginia's state and local militia records, many of which have been lost over time, and will provide insights into lesser-known archival records that may help document military service.   Closing out the day-long program will be Local Records Program Manager Greg Crawford, who will speak about the Library's Untold Virginia: The African American Narrative Digital Collection.  He will describe how pre-Civil War local, state, and other records in the Library's collection included in this valuable online resource can help African Americans trace their family history and stories.

The Virginia Genealogical Society conference program on Saturday, April 30, will feature professional genealogist, teacher, and speaker Sharon Hodges, who will share her knowledge and research strategies that can open up new avenues of access to Library of Virginia collections.  In particular, she will discuss how to get the most from the Library's website, how to identify records that may be useful to genealogical research in the Archives Annex at the State Records Center, and how to use finding aids, specialized publications, periodicals and other outside resources to locate materials held by the Library.

The Friends of the Virginia State Archives/Virginia Genealogical Society conference is open to the public but pre-registration is required.  Conference registration for members of the sponsoring organizations is $70 and for non-members $80.  One-day registrations are also available.  Please go to http://www.vgs.org/ to register.



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