Society General Meeting
Saturday, July 12, 2008 2:00 p.m.
Tyler Public Library Taylor Auditorium
Program: "The Reality of Researching
Your Indian Ancestors"
Speaker: Carolyn Earle Billingsley
Rather than teaching how to trace the Five
Civilized Tribes through normal avenues, Carolyn Billingsley’s
lecture gets real. Most Native Americans didn’t sign up on the
Indian Rolls, and thus, genealogists must use other methods to
"prove" Indian ancestry. Education in how to go about it is the key.
Carolyn will explain that only a very small
percentage of Native Americans enrolled or were counted on
"official" Indian rolls and that all the standard methods of
researching Indians will never be the answer for the majority of
folks with Native American Ancestry. Her lecture will present the
reality of the task, but while bursting a few bubbles along the way,
it will also help guide the genealogist in moving toward more
fruitful avenues of research.
She will describe the official records, and
explain why you may not have found your ancestor there. Carolyn will
provide instructions about using the Genealogical Proof Standard and
the different perspectives to arrive at the most satisfactory
resolutions. Using the traditional records, our speaker will guide
you in assembling the threads of your possible Indian ancestry.
Carolyn Billingsley of Saline County, Arkansas,
is a research consultant and lecturer with thirty years experience
in both genealogical and historical research, editing, writing,
teaching and lecturing. She earned a B.A. in history, with minors in
Arkansas Studies and German, from the University of Arkansas at
Little Rock; and an M.A. and Ph.D. in Southern History, with fields
in Colonial America and Anthropological Kinship Studies, from Rice
University in Houston, Texas. She attended Samford Institute of
Genealogy and is a member of many professional organizations.
To allow more time for questions and answers from
the audience, the Computer Interest Group will not meet in July. |
