What's Old in Indiana This Month?

Some new and not-so-new things I've learned about Indiana lately:

Eva Mendieta writes about Mexican-American mutual aid societies in Indiana Harbor (now part of East Chicago). Their records are not always well preserved -- the records of the Benito Juarez Society, founded in 1924, were retrieved from the basement of a bar and are now in the Latino Collection of the Calumet Regional Archives at Indiana University Northwest -- and the stories they tell are not always happy. When many Mexicans were forced out of the area during the Depression, the societies fell on hard times.

Ron Darrah describes the history and records of the Citizens' Military Training Camp Program that took place between the World Wars.

The Indiana Historical Society has added a digital collection of photos from Whitley County a century ago -- the Oliver Frank Kelly Glass Plate Collection -- including some shop interiors. Also new are several collections of Civil War letters (in addition to the 500 or so it already holds), from Lawrence N. Cox (21st Indiana), Francis M. Kalley (14th), Franklin J. Moore (43rd), John E. Moore (115th), and Tillman Moore (31st) -- as well as papers of Zenas Harrison Bliss, who first seved in the 9th Vermont Infantry and then captained Company K of the 28th United States Colored Troops, an Indiana regiment that served in Texas 1864-1865.

Not exactly news, but still true: the Indiana Genealogical Society will hold its annual conference Saturday, April 27, in Bloomington, with feature speaker Joshua Taylor and auxiliary speakers Lou Malcomb, Curt Witcher, and yours truly on "Probate Will Not Be the Death of You" and "Land and Property: The Records No Genealogist Can Do Without."



Eva Mendieta, "Celebrating Mexican Culturre and Lending a Helping Hand: Indiana Harbor's Sociedad Mutualista Benito Juarez, 1924-1957," Indiana Magazine of History, vol. 108, no.4 (December 2012):311-44. 

Ron Darrah, "Did Grandpa March in the CMTC?," Indiana Genealogist, vol. 23, no. 4 (December 2012):32-34, http://www.indgensoc.org/membersonly/igs/quarterly/2012/IndianaGenealogist_2012_12.pdf : accessed 29 December 2012.


Harold Henderson, "What's Old in Indiana This Month?," Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 7 January 2013 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : accessed [access date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]

Indiana Genealogical Society seminar

Things I wouldn't know about if I hadn't attended the annual IGS seminar in Fort Wayne Friday the 27th:

* the pros, cons, and potentials of Vu-Point and Flip-Pal scanners;

* the latest thinking (from ACPLGC's Curt Witcher and others) on how best to publish indexes and abstracts when paper publication is way expensive (do it digitally while granting libraries permission to print a copy if they see a need);

* newly available on-line indexes for Grant County and newspaper pages for Putnam County;

* how to (and how NOT to) use social media to attract new members to your genealogical society (Tina Lyons).

* a cache of World War I documents including some results of a Women's War Census taken in April 1918 for the Indiana State Council of Defense Women's Committee.


Harold Henderson, “Indiana Genealogical Society seminar,” Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 28 April 2012 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : accessed [access date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]  

Gem of the Midwest

Curt Witcher of the Allen County [Indiana] Public Library's Genealogy Center in the 31 March issue of ACPL's "Genealogy Gems" newsletter:

"I had to smile when a colleague sent me a link to a KNXV Phoenix, Arizona television broadcast where, in a story about genealogy, the newscaster stated the top three places in the country to engage in genealogical research are the Library of Congress, the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, and our own Genealogy Center in Fort Wayne."

This issue also includes a discussion of Holland Land Company records for Midwest feeder areas in western New York and Pennsylvania.

And as part of the last-Saturday "Tree Talks," John Beatty will give a presentation on Indiana church records 10 am on 26 April.