👉🏼I’m trying to organize my recipes. This one sounds like a good idea for tonight. Wonder if Mr. Myrt will spring for vanilla ice cream to go with this?

👩🏼‍🦳❤️🤠

THOUGHTS

Yes, it might be easier to digitize everything. For my favorite recipes, I relate better to a recipe card propped up close to my mixing bowl.

As you can tell from this example, I’ve unearthed the recipe of a favorite treat from a long time ago. But, when I look at the card I see more than the recipe.

I remember the first time I made this upside down peach cake. It was to share a bit of sunshine with a neighbor going through a rough time.

I remember showing my girls how to easily remove the fresh peelings by dipping each peach in hot water “just long enough.” After quickly immersing the peach in icy water, to stop the cooking process, the peeling slips off like magic!

I remember the 2 bushels of peaches I’d buy in the summer, adding ready-to-bake pies to our freezer and jar after jar of sliced peaches to the yellow food storage shelves.

I recall Grandma Myrtle putting up jars of all sorts of things — watermelon pickles, sweet gherkin pickles, mustard pickles, apricot preserves, and such her shelves were in the dirt floor shelves in the cellar of her home on 2nd in Puyallup.

What memories do you have of old family recipes?

Take the time to snap a photo with your phone and share the story with family.

How about an impromptu mini-reunion? Make sure someone brings extra ice cream.

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Happy family tree climbing!

Myrt

DearMYRTLE,

Your (not-so) retired friend in genealogy

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Until I heard of Ken Sanders’ take on this lawsuit, I had no idea AI companies are doing a thing — buying a copy of every book and “DESTRUCTIVE SCANNING” them.

Why?

To train the LLM.

Mostly non-fiction.

Ken is worried about what AI companies will do with the accumulated knowledge.

Ol’ Myrt here is not sure how I feel about this practice — what do you think?

I guess I was being naive not to realize they were doing this.

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Happy family tree climbing!

Myrt

DearMYRTLE,

Your (not so) retired friend in genealogy.

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Every name deserves to be remembered: delegates from 8 countries met in Cambodia, on 13–14 August to advance preservation of genealogically rich records.

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia FamilySearch International convened archivists from 8 Asian countries to advance the digital preservation of, and access to, genealogically significant records, including birth, marriage, and death registers, censuses, and so forth, during a two-day records preservation symposium held here on 13–14 August 2026. The announcement and more photos from the event can be found and shared on the FamilySearch Newsroom.

Delegates included 68 archivists, registrars, librarians, and civic leaders from 14 institutions, who met for the 2026 Asia Family History Symposium under the theme “Uniting Families Through Records.”

FamilySearch provides digitization equipment, training, and online publication at no charge, and participating institutions retain ownership of their collections. The symposium coincided with the public open house of the Phnom Penh Cambodia Temple, conducted by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Key Facts

• What: 2026 Asia Family History Symposium, theme “Uniting Families Through Records”

• When: 13–14 August 2026

• Where: Phnom Penh, Cambodia

• Who attended: FamilySearch International, a nonprofit sponsored by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, hosted 68 archivists, registrars, librarians, and civic leaders from 14 institutions in 8 countries across the region.

• Keynote: Elder Mark A. Bragg, chairman of the board, FamilySearch International

• Held alongside: Public open house of the Phnom Penh Cambodia Temple, conducted by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Offer to record custodians: No-cost digitization and preservation partnerships

What FamilySearch Offers

FamilySearch invites archivists globally who oversee genealogically rich records (birth, marriage, death, census, and so forth) to explore its collaborative preservation efforts. The organization provides the latest digitization equipment, training, and online publication at no cost to the archive, and record custodians retain ownership of their collections. Interested institutions may contact an area FamilySearch representative at FamilySearch.org/en/archives.

Records Preservation Is Humanitarian Work

Cambodia’s civil registries, parish registers, cemetery ledgers, and colonial-era collections are vulnerable to flood, fire, conflict, and administrative loss.

“Archival work is a kind of sheltering. It is a way of protecting truth from weather, time, and forgetting,” Elder Mark A. Bragg said. “Preserved records always speak again.”

“You work with records, but in a very real sense, you work with lives,” he told delegates. “When a birth is recorded, a life is acknowledged. When a marriage is preserved, a family connection is remembered. When a death record is kept, a life is honored.”

For individuals, a preserved record secures “a place in the human story”— a grandparent’s name, a village of origin, a connection that would otherwise be lost. For communities and nations, the same records preserve memory “across generations and across boundaries,” keeping a shared heritage from dust and neglect.

Guidance for Records Custodians

Digitization is preservation: Electronic copies survive flood, fire, and filing errors.

Metadata is memory: Names, dates, places, and relationships make a record findable decades later.

Access multiplies value: A findable record serves every family and researcher who needs it, not only the archive that holds it.

The work outlasts its custodians: Much of what is preserved today will be used by generations the archivist will never meet.

Connection to the Temple Open House

Delegates were invited to tour the Phnom Penh Cambodia Temple before its public open house. Temples of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints differ from the chapels used for Sunday worship. They contain rooms where a few people at a time receive sacred ordinances, such as baptism and marriage, most often on behalf of deceased ancestors. “Chapels represent gathering and sociality,” Bragg said.

“Temples represent heaven on earth.”

Members of The Church of Jesus Christ believe that families can be connected—sealed—beyond this life and that those who died without these ordinances should be offered them. Members identify their ancestors andthen receive the ordinances on behalf of those ancestors. These ordinances are performed for ancestors related to Church members, and the Church respects all religions.

The Rt. Reverend Dr. Vincent Vinod Kumar, bishop of CSI Karnataka Central Diocese, Bengaluru, India, remarked, “I truly appreciate FamilySearch’s leadership and dedication to bringing people [archivists and record custodians] together. The work it is doing to preserve heritage and connect families across generations is profoundly impactful.”

———

For more info see: [https://www.familysearch.org/en/newsroom/familysearch-records-symposium-draws-archivists-from-8-asian-countries]

Thank you for sharing your thoughts, . You hit the nail on the head with the example of a cashier who cannot count back change.

To avoid becoming inept checkout cashiers, humans must never retreat from brainstorming, hypothesizing, researching, and struggling to find answers. My discussions with AI help me do just that.

Genealogists who embrace AI tools tend to speak of AI as their “assistant” but I’ve lately thought of AI more as an “academic advisor” that encourages new avenues of thinking.

AI tools can also be thought of as a “book editor.” It took some effort on my part to convince my human editor that Everton’s Handybook for Genealogists should not be called “Handbook.” 🤣

That sort of back and forth discussion must also happen with AI regardless of the assistant, academic advisor, or editor label we may give AI tools in our mind. We as humans must have the final say.

The accelerating speed of AI development complicates efforts to strike a balance.

And that is precisely why we must keep learning about AI and talking with each other about its usefulness.

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Sadly, there are those who latched on to the word “hallucinations” and dismiss the use of AI altogether. That’s so 2024!

I do pity those who don’t include AI courses in their continuing education curriculum.

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Happy family tree climbing!

Myrt

DearMYRTLE,

Your (No so) retired friend in genealogy.

Thank you to Ann Staley 🤗 for offering, in the midst of her IGHR prep, to personally orient this Ol’ Myrt to the new BLM-GLO website. Ann’s institute participants will appreciate her new screen shots and the latest, greatest info on the subject!

—————————————

Wow! The BLM-GLO rebuild has caused quite a stir among professionally-oriented family historians, who have moved on from gathering the basic census and vital records to make cogent kinship determinations. 🤗

WHAT’S THE BLM-GLO?

The Bureau of Land Management - General Land Office was charged with surveying and distributing federal land in public land states under authority of laws enacted by Congress, with the purpose of claiming heretofore undeveloped land in the wilds of the American west.

“The BLM-GLO Records website is an official database providing digital access to more than five million federal land title records, survey plats, and field notes dating back to 1788. It is managed by the Bureau of Land Management.” See: [https://glorecords.blm.gov/s/]

The default search option on the current home page requires knowing the legal land description, serial number, standard geocoder, or address.

My research of cash entry, homestead, and desert land claims in the BLM-GLO land records did not include an address for property. Rather, the base line and principle meridian assigned by surveyors set the area for PLSS (Public Land Survey System) or rectangular survey. Instead of addresses to uniquely define my ancestors’ property purchases, the records include a section, township, and range to describe the boundaries of a given piece of land.

Obviously searching by name is sorely needed.

ADVANCED SEARCH

What I’ve discovered is that “advanced”search is not currently available on a mobile devices like my iPad or iPhone. That’s where one may search by a name rather than the legal land description

It is by surname that I located federal land purchases in places I had never anticipated finding an ancestor. This widened my understanding of his migration pattern and learning his friends, associates and neighbors — essential for differentiating between two men with the same name.

COMPUTER VS MOBILE DEVICE ACCESS

The old BLM-GLO website *did* look and act the same in both the computer and mobile versions. Not so with the revision. Exploring the revamped website proved frustrating.

Our first clue that the mobile device experience was different from accessing via computer was when Mary Kircher Roddy noticed her map view via computer showed “Gulf of Mexico” whereas my iPad and iPhone showed the label “Gulf of America.” We exchanged screen shots to prove it.

SIDE NOTE

Followers know me well enough to understand I would never attempt intensive historical document research on my cell phone. 🤣 I need four monitors and my U-shaped desk.

WHY IS MYRT USING HER CELL?

Several times during an impromptu conversation, my iPhone has proved useful to quickly show a friend what’s available at BLM-GLO, FindAGrave, WikiTree, & etc. to encourage breaking away from relying solely on Ancestry, FamilySearch Family Tree, or FamilySearch Record Search.

I’v recently noted a sharp rise in the use of mobile devices, mostly among the 20-30 year old people I meet up with for other reasons. They hear I’m into genealogy, and I’ll end up pulling out my iPhone to show them an ancestral document to get ‘em excited. Hence my testing *any* site on my phone.

21st CENTURY TECHNOLOGY

Modern web development requires full functionality across multiple devices and all mainstream browsers. It may be that the government contract for revamping the BLM-GLO website did not specify the extra hours to accomplish this.

CONCLUSION

The lesson here to take best advantage of the revamped BLM-GLO site one should explore via computer and not a mobile device.

AND, if ever you get a chance to learn research methodology from Ann Staley, TAKE IT!

Happy family tree climbing!

Myrt

DearMYRTLE,

Your (not so) retired friend in genealogy.

Randy Seaver of Chula Vista, California, is the creator of one of the longest-running genealogy blogs, Genea-Musings. Launched in 2006, it includes topics ranging from the evolution of online genealogical research to his own family’s broad histories. The blog also covers specific aspects of records preservation and genealogical education. Seaver serves thousands of readers in a friendly and informative style. A retired aerospace engineer, he is a staple in the genealogical community and respected by everyone.

The NGS Award of Merit is presented to an individual or nonprofit genealogical or historical organization to recognize exceptional contributions to the field of genealogy over a period of five or more years. Their work must have significantly aided research or increased interest in genealogy.

NOTE: Randy is a founding member of GeneaBloggers, and has been honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award by that organization. He serves as a Mondays with Myrt panelist and more recently as a cohost.

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We will also explore both positive and negative experiences in our question of the week:

As a genealogist, share how you handled a touchy subject when communicating with a stranger. Did it work out?

Leave a comment

Our LIVE stream starts at Noon Eastern, and it’s automagically archived for viewing later

Happy family tree climbing!

Myrt

DearMYRTLE,

Your (not so) retired friend in genealogy.

Share

Mondays with Myrt - 11 May 2026 streaming live at Noon Eastern (New York). Practical advice for family historians. [

Happy family tree climbing!

Myrt,

DearMYRTLE,

Your (not so) retired friend in genealogy.

• Randy Seaver’s “Updated ABC Biography Process”

• Genealogy: Integrating into post-secondary education.

• 1926 Ireland Census ☘️

• AI: Is it refreshing or totally reimagining your ancestor’s photo?

QUESTION OF THE WEEK:

What software do you use to compose a proof statement, proof summary, or proof argument?

Leave a comment

Happy family tree climbing!

Myrt,

DearMYRTLE

Your )not so) retired friend in genealogy.

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Start your genea-week off right — join our discussion. Post your questions & comments. Your opinions matter.

OK, we’re committed to sharing Quaker research suggestions and to catch up on Blogging 101 - Adding a Search Box and the importance of a Disclosure Statement.

Let’s also explore Ancestry’s new “Census Compare” for US & UK census records.

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Happy family tree climbing!

Myrt 🙂

DearMYRTLE,

Your (not so) retired friend in genealogy.

Boston Tea Party Descendants® Program
https://www.bostonteapartyship.com/boston-tea-party-descendants

Happy family tree climbing!
Myrt :)
DearMYRTLE,
Your (not so) retired friend in genealogy.

Into Substack big-time, Lori has three publications:

The Lost and Found Story Box

True stories for family historians, researchers, local history buffs and other curious folks.

The Lost & Found Story Box

Uncovering forgotten historical events, untold family narratives, and rediscovered tales of resilience and legacy, this weekly newsletter brings unique, engaging, and historically relevant stories to life—connecting the past to today's world.

By Lori Olson White

Culinary History is Family History

Culinary History is Family History

Sharing personal stories at the intersection of culinary and family history

By Lori Olson White

Bicentennial Memory Project

Bicentennial Memory Project

Grassroots project to collect the memories of everyday Americans of the 1976 Bicentennial celebrations

Leave a comment

Happy family tree climbing!
Myrt :)
DearMYRTLE,
Your (not so) retired friend in genealogy.Happy family tree climbing!

Gregory presented two classes at RootsTech:

• Unlocking Greek Genealogy: New Records and Innovative Tools for 2026 (video, slide deck, and syllabus.)

• Genealogy at the Crossroads: International Links in Greece (syllabus is chock full of the history of Greece, with incursions from various ethnic groups, and multiple boundary changes.)

Discover More

• https://greekancestry.net/

• https://www.facebook.com/GreekAncestry/

• https://www.youtube.com/@greekancestry4258

Leave a comment

Happy family tree climbing!
Myrt
DearMYRTLE,
Your (not so) retired friend in genealogy.

Subscribe now

From the publisher:
Forensic Genealogy: Theory and Practice offers professional genealogists a deep dive into the specialty areas and skills required to build a career as a forensic genealogist. Part one of the book, examines forensic genealogy’s major subspecialties. The first seven chapters discuss

• Missing and Unknown Estate Heirs: Law and Procedure

• Real Estate Issues

• Mineral Interests

• Military Repatriation

• Solving Unknown Parentage Cases with DNA

• Investigative Genetic Genealogy (IGG)

• Dual Citizenship

Chapter eight offers an overview of other specializations, including: Memoir-Fraud, Capital Mitigation, Copyright and Trademark, Guardianships, Provenance, Reparations, Tort Cases, Tribal-Membership Research, Unclaimed or Abandoned Property, Unclaimed Persons and United States Citizenship .

Leave a comment

Happy family tree climbing!
Myrt
DearMYRTLE,
Your (not so) retired friend in genealogy.

Subscribe now

You’ll find it here: https://www.facebook.com/ForgottenPeopleCaneRiverCreoles

Genealogy societies could spark a lively discussion about research best practices using this public post as a case study. ✔️

Thank you to ESM for encouraging thoughtful, thorough research and cogent analysis skills. 🤗

When reading this, I could hear Elizabeth’s voice guiding us through the process. 🤗

Happy family tree climbing!

Myrt,

DearMYRTLE

Your (not so) retired friend in genealogy.

Debbie Ostler is the one who gathered friends to learn more about these capable women who literally moved mountains of long over-due mail to servicemen during World War II. https://sites.google.com/view/honoringthe6888

Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/p/Honoring-the-Women-of-the-6888th-61565654972407/

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Happy family tree climbing!
Myrt
DearMYRTLE,
Your (not so) retired friend in genealogy.

Subscribe now

Interested in Serving as a Panelist?

Interested in Serving as a Panelist?

From the publisher: “This second edition of Mastering Genealogical Proof, like the first, is a textbook […] designed to help new and experienced family-history researchers apply accepted standards for achieving and writing about acceptable and convincing genealogical conclusions, despite having to use supporting material of questionable accuracy.

The second edition expands, revises, and updates the first edition’s content. Offering more depth and breadth than before, the second edition contains upwards of 20 percent more information. Nearly all the examples are new, as are many of the exercises. Especially noteworthy are two of the second edition’s expanded emphases: the many aspects of writing genealogical proof arguments, and the incorporation of DNA evidence into genealogical research and proofs. Both editions aim to help genealogists establish genealogical proof despite the pervasive presence of genealogical roadblocks.”

Call for Panelists

DearMYRTLE’s Mastering Genealogical Proof Book Club

DearMYRTLE looks forward to hosting a new Book Club focused on the second edition of Mastering Genealogical Proof by Thomas W. Jones.

Sessions will be held at Noon Eastern Time (Daylight Time where applicable) and will run approximately 60–90 minutes.

Each chapter includes suggested exercises with answers in the back of the book. Because our meetings are public and we wish to respect copyright, we will not use the book’s specific workbook exercises during the sessions.

Instead, each panelist will select a concept from the assigned chapter and apply it to their own genealogical research, sharing that experience with the group.

What Panelists Need

To participate as a panelist, you must:

• Purchase the book Mastering Genealogical Proof by Thomas W. Jones (Arlington, Virginia: National Genealogical Society, 2026). The book is expected to ship Spring 2026 from the publisher: https://www.ngsgenealogy.org/mastering-genealogical-proof/

• Have the necessary equipment

• High-speed internet

• Computer

• Microphone

• Webcam

Where

Panelists will participate via StreamYard.

Attendees will watch the live broadcast on YouTube.

When

Panelists will arrive 30 minutes before the scheduled start time for each session.

Meeting times across the United States:

Time ZoneTimeEastern (New York)Noon
Central (Chicago) 11:00 AM
Mountain (Denver / Salt Lake City)10:00 AM
Pacific (Los Angeles) 9:00 AM

Need a time-zone converter? DearMYRTLE recommends:
http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/converter.html

Exact dates will depend on the release of the book.

Exact times will depend on the panelists schedules.

How the Panel Works

Selected panelists will receive an email from DearMYRTLE that includes:

• A link to a shared Google Sheet with the panelists-only StreamYard link
• A promo graphic and YouTube session link to share with your followers
• A place to add your homework by Noon Pacific each Saturday

Assuming everyone has a free Substack account, Myrt will also create a private Substack chat for back-channel communication among panelists.

Each week, panelists will share brief homework examples inspired by the chapter and their own research experience.

What We Don’t Know Yet

A few details depend on the book’s release:

• When the book will ship
• How many chapters the new edition contains
• How many weeks the Book Club will run

We anticipate approximately 10 sessions, likely beginning late summer.

What We Do Know

• We will observe copyright and not use the textbook’s workbook examples.
• Each session will focus on one chapter.
• Panelists will share research inspired by concepts from that chapter.
• Sessions will run approximately 60 minutes.
• Meetings will likely be held Tuesdays at Noon Eastern (daylight where applicable).
• An evening option (7 PM Eastern) may be considered if that better fits panelists’ schedules.
• Panelists will join via StreamYard; attendees will watch on YouTube.
• Sessions will be recorded.

As soon as the book ships, Myrt will calendar the chapters and notify everyone when the Book Club series will begin.

Interested in Serving as a Panelist?

Interested in Serving as a Panelist?

Those wishing to participate may sign up using the Google Form below.

You can trust that the personally identifying information you submit will not be shared and will be used only for organizing this Book Club series.

Leave a comment

Happy family tree climbing!
Myrt
DearMYRTLE,
Your (not so) retired friend in genealogy.

• Blogger.com (why & why not)

• DearMYRTLE’s Substack Explained Playlist

Question of the Week

What was your FAV RootsTech class? Provide the link to the class. If it wasn’t recorded, provide the link to the class syllabus material.

Voice-to-Text Non-Affiliate links:

-- Google Live Transcribe (for Android) https://tinyurl.com/22mku4b5

-- Google Workspace’s Transcription - Transcribe Speech to Text - https://tinyurl.com/5hc5ys6r

-- Otter Transcribe Voice Notes (for iPhone, iPad & web) https://otter.ai/

Where’s Myrt?

You’ll find Myrt’s posts and a smattering of genealogy news at:

DearMYRTLE's Village Square

Practical, down-to-earth advice for family historians from your (not so) retired friend in genealogy.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/DearMYRTLE

BlueSky @DearMYRTLE

Threads @dearmyrtle

Instagram @dearmyrtle

DearMYRTLE’s Archive (YouTube Channel) https://www.youtube.com/@DearMYRTLEArchive

Happy family tree climbing!

Myrt :)
DearMYRTLE,
Your (not so) retired friend in genealogy.

Douglas Cornwall is the President General of the Society of the First African-American Families of English America. Members of the Society descend from men, women, and children who arrived on these shores as early as August 1619, through 1783. https://sofafea.org/

Shamele Jordan is the host of Genealogy Quickstart TV that broadcasts live every other Tuesday at 8pm Eastern. https://www.youtube.com/GenealogyQuickStart

Happy family tree climbing!
Myrt
DearMYRTLE,
Your (not so) retired friend in genealogy.

GeneaBloggers Project Kin Collaboration

Currently serving as president of GeneaBloggers, Ol’ Myrt here hosted a number of pre-RootsTech interviews and helped man the booth in the RootsTech Expo Hall. Find out more about the collaboration here.

On the Road to RootsTech Interviews.
(I could barely keep things to 5 minutes each!)
Contact info is found in the individual video descriptions.

• Mini-Myrt: Bill Moore of Family History with Bill Moore

  (A Mondays with Myrt panelist!)

• Mini-Myrt: Kyla Bayang of RootsSquad Roundup

  (A loyal RootsTech Booth volunteer!)

• Mini-Myrt: Jennifer Jones, Tracking Down the Family
  (And Myrt’s new-found cousin!)

• Mini-Myrt: Ellen Thompson-Jennings, The Family History Hound
  (A Mondays with Myrt panelist!)

• Mini-Myrt: Maureen Taylor, The Photo Detective
  (Author extraordinaire, who helps us decipher clues about our ancestors in photos handed down through the family.)

• Mini-Myrt: Lisa Rex of The Ancestor Audit
  (She suggested RootsTech RideAlong Watch Parties,, which Barbara set up on her Zoom account. I heard Bill Moore was quite the Zoom host!)

• Mini-Myrt: Miles Meyer of Miles’ Genealogy Tips
  (A Mondays with Myrt panelist!)

• Mini: Myrt: Barbara Tien of Project Kin
  (Ringmaster, and creater of RideAlongPartners.org!)

Mondays with Myrt direct from the FamilySearch Library

A Visit to the Family History Library

Yes, they stll have some microfilm!

Tuesday GeneaBloggers Lunch

Day One

Where our dear friend Roger Moffat was #NotAtRootsTech, but he was also At RootsTech.

Day One and a Half

Last Day

RideAlong Wrap Up with Barbara@Projectkin - LISTEN HERE

(Back at the hotel, half asleep, and still needing to pack!)

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Random Selfies & Such

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Look for individual posts featuring the folks I was honored to interview during RootsTech 2026.

Happy family tree climbing!
Myrt
DearMYRTLE,
Your (not so) retired friend in genealogy.