PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE
• Greetings and Happy New Year! I am most honored that you have chosen me to serve as your President for 2003 and I promise to do my best to continue the excellence this Chapter and its officers have provided in the past. And on behalf of the Chapter members, I extend our thanks and appreciation to the officers and committee chairpersons and committee members who "retired" at the conclusion of the calendar year.
• As we begin this New Year, I challenge you to make it a great genealogy year--for you personally and for the Mercer County Chapter. There are several ways you can do this and I would like to suggest three.
• PLAN TO ATTEND at least one genealogy conference or workshop! Opportunities abound! The Ohio Genealogical Society conference to be held in Columbus in April promises to be outstanding. The National Genealogical Society's national conference in May (another outstanding event) is also close to home this year (Pittsburgh, PA). Both conferences will teach you a lot and provide a wealth of ideas and inspiration for your continuing research. Other local Chapter members are already planning to attend these conferences. So, you will certainly know someone there. And, on the local scene, the local Chapter plans to provide one or two workshops later this year for your personal growth.
• VOLUNTEER! The Chapter provides a number of opportunities for you to contribute to our activities and projects. Ask an officer about where you might assist.
• Make a contribution to the genealogy community at large. I am not referring to a monetary contribution (although genealogical societies are always very appreciative of them). Have you ever thought about how much family information you have been able to assimilate because someone took the time to collect and transcribe that information for you? Consider the possibility of doing the same--making hard to obtain data available for other researchers. What has not already been done you ask? I would suggest that you consider working on church records. These records contain so much valuable information (births, baptisms, confirmations, deaths, marriages, immigration and emigration from the area) and put folks in a particular place at a particular time. However, these records are not usually readily accessible to the researcher. How do you get started? Talk to Karen Bennett or me. Both of us are working on church record projects. THINK about what you might do. Make it a great genealogy year.

DWANE GRACE, President

TECHNOLOGY: BANE OR BLESSING?
• Folks who are interested in getting started in genealogy often ask, “Do I need a computer and do I need Internet access?” My answer always begins “No, but...!” People have been doing genealogical research forever without the assistance of computers and the Internet. And many will continue to successfully do so.
• Even though I had a computer when I started this addictive hobby years ago, it was only later when I began to discover how this technology could augment my research. Now, I wouldn’t be without it.
• There are those who claim to have completed their five-generation charts in only a few hours using the Internet and CDs. All I can say is that their ancestors must have left a better paper trail than my ancestors did! Actually, the quantity of useful data that I have found with these resources has been minimal. Then there’s the question of quality. I’ve found many a family tree, but alas, there’s no documentation. And when I email the submitter asking politely where they got their information, I get no response. Good, ol’ traditional research methods have paid much better dividends!
• So, if the quantity and quality of data available is still minimal, why are a computer and Internet access valuable genealogical tools? Communication is one. Without the Internet, I probably would have never found a second cousin now living in Montana nor a very distant cousin living in Cincinnati who also has done extensive Hahn family research. Both of these folks have been valuable resources. Collaboration has benefited all of us!
• There are a myriad of genealogical Internet sites, but non-genealogical sites can also assist your research. One I recently discovered is . This site allows you to find libraries by type (public, government, state, medical, etc) and then access their catalogs. The “Reference Desk” part of the site has links to other resources such as grammar and style, dictionaries, encyclopedias, public records, maps, and even genealogy. And using online library catalogs has been very worthwhile. I’ve made much better use of library time by using online catalogs before visiting the repository.
• Yes, technology has its downside, but you can be a more effective and efficient researcher with it.

DWANE GRACE, President