Genes Reunited Blogs

Did you see the fourth episode of Long Lost Family on Thursday? It featured two very different but extremely emotional stories.

Family history isn't just about finding your ancestors. For some of you it can be about reuniting with your living relatives. We have put together a short guide on how Genes Reunited can help you find your family.

Did you miss episode 3 of Long Lost Family, or need a refresh? It was another great watch, so here's a quick recap. In last night's episode Peter Arundel and Maureen Saville were both searching for their birth mothers.

The second episode of series proved to be another emotional one. We followed two very different stories this week. First of all we met Brenda. She fell pregnant and moved to a Mother and Baby home when she was 3 months gone. She lived there with her daughter Joanne until she was 6 weeks old. Sadly keeping the baby wasn’t an option for Brenda and so she had no choice but to give her up for adoption.

This week saw the return of ITV1 series Long Lost Family, and the first episode proved to be the emotional rollercoaster reunion we had hoped for. Taking me from a state of sadness and sympathy to one of joy and happiness as the relatives are reunited and I reach for yet another tissue to dry the stream of tears running down my face.

April Fool and her family revealed in the 1911 Census

Last week, I was delighted to discover that I was listed amongst the seventy or so nominees for 'Genealogy Rock Stars' on John D. Reid's American "Anglo-Celtic Connections" website. Other British nominees included Else Churchill, Audrey Collins and Chris Paton. I don't think any of us could ever be genuinely described as "rock stars", but then what is a rock star supposed to be like? I had lunch in the Cavendish Hotel recently with a very famous rock star, who has hired me to trace his family tree, and far from throwing plates about and eating people's pets, he behaved exactly like a very keen, very knowledgeable family historian!

I have been enjoying trying out the newly indexed newspapers on Genes Reunited. Knowing from long experience what a very long, eye-straining and hit-and-miss affair newspaper searching is, it's extraordinary to be able to find material so easily.

It has been a few weeks since I posted a Technical Update, and I wouldn't want anyone thinking that we've been slacking. I'm sure you are all very aware that we have made some changes, many have been behind the scenes, some more up front. From a performance and stability and evolutionary point of view they have been quite significant, and looking at the statistics of the site running, and the general volume of feedback from members, we are now heading in the right direction. But of course there will be more improvements coming very soon.

Firstly, I would like to apologise that this blog was not completed until today, and should have been posted over a week ago. Hopefully, despite my negligence, you still enjoy the report. Well, the final day at RootsTech2012 is over (well for me at least), and what an amazing, informative, motivating experience it has been. RootsTech2012? I was going to equate it to the "Who Do You Think You Are" show at Olympia in London (UK), but that would be an unfair comparison. RootsTech is in its 2nd year, hosted by FamilySearch.org in Salt Lake City, Utah USA (and jointly sponsored by brightsolid and several other companies), and is quite unique in terms of content. It is both a genealogy show for genealogists and family history enthusiasts, but also a technical conference where all the major and minor for-profit and not-for-profit companies in the genealogy business get together to discuss new technical innovations that are being incorporated into this field and are discussed openly in the hope that we all rise to the challenge in providing and securing genealogical records, research and discoveries for now and the future. It was so pleasing to see non-technical genealogists showing a a direct interest in the technology seminars, as well as developers and the like attending user focused seminars, and this cross fertilisation of ideas and concepts and requirements between the groups.