Louis Kessler’s Behold Blog     The Behold User Forum

At 9 am, Paul Milner’s talk was about “Occupation and Guild Records”. Paul always talked to a room-full of interested listeners. At 10 am, we all (145 of us) assembled on the majestic staircase of our ship’s main dining room for a group picture. Below is a picture of the proof, since I don’t ...

On Day 6, I caught Shauna Hicks' presentation: “Warning, Warning: Tips & Tricks to Avoid Family History Mistakes”. At 11 am, I gained further knowledge about writing an interesting family history with Carol Baxter’s talk on “Writing Narrative Non-Fiction”. My wife and I shared a nice lunch ...

Back at sea, sadly heading back for Sydney, meaning the cruise is half over. I have no talks to give today. My remaining 5 talks will be two tomorrow, two Sunday, and the last one on Monday. So today I had a chance to listen and learn. As usual, I wasn’t there early enough for the 9 am session. But I caught ...

Day 2, Thu Feb 12 had a full day of sessions. Shauna Hicks started off the day talking about “Trove and other National Library of Australia Treasures”. Helen Smith was always busy helping with the conference at the back of the room. Jill Ball and Anthea Phillips Natalya Mills, from Clean Cruising, ...

My schedule for speaking is perfect. I’m always on in the afternoon sessions, 1 p.m. to 4 pm. So technically, all my mornings and evenings are free. But I am going to attend other sessions of interest to me and also make an attempt to talk to as many genealogy people as possible. My endeavor to get ...

Today we set sail. Wow! Prior to supper, we met up with Helen Smith (a genea-blogger) and Alona Tester (also a blogger, and an Unlock the Past employee who is not so secretly the daughter of Alan Phillips). It’s easy to identify each other by the green Clean Cruising lanyard we wear around our necks, which ...

We’ve had a great 4 days in Sydney, enjoying summer when it should be winter, enjoying walking around in t-shirts and shorts when it should be parkas and mitts, enjoying sunshine for 14 hours when it should only be daytime for 9, seeing all the mandatory sights of the city, and shopping, shopping, shopping. ...

My wife and I are leaving tomorrow for Sydney Australia. We’ll arrive on Tuesday and we’ll be staying at the Swissotel until the cruise starts on Feb 10, and we’ll be there again for a few days after the cruise ends on Feb 19. If there are any Behold users that can make it to downtown Sydney while we’re ...

I’m all ready and looking forward to the Unlock the Past History & Genealogy cruise. My seven presentations are all prepared and should be interesting for those who attend my sessions. The final count is 145 people booked for the genealogy program. But it will still feel like a RootsTech type of event ...

As you know, I run the GenSoftReviews site that lists all genealogy software available and allows people to review and rate the programs. The ratings are from 1 to 5 stars. 1 is worst. 5 is best. They are subjective ratings, up to the user. For the past 4 years, at the end of the year, I have listed all ...