#UTPCruise - Still cruisin’ and it’s great combining pleasure (genealogy) with vacation (cruise).
Day 12 - At sea. A full slate of genealogy programs. I took this day off.
Day 13 - Melbourne. This was a land-based program that Unlock the Past put on for the Melbourne residents. They are doing the same in about 8 other cities along the way. In most of them, Judy Russell and Paul Blake are the ones going ashore to speak. Here in Melbourne, Judy had other obligations and Alan Phillips asked if I would step in for her and I was happy to. I was very interested to see how their land-based programs were set up.
Alan, Paul, Eric Kopittke and I took one cab, and Rosemary Kopittke, Helen Smith and Alona Tester took the other down to the venue, the Celtic Club in downtown Melbourne. The gang set up their materials at the back of the room, along with the Australian Institute of Genealogical Studies, Genealogical Society of Victoria, and VicGum. The event was well attended, especially for a weekday during the day. About 70 people were in attendance. The earliest arrivals filled the front rows of seats!
I spoke first and gave my talks about Source Based Genealogy and Organizing Your Genealogical Computer Files. It was well received and about 8 people came up to me afterwards to tell me how much they enjoyed it.
Alan Phillips of Unlock the Past introduces me for my talk on Source Based Genealogy in Melbourne #UTPCruise pic.twitter.com/Leky5uG4UX
— Louis Kessler (@louiskessler) February 26, 2016
I was very happy to meet Sam M. who I had been corresponding with a long time. Sam purchased Behold 10 years ago and he often sent me ideas for Behold and told me about programs for me to add to GenSoftReviews. I’ve always enjoyed emails with him. Sam took the day off work and drove the hour in to listen to my talk. After I finished my talk, Sam and I went out for a snack and got a chance to talk. Sam has learned Python and is now starting to contribute to the development of the program Gramps. In fact, Sam was the one who added the info about Gramps GEDCOM export that I had tweeted about a week ago:
"Lost information on a GEDCOM export from Gramps". Much credit to them for documenting this. All programs should. https://t.co/Mfaneuy69T
— Louis Kessler (@louiskessler) February 20, 2016
Sam then gave me a nice tour of Melbourne’s Victoria Market, and then we said goodbye’s. I went back to the Celtic Club to hear the latter part of Paul’s talk, and then we took taxis back to the ship.
Day 14: At sea enroute to Adelaide. Another full slate of talks. Some of the ones I went to were:
Jan Gow presenting on Family Search - 10th Unlock the Past genealogy cruise. #UTPCruise pic.twitter.com/jrpe2q10A7
— Louis Kessler (@louiskessler) February 26, 2016
Judy Russell presenting DNA Tests. 10th Unlock the Past genealogy cruise #UTPCruise pic.twitter.com/JngO1JQcN0
— Louis Kessler (@louiskessler) February 26, 2016
"Hatch, Match, Dispatch" (born, married, died) - Judy Russell, the legal genealogist #UTPCruise
— Louis Kessler (@louiskessler) February 26, 2016
Geoff Doherty giving the story of his Boer War deserter relative #UTPCruise pic.twitter.com/ZkbF09CEck
— Louis Kessler (@louiskessler) February 27, 2016
Rosemary Kopittke guides us through the records in https://t.co/1j8EVufJnZ #UTPCruise pic.twitter.com/2myyjtWUsW
— Louis Kessler (@louiskessler) February 27, 2016
A Brief History of the Photograph by Paul Blake on the 10th Unlock the Past genealogy cruise #UTPCruise pic.twitter.com/yBCid8QkTY
— Louis Kessler (@louiskessler) February 27, 2016
I also presented my 4th talk on the ship. This one was “Making the most of your genealogy software” and Alona tweeted a couple of things from my talk:
"every genealogist should take a typing course, just think of how much quicker you can enter your fh" - @louiskessler #utpcruise #genealogy
— Alona Tester (@Lonetester) February 27, 2016
"never merge another person's data with your own" - @louiskessler #utpcruise #genealogy
— Alona Tester (@Lonetester) February 27, 2016