Monday 9 March 2015

Day 2 of RootsTech 2015 and my interview with Tahitia McCabe, from Strathclyde Genealogical Studies

Day 2 of RootsTech 2015 was Friday 13th February - traditionally a superstitious date if ever there was one.  Luckily I didn't see anything bad happen on that day!  In fact only good things happened as I hope this post conveys.

The Keynote session with Laura W Bush and her daughter, Jenna Bush Hager, was a real treat, as I mentioned in my earlier post.  

The interview of Laura Bush by her daughter, Jenna, showed that even a very well-known family such as theirs can enjoy talking about some very day-today issues.

Sadly, the Laura Bush / Jenna Hager session was not made available on the livestream and so no recording is available.  


However, the rest of the session, featuring D Joshua Taylor, director of family history at FindMyPast is available here. As well as detailing many new datasets recently added or about to be added, Joshua described several new Partnerships, including:

  • a partnership to share records with the New York Genealogical and Biographical Society (NYG&B)
  • a partnership with FamilyTreeDNA, to offer DNA testing services to the FindMyPast customer base.  (The link is now visible on the FindMyPast.com website.)
  • working with StoryPress "to help capture and share family stories" in combination with FMP data and family trees.  Joshua believes that everyone shouldbe able to have their own "Who Do You Think You Are?" family story
Joshua then told his own family story, tracing his family back to his ancestor, William Heaps, who was sentenced to transportation to Australia, and escaped from prison, for stealing cheese, and relating this to his own love of cheese. He then showed how he had used StoryPress to make his own Family History Story.

On the right are some of the RoostTech ambassadors backstage with Joshua after his KeyNote session.

Later the same day, I attended the FindMyPast lunch during which Ian Tester, Director of Partner Products, provided further details of how FindMyPast's WhoDoYouThinkYouAre? Story  can help you tell your own WhoDoYouThinkYouAre? Story.
Tahitia McCabe and yours truly(photo courtesy of Jill Ball)


Towards the end of the day I interviewed Tahitia McCabe, Knowledge Exchange Fellow, University of Strathclyde Genealogical Studies Programme. Luckily we just about completed the interview before the evening's "entertainment" of bagpipes started, which would have completely drowned us out!

Here I am with Tahitia in the media studio, at the start of the interview. During the interview Tahitia mentioned the University of Strathclyde Summer Institute of Genealogical Studios' summer courses, details of which can be found here. Personally, I'm rather tempted by the 5-day "Practical Applications of Genetic Genealogy" course.

My interview with Tahitia can be found here:



Thank you to Tahitia for taking time away from her Strathclyde booth to grant me this interview.

Rosemary Morgan

London Roots Research

3 comments:

  1. Interesting developments at Strathclyde! Great interview, Rosemary & Tahitia :)

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  2. I'm tempted by Tahitia's offerings.

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  3. Huguenots, Famous French Immigrants to London, Were Descendants of Muslims In Europe
    Huguenot history, descriptions, fate in Europe and their occupations and skills etc are so integrally related to Muslims that it is not far-fetched to investigate their being Muslims. Remember it is well known that well before the fall of Muslim Imarrat and Wilayats of Sicily and Spain Muslims had to use two names where one is to hide their Muslim origins when passing through/doing business with people in enemy areas. Such an investigation becomes more of a possibility when we know that Muslims in Spain and other parts of Europe are known in many denominations, Moors, Moriscos, religionnaires, Mudijars, crypto-Muslims, Conversos and may also be Huguenots as well. http://www.arfaglobal.com/p/huguenots-anabaptists-were-they-muslims.html

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