Fourteeneth Annual Conference Helps African American Families Discover their Roots

CONFERENCE HELPS FAMILIES DISCOVER THEIR ROOTS

While February is African American History Month, March will be the month some African Americans in Southern California focus on their own histories.

The 14th annual African American Family History Conference, Discover Your Roots, will be held Saturday, March 12, at 1209 South Manhattan Place in Los Angeles from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Pasadena resident Marcie Ambrose has been tracing her ancestry for more than two decades.

“The Roots conferences have helped to reinforce my desire to find my ancestors,” she said. “With more than 20 workshops for both beginners and experts at tracing their family trees, these conferences have given me invaluable tools.”

Among this year’s workshops, Ambrose said she looks forward to attending a class on the Freedmen’s Bureau Project presented by Thom Reed, who oversees global communication for the project.

Emancipation freed nearly 4 million slaves and the Freedmen’s Bureau, formerly known as the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands, was established in 1865 following the Civil War to help transition them from slavery to citizenship.

Ambrose said the records are invaluable because handwritten records of the bureau’s transactions documented, for the first time in U.S. history, the names of those individuals and their courageous stories.

“Accurate records were not always kept for slaves and many families were separated due to slavery or forced migration,” she said. “These archives of the bureau from 1865 to 1872, that include names, family relations and brief oral histories, will help overcome the barriers to discovering our ancestors.”

FamilySearch International, the largest genealogical organization in the world, obtained copies of these records from the National Archives and Records Administration for the purpose of indexing them and making them free for all to access.

Indexing involves transcribing pertinent information from the original records that is then made freely searchable online at FamilySearch.org.

Since the project’s launch on June 19th, the 150th anniversary of Juneteenth (also know as African American Freedom Day), more than 14,000 indexing volunteers have contributed to the project and together they have indexed more than 700,000 records.

To volunteer or find more information on the project visit http://www.discoverfreedmen.org

Ambrose explained that her main motivation for pursuing her family history is building a legacy for her children and grandchildren.

“Some of our history is painful, but our ancestors survived and overcame tremendous obstacles. That’s why we’re here. We get our strength from their struggles and the choices they made to survive and protect and perpetuate family and family traditions,” she said.

Pre-registration by February 17 is $30. For more information visit www.discoveryourroots.org or call 1-800-533-2444.

The event is sponsored by the California African American Genealogical Society, the San Diego African American Genealogy Research group and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.