To U.S. residents: were you counted in the 2020 Census?

According to an article written by Hansi Lo Wang and published in the NPR web site:

For the 2020 census, all states were not counted equally well for population numbers used to allocate political representation and federal funding over the next decade, according to a U.S. Census Bureau report released Thursday.

A follow-up survey the bureau conducted to measure the national tally's accuracy found significant net undercount rates in six states: Arkansas (5.04%), Florida (3.48%), Illinois (1.97%), Mississippi (4.11%), Tennessee (4.78%) and Texas (1.92%).

It also uncovered significant net overcount rates in eight states — Delaware (5.45%), Hawaii (6.79%), Massachusetts (2.24%), Minnesota (3.84%), New York (3.44%), Ohio (1.49%), Rhode Island (5.05%) and Utah (2.59%).

For the other 36 states, as well as Washington, D.C., the bureau did not find statistically significant net over- or undercount rates.

These revelations come after the population totals from a census beset by the coronavirus pandemic and years of interference from former President Donald Trump's administration have already been used to divvy up seats in the House of Representatives, as well as votes in the Electoral College, for the next decade.

"No census is perfect," Census Bureau Director Robert Santos warned during a public webinar about the latest results from Post-Enumeration Survey. "And the PES allows us to become more informed about the 2020 census by estimating what portion of the population was correctly counted, where we missed people and where some people were counted that shouldn't have been."

You can read the entire article at: https://n.pr/3Mx1DkT.

The following announcement was written by the British Association for Local History (BALH):

The British Association for Local History’s annual flagship event will this year be headlined by Dr Janina Ramirez talking about her upcoming book Femina: A New History of the Middle Ages, Through the Women Written Out of It. This ground-breaking reappraisal of medieval history reveals why women were struck from our historical narrative, restoring them to their rightful positions as the power-players who shaped the world we live in today. Dr Janina Ramirez is an Oxford lecturer, BBC broadcaster, researcher and author. She has presented and written over 30 hours of BBC history documentaries and series on TV and radio and written five books for children and adults.

Paul Dryburgh, BALH Acting Chair, said, “During lockdown people across the country have engaged in new ways with their local communities and their history. Join us as we celebrate the vibrancy of local history in Britain today. We look forward to welcoming two fantastic speakers and learning a great deal about often neglected voices and records. It will be a privilege to meet our award winners who truly represent the commitment of local historians and the full range of approaches in local history today.”

The event will also feature a talk by Dr Mark Forrest on his recently published BALH handbook to post-medieval manorial documents. Formerly archivist at Dorset History Centre, an expert on taxation and the author of several local history handbooks, Mark will discuss how to navigate records of rural and urban land and property holding, and the relationship between communities and their landscape, over the last 500 years. The results and winners of the inaugural BALH Local History Photographer of the Year and the BALH Awards for Local Historians will be announced.

Local History Day is at Conway Hall, London, on Saturday 11 June 2022. Tickets (£5-£10) are available for in-person and online from the British Association for Local History’s website here:

https://www.balh.org.uk/lhd2022

About the British Association for Local History

The British Association for Local History is the national charity for local history and serves local historians across the country. It publishes a regular magazine and journal as well as books and pamphlets on local history. It also organises a number of events and activities throughout the year, in-person and online.

NOTE: This article is off-topic. That is, it does not concern anything to do with genealogy, DNA, or related topics normally found in this newsletter. However, I enjoy saving money and am quick to publish articles telling others how to save money or to use a high-tech device that I enjoy, regardless of the topic.

Looking for a new tablet computing device? Well, you can purchase an Apple iPad for $329 (US dollars) and up, depending upon options included. Or you can purchase an Amazon Fire 7 for $59.99. Your choice.

I own the previous version of the Amazon Fire 7 (not the newly-announced version) and must say that I am quite satisfied with it. I use it daily. To be sure, it is not "just as good as an iPad." When compared to an iPad, several items are missing or have lower capabilities with the Amazon Fire 7. Even so, it meets my needs perfectly and does everything that I want to do with a tablet. The fact that it is about one-fifth the price of an iPad was my deciding factor.

The downsides of the Amazon Fire 7 (as I see them) include:

1. It has a 7-inch screen. That is small, not much bigger than a cell phone. Actually, I consider the small size to be an advantage, not a disadvantage. But many other people will probably have the opposite opinion.
2. The price of $59.99 is for the unit with 16 gigabytes of internal storage memory. I always seem to fill up almost any device I purchase so I usually buy the more expensive unit with more storage space. In the case of the Amazon Fire 7, that has a $20 higher price of $79.99. HOWEVER, unlike an iPad, the Amazon Fire 7 accepts microSD memory cards and an extra 16 gigabyte memory card is available (also from Amazon and elsewhere) for $4.99. Even higher capacity microSD cards are available at higher prices. Purchase the cheaper Amazon Fire 7 and also a microSD card. plug it in and you will instantly have 32 gigabytes (or even more if you purchase a larger storage microSD card). That strikes me as a more cost-effective option.
3. All Amazon tablets use the Amazon Play Store, not the normal Google Play Store that most Android devices use to install more applications. The Amazon Play Store unfortunately has far fewer available apps available than does the Google Play Store. However, there are dozens of online articles telling how to use the larger Google Play Store on Amazon devices. I converted my (older) Amazon Fire by following the instructions at https://www.androidpolice.com/install-play-store-amazon-fire-tablet/ and it worked perfectly. My device now obtains new apps from the much larger Google Play Store.

The new Fire 7 is available for preorder starting now and will begin shipping June 29.

NOTE: I am not compensated in any way for publishing this article. The folks at Amazon don't even know that I am writing it. Whether or not you purchase an Amazon Fire 7 because of this article makes no difference to me: my financial impact will remain at zero. I simply enjoy the unit I have and want share the news with readers of this newsletter.

You can find the Amazon Fire 7 at https://amazon.com. It is the company's newest device and is being promoted all over the web site. You won't have any problem finding it.

Jay Mack Holbrook, 85, of Provo, passed away peacefully on May 17, 2022 of causes related to dementia. He was born on January 12, 1937 in Chesterfield, Caribou, Idaho to Lawrence E Holbrook and Mary Marjorie Boyatt. He was the oldest of eight children.

Jay Mack's interests were many and diverse: debate, theater, music, dance, poetry, gardening, languages, travel, and public speaking.

He was the founder of Holbrook Research Institute a.k.a. Archive Publishing, which collected, preserved, and published New England town records. He published some 300 titles, with his better-known works including "Massachusetts Vital Records to 1850; Connecticut Colonists; Vermont's First Settlers 1749-1803"; and "New Hampshire Residents 1633-1699". He sold his business to Ancestry.com in 2011 and now his work is available online and benefits genealogists and historians worldwide.

His obituary (which details many more accomplishments of his life beyond genealogy) may be found at: https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/name/jay-holbrook-obituary?id=34782229

The following announcement was written by the American Society of Genealogists (ASG):

A $2500 grant has been awarded to William E. Cole of Gold River, California, toward three projects: preparation of a compiled genealogy of The Wife of John Cole of Weedon Bec, Northamptonshire: Frances ____, her siblings and parents; a compiled genealogy expanding on “The English Origins of Job, John, Daniel and Ruth Cole,” as published in Mayflower Descendant, vol. 69 (Winter 2021); and a narrative history of the trials and tribulations faced by nine Puritans for their non-conformist beliefs in the early 1590s within the Church of England and in England’s highest courts.” Mr. Cole is an in-demand genealogy presenter who will be speaking at the National Genealogical Society Family History Conference, The American Mosaic, in Sacramento, May 24-28, 2022.

A $2500 grant has been awarded to Al Sharp of Kittitas, Washington, to continue his “Henrico Project” of content notes from the Henrico County, Virginia, court records, of which fourteen volumes have been published. This grant will be applied towards the completion of “Court Minute Book 1752-55,” and “1755-1762.” Mr. Sharp has worked with the editors of the Papers of George Washington and James Madison at the University of Virginia in an Early American Studies seminar critiquing draft theses of graduate students. He was also instrumental in obtaining changes in the Virginia laws to allow digital access to Virginia court records.

For more information about the Grant Program e-mail acwcrane@aol.com or write to

Alicia Crane Williams, FASG, Chair
ASG Grant Committee
4 White Trellis
Plymouth MA 02360

Zack Daily-Anderson was conceived using a sperm donor. He later discovered 237 half brothers and sisters, all linked to the same man who donated his sperm.

When Cindy Daily and her partner decided to have a baby in the early 2000s, they knew it wouldn't be an easy path. After using a sperm donor and going through several rounds of IVF, their baby boy Zack Daily-Anderson was finally born.

Daily bought donor sperm from the Fairfax Cryobank in Virginia, one of the largest sperm banks in the country.

The popularity of DNA sites like Ancestry.com and 23andMe causing their donor group number to skyrocket. Today, at 18-years old, Daily-Anderson has 237 half brothers and sisters that he knows of. Some live near him in Virginia, but others are spread out across the United States and the world. According to the family, all the siblings are linked to the same man who donated his sperm over many years.

During an interview, Daily said her family doesn't want to sensationalize their story, but wants to see some regulations in the industry that allowed their family to form. "You have a government that regulates us to death, but this is a loophole that they’ve never investigated," she said.

You can read more in an article written by Marcella Robertson and published in the WUSA9 web site at: https://bit.ly/3woW6XP.

A Facebook post has claimed that the investment management firm BlackRock owns 75% of the genealogy company Ancestry. This spawned other claims that BlackRock now owns the ANCESTRY.com DNA database and lots of other personal information of its customers.

Like many other claims posted to Facebook (now called meta.com), there is but one problem with the claim: it isn’t true.

Ancestry is actually owned by another investment management firm called Blackstone.

Ancestry was acquired back in 2020

We can see where the confusion might come from, but Ancestry was actually bought by a different, though similarly titled investment management firm, called Blackstone, back in 2020.

The deal saw Blackstone acquire the family history website and DNA testing service for around $4.7 billion, representing around a 75% stake in the company, according to multiple reports at the time.

Despite the similarity between their names, Blackstone and BlackRock are two separate asset management companies.

You can read more about this fairy tale in an article written by Hannah Smith and published in the Full Fact web site (which specializes in disproving false rumors) at https://fullfact.org/online/ancestry-ownership/.

Laird Charles Towle passed away peacefully at home on April 20, 2022. In 1962 he completed his formal education with a Ph.D. in Physics from the University of Virginia. He worked in that field for twenty years, principally at the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, D.C.

In 1968 he became seriously interested in genealogical research, later in genealogical book publishing. Laird and his wife, Marlene, founded Heritage Books, Inc. in 1977. Laird soon become well-known throughout the genealogy community.

Twenty-five years later, he sold the business to Craig Scott and settled into retirement; spending his time on his hobbies: genealogy, gardening, traveling, reading, boating, archeology and an appreciation of the arts.

I well remember a conversation I had with Laird many years ago in which he taught me about one of his professional interests: the viscosity of various lubricants in the -400 degree temperatures found in outer space. That was something he had worked on for the space program.

I knew absolutely nothing about that topic at the beginning of the conversation but Laird explained everything in such an interesting manner that I felt I was an expert after listening him talk for about a half hour. I will always remember him for his widespread knowledge and his manner of explaining the driest of topics in an interesting manner.

You can read Laird Towle's obituary at https://www.beallfuneral.com/obituary/laird-towle, although that will not mention the viscosity of lubricants in extreme cold conditions.

Hundreds (perhaps thousands) of people knew Russ Worthington. He perhaps was better known as Cousin Russ.

I was amongst the many who knew and admired Cousin Russ. He seemed to be at all the genealogy conferences, helping others in the Family Tree Maker booth. When he wasn't in the booth, he was usually someplace else helping someone with a question they had.

I spent the last hour trying to write my thoughts about Cousin Russ. I failed. Then I found a eulogy written by Geoff Rasmussenin the Legacy Genealogy News web site that said everything I could not think of. I suggest you read Geoff's article at: https://news.legacyfamilytree.com/legacy_news/2022/05/cousin-russ-well-miss-you-and-thank-you.html.

Depending on who you ask, it stands for “Rich Site Summary,” “Really Simple Syndication,” or “RDF Site Summary.” Regardless of the acronym, it’s actually a very straightforward technology: whenever a website publishes new content, that content can automatically be put into an RSS feed.

Best of all, you can use an RSS newsreader (a bit of software) to quickly and easily check your favorite web sites to see what is new. "Your favorite web sites" might include news sites, the latest stock market prices, weather forecasts, just severe weather updates, your genealogy society's web site, a list of upcoming satellite launches, updates on airline flight prices, some job-search websites, a certain genealogy newsletter (ahem!), Hollywood gossip sites, or if you’re especially interested in one particular topic you can easily and quickly see what is new on that site. The sky is the limit.

HINT: The RSS newsfeed for Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter is: https://eogn.com/page-18080/rss

You don't use a normal web browser to read RSS news feeds. Instead, you use what is known as an RSS newsreader. That might be software that you install in your computer or you can use an RSS newsreader that is in the cloud (which means you don't have to install anything).

You can get web-based, desktop, mobile, and even browser add-on RSS newsreader versions, most of which let you subscribe to up to 100 sites before asking you to pay to upgrade your membership to access more features. There are dozens out there, but the following are a great place to start.

Feedly (my favorite web-based RSS newsreader (no software installation required!) plus Android and iOS versions are available) at https://feedly.com.

InoReader (Web-based plus Android, iOS, and Windows Phone versions at https://www.inoreader.com/).

NewsFlow (for Windows only) at https://apps.microsoft.com/store/detail/newsflow/9NBLGGH58S5R?hl=en-us&gl=US.

RSSOwl (Completely free for Windows, macOS, and Linux) at http://www.rssowl.org/.

NetNewsWire (completely free for Macintosh or iOS only) at https://netnewswire.com/.

Awasu An advanced RSS newsreader but for Windows only) at https://awasu.com/products.php.

Feeder (an add-on for the Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, and Microsoft Edge web bowsers plus free-standing apps are available for iOS) at https://feeder.co/

There are dozens more RSS newsreaders available but the above list is some of the more popular ones. I'd suggest you start with one of the above. It is possible that you will want to switch later to something else once you gain experience with the advantages of RSS,

RSS remains one of the best ways to make sure you see everything your favorite sites publish. It also allows you to check dozens of web sites much more quickly and easily than visiting each web site one at a time with a web bowser.