Upcoming Genealogy Events for 2021

by Robert M. Wilbanks IV, B.A.
Chief Genealogist & Historian, C.S.A.
genealogy@arizonascots.com

Even though you may not have Arizona ancestry, local genealogy societies across the state are a great place to network, learning from others, and attend meetings, and learn from great presenters on a variety of topics. With the beginning of a new year, I again share with you the annual listing of upcoming genealogy learning and networking events for 2021, with links for further information. Here you will find a small variety of highly significant genealogy conferences and seminars coming up in the next few months hosted by various Arizona genealogy societies.

Don't hesitate to take the time to attend and learn more. An exciting change this year is that many events are provided live online, and some are even completely free. Here is some information about a few genealogy groups around Arizona, as well as links to a few events coming soon.

The West Valley Genealogical Society (azwvgs.org) is the largest genealogy society in Arizona and operates its own genealogy library with over 4000 square feet of books and more, plus access to a wide variety of subscription-based genealogy databases. In addition to their monthly meetings, the Library provides a number of "How-to" genealogy classes on a variety of topics. Their annual all day seminar will be virtual this year on February 20, 2021 featuring Angie Bush presenting "Usage of DNA Tools to Expand Your Family Story" (azwvgs.org/education/seminar).

The annual seminar of the Southern Arizona Genealogy Society, south of Tucson in Green Valley, Arizona, (azsags.org) will be on Saturday, February 13, 2021, titled "Sharpen Your Genealogy Detective Skills" featuring Lisa Louise Cooke. Lisa is the producer and host of the "The Genealogy Gems Podcast", and the YouTube show "Elevenses with Lisa". A Friday Workshop is also included.

The Family History Society of Arizona (fhsa.org) has about seven chapters around the valley that each meet a different day of the month. They also have a Virtual Chapter that meets monthly. You could theoretically attend all eight meetings monthly. Their 2021 annual meeting will be March 27, virtual and completely Free. It will feature five presenters with five topics.

A significant non-Arizona event is RootsTech 2021 (rootstech.org), one of the largest annual genealogy events which provides an extensive learning conference combing technology with genealogy, while celebrating connections with your family and your heritage. This year, the 4-day event will be February 25 to 27, 2021, entirely virtual and Free. Go to the website today to register for this international event.

There are many other Arizona genealogy groups, historical and heritage societies that you can find through the Arizona Genealogical Advisory Board (AzGAB) (azgab.com), promoting genealogy and history by addressing the educational needs and interests of Arizona's genealogical community through cooperation by the various groups and individuals. They have an impressive calendar of genealogy events around Arizona, and around the United States.

A key AzGAB event, coming March 20, 2021, is the first annual Arizona Genealogy Day, co-hosted with the Arizona State Library, Archives and Public Records. This Free Virtual event will have big name speakers and multiple topics. Watch for a flyer and registration information to coming out in early January at azgab.com

The website ConferenceKeeper (conferencekeeper.org) is a site solely dedicated to listing live, and now virtual, genealogy meetings, seminars, and conferences all around the world. They have a master chronological listings page, as well as pages by locations. There is even a page that lists all virtual events by specific date.

This is another of a series of articles in which I show you the basics of searching for your family history, discussing the use of family records, public records, and online resources nationally and internationally, etc. The previous articles are now available on the Genealogy Section of this website.   See “Genealogy” in the menu options at the top of the web page.