Lectures
Bruce Moore got involved with genealogy to spend more time with his wife, Kristin. He is a life-long photographer who converted from film to digital photography in 2007, and he actively uses photo library management software to keep his collection of family images under control. In his professional life, he is a data scientist specializing in pricing problems. His academic career includes a BSE in Chemical Engineering from the University of Michigan, a MS in Operations Research from Southern Methodist University (SMU) and a Doctor of Engineering in Engineering Management also from SMU.
He is learning genealogy through attending the Rootstech, Federation of Genealogical Societies, Texas State Genealogical Society and Dallas Genealogical Society conferences, with primary interest in speakers on methodology. Dr. Moore has made several courthouse, archive and library visits to support his own and Kristin's research activities in Texas, Illinois, Missouri and Michigan.
Dr. Moore's genealogy lectures focus on technology issues for both individual researchers and for society officers.
Technology Topics for Individual Genealogists
The lectures that follow are oriented to technology topics for individual genealogists. They assume that the audience members have basic computer skills for word processing, email and using online services such as Ancestry.com.
Using Adobe Lightroom and Other Photo Facial Recognition Tools for Genealogy
In the past few years, facial recognition tools have moved from TV crime shows and Sci-Fi to mainstream photo management tools. There is much that genealogists and family historians can gain from mastering these software tools. This lecture covers current free and fee facial recognition offerings and how family historians can use them to catalog photographs of known people, and figure out which unknown people to prioritize–and where to look.
This lecture can be adapted to lengths of 45 minutes to 120 minutes. Shorter versions are useful to show what can be done, but omit any meaningful discussion of how to use the various tools.
Getting Started with Evidentia
For experienced genealogists, tree software is not useful when working to figure out conflicting or ambiguous documents, since tree software requires that you tie a document to a person. What do you do when you know the document is relevant to your tree, but do know know which person to whom to tie it? How do you keep track of documents when you are trying to figure out whether your ancestor faked his death and assumed the identity of a fellow soldier, or whether the fellow soldier absconded with your ancestor's land grant?
Dr. Moore uses this mysterious relative as a case study for how you can get started with Evidentia, a tool for cataloging and examining conflicting evidence for genealogical analysis.
This lecture can be adapted to lengths of 45 to 120 minutes.
General Topics for Individual Genealogists
The lectures that follow are oriented to individual genealogists who have largely exhausted the records available online and at local libraries, and are beginning to travel to major repositories and to county courthouses to search records that have not been digitized. This set of lectures assumes no technology experience.
How to Pull Your Spouse into Your Genealogy Hobby
This is a humorous–and serious discussion of how to get your spouse involved in your genealogy hobby. The lecture covers both the disasters and ultimate success of Kristin’s efforts to get Bruce interested in genealogy. Although this lecture contains many humorous anecdotes, it is ultimately a serious discussion on how to involve and interest your family in history and family history.
This lecture can be adapted to lengths of 30 to 60 minutes.
How to Prepare for a Courthouse Visit
To support his own research and Kristin’s research, Dr. Moore has made visits to county courthouses in Texas and Illinois and will make visits to courthouses in Indiana an Michigan in the future. This lecture is a practical lecture on how to prepare for a visit both in education on the records to expect, preparatory research and the equipment to take (or not take).
This lecture can be adapted to lengths of 30 to 60 minutes.
How to Prepare for a Trip to Salt Lake City
As part of trips to RootsTech, Dr. Moore has visited the Family History Library in Salt Lake City twice. This lecture is offers a practical look at how to prepare for a trip to Salt Lake City and the Family History Library.
This lecture can be adapted to lengths of 30 to 60 minutes.
How to use the Texas General Land Office
The Texas General Land Office (GLO) has a wealth of important records for early Texas research. In the lecture, Dr. Moore discusses the records that are available online, and on how to prepare for a visit to the GLO.
This lecture can be adapted to lengths of 30 to 60 minutes.
How to Prepare for a Trip to Washington, DC
Dr. Moore has never done research in Washington, but Kristin has done so, and found a wealth of information in several different archives, libraries and repositories. This is a tag-team lecture aimed at helping individuals prepare for a trip to Washington for the 2019 FGS conference.
This lecture can be adapted to lengths of 45 to 60 minutes.
Topics for Society Officers and Those Planning a Genealogy Business
The topics that follow are useful for society officers and those who are planning to start or already have a genealogy business.
Search Engine Optimization for Society Officers
As the world goes online, it is critical that genealogical and historical societies have a web presence to enable remote family historians to find their society and their society's holdings. Only in rare instances will the officers of a society have the technical skills to evaluate or improve the search performance of their society's web site.
In this lecture, Dr. Moore will go over some simple tools that a society owner can use to determine what should be done for a society web site. This lecture is based upon an article on Dr. Moore's professional web site: Doing an SEO Review When You are Not the Webmaster
This lecture can be adapted to lengths of 45 to 90 minutes. Longer versions provide more information on how to modify your site for better search engine optimization.
Website Management for Society Officers
Both large and small historical and genealogical societies need websites so that researchers and potential members can find the organization online. Societies with many programs need to publicize events, while societies with archive holdings need to make descriptions of holdings available to remote users. Most societies have few technically skilled people to run web sites and social media, so it is important not to burn out the few people with requisite skills.
In this lecture, Dr. Moore discusses content management systems, customer relationship management systems and the trade-offs in function versus complexity as a society works to put together a technology plan for publicizing events and archive catalogs as well as membership management.
This lecture can be adapted to lengths of 45 minutes to a multi-segment all-day seminar. Longer versions include more detailed information on the membership management components and handling archive catalogs.
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