2018 MAAGI Conference at the ACPL When: July 12, 2018

“Nobody’s getting lunch,” Janis Forté, MAAGI instructor and institute coordinator, said to the group assembled at the Midwest African-American Genealogist Institute’s Thursday coordination discussion in Room C at the Allen County Public Library.  The talk was running long and 12 noon was coming fast.  “No, we gonna eat today,” an attendee retorted.

The groups of two or three in the room were tasked to analyze notices for runaway slaves.  One particular $10 ad noted that a slave named Andrew had small pox scars on his face, took several sorts of clothes, and was surely headed to the plantation of his brother, owned by a man named James Ransom.  The discussion about Andrew was over the validity of the descriptions and his true destination.

Room B’s group focused on the emotional side of the DNA research, about whether researchers should give themselves totally over to a genealogical search.  Scenarios, taken directly from Facebook queries, were presented as potential assignments to the Room B attendees.

The three-day event featured instruction across various subjects related to genealogy research. 

The Allen County Public Library Downtown will also host the 2019 conference, to be held July 9-11, 2019.  In 2019, MAAGI will become the first genealogy institute to offer classes devoted entirely to the Freedmen from Indian Territory and the Five Tribes: Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, and Seminole Nations. 

For more information about the MAAGI, visit www.MAAGIInstitute.org