This year I had the opportunity of working with three individuals. The first one wanted to create a tree and then add her family in. She had a book full of family that could go in. I instructed her to write down her username and password that she selected so she would not forget, but she chose not to and consequently we spent the next 15 minutes trying to figure out what she put in. All she said was "I know you told me to write it down but I didn't."
After we got her in I gave her some basics on FamilyTree and we were able to get three generations in. She was really excited to go home and add all of the other family members that she had in her book.
The next two individuals just wanted to see if they could find family. I was able to find census records of both of them and they really got excited. It is so fun to watch when they find a family.
Diane just wrote about her experience at Harlem Days, and while she was doing that, Elder Dransfield and I took the train back to Lincoln Square to get our laptop computers, since there were only a few who brought them, and missionaries that had tablets. But by the time we returned and I set up my laptop, I found that when I tried to set up an account with one of the patrons, I wasn't able to get it done without errors, probably due to the number of people who were logged into the hotspot being used powered by a generator. By that time, Diane was ready to go back to the apartment and Elders Tom and Liz Hanson (the other full-time missionary couple assigned as Family History Missionaries) were there to relieve us.
During the week, we both have physical therapy--mine regarding my recent hip replacement and hers for her back, neck and hands. On Monday, while I had physical therapy, Diane decided to walk in Central Park. Shortly after I finished, she phoned to tell me that she wasn't sure where in the park she was, and started to make her way back to 66th Street and Central Park West near our apartment. Since I was also walking in the park, I took these photos from the corner of Central Park West and Columbus Circle, about a block from our physical therapists.
 |
| Orthology (Physical Therapy) is located on the corner of this building - 5th Floor |
On the corner across the street to the east, Central Park begins. It goes from 60th Street to 110th Street (where Harlem begins). From the corner of Central Park, at Columbus Circle, these photos were taken about the time I received the call from Diane just prior to taking a walk through Central Park and back to the apartment.
 |
| Close-up of the base of the statue at the corner of Central Park |
 |
| Statue: Central Park West and Columbus Circle NYC |
Last evening in stake conference, one of the speakers was Talvin Staton, a black member of the Church. As a recent convert, having received his own endowment last week, he bore a strong testimony of missionary work and mentioned his conversion. This was particularly impressive since he is deaf and dumb and used American Sign Language through an interpreter.
On Thursday, he and two of our ASL missionaries, Elders Edelfsen and Cross came to the Family History Center. I had the privilege to work with Talvin, and whenever an explanation was needed, the Elders would translate. Otherwise, we worked together building his family tree by pointing or using notes for the reason statements he entered whenever attaching sources. In the process, he learned a great deal about how to navigate FamilySearch.org and Family Tree.
In the three hours we worked together, every time he found new information that connected to something he knew about the family, or enough information was provided for Family Tree to show that temple work could be reserved for a person, he would light up and become so excited. We have learned that working with deaf members, they are much more animated in their excitement than hearing individuals! So the first time it happened, I explained that what he was feeling was the spirit of Elijah testifying of the divine nature of families.
It was a lot of fun! In that time, we were able to find and enter records for four generations on his Staton ancestors and their families from Edgecombe, North Carolina, some having many children. After the shift change, Liz Hanson worked with him for about another hour and a fifth generation family with eight children was found going back to 1843. From only having himself in the tree when we began, it was awesome to see what had been accomplished. He is so excited to have the Deaf Branch help him with some of the temple work next month when they have their temple day.
On Friday, I was surprised to get a phone call from Brother Rod Barney, who is serving with Roxann in the Washington D.C. Temple. He said he was reading our blog and was surprised to read that out home was going up for sale in Salem. The Washington Temple will be closed for a month following Labor Day and he and Roxann plan to spend a couple of days in New York City, as they have never been here. We invited them to stay with us in our small apartment if they were willing to sleep on an air mattress bed. So this coming week we will be in touch to make plans together.
Also, just before the adult session of stake conference as we were entering the chapel, Abu Conteh (High Priest Group Leader from Harlem 1st Ward) a native of Sierra Leone in West Africa asked me to get him my contact information so he could make an appointment. Today, I had a conversation with him on the phone, where he indicated he wanted to see if he could trace and do more on his family. He has a family tree we have worked out together back to his grandparents from information he remembered.
I told him I didn't think we had records for Sierra Leone, as I had looked at the catalog a couple of months ago when working with him at Harlem during training of temple and family history consultants. He told me that records were in Freetown, and that recently there had been so much rain that the mudslides from the mountains had buried 800 people in that city, and rains were continuing even from what he saw on the TV this morning.
While we were talking, I checked the catalog on FamilySearch.org and found that the 20 microfilms listed for Sierra Leone civil records had all been digitized, so they are available. This week, FamilySearch will discontinue accepting orders for microfilms. Any that we may need can still be ordered and remain here. He made an appointment for us to meet tomorrow afternoon at the Lincoln Square FHC where we are serving to see what we could do. My concern has been to help him get his own parents' temple ordinances completed so he could be sealed to them, as he is 82 years old. Hopefully that can also be accomplished before we return home from our mission in November.
No comments:
Post a Comment