Pointe de l'Eglise: Acadia Genealogical and Historical Society, Inc.

Ancestor Charts

We are asking for members and others with Acadia Parish connections to contribute ancestor charts for inclusion in a future revision to our book of ancestor charts. Each chart should include at least four generations. Items to include in the chart are: name and dates/locations of birth, marriage and death, as applicable. The book will be donated to the Acadia Parish Library and will be made available for sale to the public to raise funds for the Society.

Since forming in 1989, the Society has been collecting Ancestor Charts from its members. Many of the charts appeared in two volumes published under titles of: " Pointe de l'Eglise Historical & Genealogical Club-Members" ; and, "Pointe de L'Eglise Historical & Genealogical Ancestor Charts Book II." We will no longer publish these two volumes. Instead, all charts received thus far have been consolidated and the first four generations of each chart, if provided, are appearing in this single volume titled, Acadia Parish Connections - A Collection of Ancestor Charts.

This project is a work in progress. The first volume contains about 375 charts and we are collecting information for the second volume. Our primary expectations from assembling and publishing these charts are to:

• Improve communication between members;
• Foster cooperation through exchange of research information;
• Increase public awareness of our existence and work;
• Increase public support our projects;
• Increase our membership and volunteer base; and,
• Make more genealogical and historical information available to the public through our contributions to the Acadia Parish Library; and,
• Raise funds for the Society.

To add flexibility and scope while reducing relative costs of publication, we have collected the data into a single file using the capabilities of the Family Tree Maker software program. Given our limited experience with the program�s report formatting capabilities, we have chosen to reduce from five to four, the number of generations covered in each chart; however, we will publish up to seven generations, if furnished. Simply put, we couldn�t get five generations on a single page and still get the level of detail we were striving for. We will break them down into two or more charts. On the positive side, thanks to the computer and related software, we believe the formats employed in this volume, with its large array of names and supporting index to aid in locating individual names in the chart(s), will be a marked improvement over our earlier efforts. Moreover, once we get over the initial "growing pains," we should see considerable improvement in subsequent revisions to this volume.

As part of the process of transferring the data from the individual charts to Family Tree Maker , we tried to edit errors or inconsistencies by merging apparently similar data submitted by two or more members. In a few cases, we referred to other sources, such as the 41-volume set of Father Hebert's Southwest Louisiana Records in efforts to arrive at an acceptable entry. More often than not, however, we tried to accept the data submitted by the member. With this in mind, users are asked to please use this information simply as a tool to identify leads to others having common family interests; to discuss discrepancies; and, to help get closer to locating source documents.

The sale price for the publication is $30.00 to members; $40.00 to non-members, including shipping and handling.