As of this writing, forty five people have signed up for the seminar. That is a good start, however. we need to have at least one hundred in attendance. Please mail in your registration or plan to bring it to the September 16th meeting. This will likely be the last time we will be able to present a seminar featuring Dr. Schweitzer, so don’t miss it!

Those who remember Dr. Schweitzer from the 2003 seminar will be delighted to hear him again. This will be a great experience for those who have not yet watched, and listened to his presentations. Dr. Schweitzer does many of his lectures in costume. He will assume a frontier persona for the Scots-Irish lecture, and become a Colonial during the Virginia presentation.

Opportunity tickets for the handmade quilt will be available at the September meeting and also at the seminar. Hopefully you are giving your friends and family an opportunity to win this quilt by selling them lots of tickets! Please call Barbara Wilgus if you would like more tickets, (949) 830-6008. Remember, all proceeds from this project will benefit our genealogy library.

Leesola was the daughter of Robert,Jr. and Lesola Palmer Munse. She was born in San Pedro, California on August 18, 1942 . After graduating from Newport Harbor High School in Newport Beach she attended Orange Coast College and UCLA. Leesola leaves a son, Charlie Boettcher, and two granddaughters, Ella and Lily.

Docents and substitutes are still needed!. Call Bunny Smith, 949-472-8046, if you can help. Training classes for prospective docents are held on Wednesdays (10-1, except 4th), Thursdays (12-3) and Saturdays (10 to 1, except 3rd). These classes are also open to current docents and members wanting help in using the resources available at the library. If this is not convenient, please call Bunny to reserve a more convenient time.

You can search our collection of over 35,000 high quality, fine art reproductions of antique property maps using either place names or addresses.

The collection of contemporaneous directories can be searched by family name to find the addresses you will need to locate the homes of relatives who lived in these areas over the past 250 years.

Eventually this site will be expanded to include approximately 650 atlases, 35,000 maps, and 300 directories.

Lutherans Online Lutheran Roots Genealogy Exchange. This exchange helps those who wish to trace their family roots, especially those with Lutheran ancestors. http://www.lutheransonline.com/lutheransonline/genealogy/
Mission Viejo Local History: http://www.cmvl.org/history/localhistory.html
SOCCGS Library Catalog: https://sites.rootsweb.com/~casoccgs/library.html
Brooklyn, Long Island, Manhattan marriages: http://www.bklyn-genealogy-info.com/Marriage/index.html
New York Marriage Records:http://marriagedatabase.com/newyork/marriage-records.htm
TENNESSEE. Transcription of the "Company Store Ledger" at the Bright Hope Furnace in western Greene County, Tennessee for the years 1834-35. Contains an index to the several hundred names found in the ledger. http://www.kiva.net/~jeskewic/brighthope.html

THE YEAR WAS 1955
~Loretto Szucs and Mary Elizabeth

(MyFamily.com 15 July 2006)

“We tend to forget that happiness doesn’t come as a result of
getting something we don’t have, but rather of recognizing and
appreciating what we do have.”
~ Frederick Koenig

Sasines are found in Scotland. They are records of land changing hands (whether by sale or inheritance), of mortgages, and of anything that involved the transfer of rights or assets associated with land. Rights can include such things as coal and the fish in streams and rivers.

Sasines go back a long way (to the 1500s). An effective system of registration started in 1617. The proper name is an instrument of sasine. It recorded the act of transfer, which at one time was more than just signing papers--giving a handful of earth, for example.

From 1617 until 1868, the system did not change; there was a General Register and a Particular Register of sasines. The former was used for properties spread across two or more counties and for registrations from any part of Scotland except the counties around Edinburgh (East, Mid, and West Lothian). The Particular Registers were only for transfers within the district named. Burghs were not part of the original legislation but in 1681 royal burghs were directed to keep their own registers. Smaller burghs appear with the county.

A simplified system of a single register arranged by counties continued for another hundred years into the 1970s.

About Contents
Information on a record includes description of the property, names of the persons involved, price, type of transaction, date, time, and witnesses. Often sasines include family history facts if, for example, property passed from one family member to another or siblings shared in ownership. Many sasines make reference to other sasines, giving sufficient facts to find them.

Generally these records are about well-to-do persons and exclude cottars and tenants. There are two other drawbacks: map references do not appear until the 1800s and Latin is the language used until the late 1700s.

Do not let these points deter you though. Assumptions about any family not being in these records can mean valuable information is missed. Sometimes, in the property descriptions, clues are given about people residing in adjacent properties. As for the Latin or unusual Scots terminology, there are guides that can help.

Finding Aids
The best finding aids are for the period after 1780. Volumes of abridgements begin at this time, as well as indexes to them (people, until 1868, and places, until 1830). The abridgements (arranged by county regardless of which register the sasines appeared in) give the essential details, often including all the facts useful to genealogists. These abridgements and their indexes have been filmed and are available in the Family History Library (FHL) or through Family History Centers. Abridgements do not include the burgh registers.

For sasines before 1781, there are indexes, but not for all years and places; seven counties have no indexes, and the royal burghs are partially covered. Minute books (summary records) can be used instead. Some of the available indexes have been published and some are in typescript form; there is a good selection in the FHL. If you read the Scotland Research Outline in the Research Helps section of the FamilySearch site (www.familysearch.org), there is a table summarizing burgh sasines indexes available in the FHL and the National Archives of Scotland (NAS). The best overall list of pre-1781 finding aids is at the NAS website (www.nas.gov.uk), within the available "fact sheets" (where a good description of sasines can also be found).

Conclusion
In my own research, relationships have been resolved, and "lost" ancestors found because of information in sasines. This is a series of records that is pretty well complete for two hundred years, from 1660 to 1868, and for ninety years it has superb finding aids that are readily accessible. Sasines are definitely worth a look.

By the way, I have heard many pronunciations for “sasines,” but the one that seems to be used most consistently is to make the word rhyme with "raisins."

(Ancestry Daily News, 21 December 2004, myfamily.com)

First Steps-In Scotland research for time periods before 1855 should focus first on the records of the Presbyterian Church of Scotland. Among its records, those of death and burial were the least well kept and, for many parishes, there are none at all. If you know the parish in which to search then the first step is to discover whether or not these records exist and, if they do, for what range of years. Fortunately this is not difficult; reference to the place search of the Family History Library Catalog ™ (FHLC), online at familysearch or on CD-ROM or in Family History Centers, will produce a summary of surviving records for the parish.

Problems-For others, where to begin presents more difficulty. You may not know where someone died; you may have searched the registers of the parish of residence and found nothing or found the burial records are missing; or, you may be collecting all references of vital events for one particular surname. In all these cases you need a more efficient way to search several burial registers or dozens or hundreds. There are a number of things you can do.

Identifying Burial Records-You could decide to wait until later in 2003 when the burial records, index and images, should be added to the resources available at the Internet portal for records, in the custody of the General Register Office for Scotland.

For those of you who know the region, and can therefore focus on a few counties, or perhaps just one, it is worthwhile checking for burial indexes and published transcripts of gravestone inscriptions. I suggest that you try each of these sites.

Scottish Genealogical Society: The SGS has been publishing volumes of monumental inscriptions for many years. The entries are comprehensive and graveyard layouts are included. Through the SGS online bookshop you can purchase copies of all volumes that are in print

County family history society: Individual societies are busy indexing their part of the country for a National Death and Burial Index. Some of these societies have published what has been indexed thus far. Aberdeen, for example, sells dozens of booklets for different cemeteries, each one fully indexed and with a cemetery plan. The best way to monitor progress reports of any society is to keep an eye on the regular reports in the Bulletin issued by the Scottish Association of Family History Societies; online at their website.

Archives and Libraries in Scotland: Local archives and libraries may have unpublished and published transcripts in their collections; if the catalog is online then you can identify these items; consider also the catalog of the National Library of Scotland, which as a deposit library receives copies of all published books.

Interment.net: This website is a focal point for the volunteer efforts of tombstone transcribers the world over.

Accessing Burial Records Once you have visited these sites, it is time to think about access. Your already know from the SGS and local society websites whether any of the volumes of transcriptions for sale relate to your family history. So, you can decide whether purchasing is a good idea.

Next, look in the Family History Library Catalog, this time using the topic 'Cemeteries.' You will find out what is in the Family History Library; there will be a note in the entry if the item does not circulate to Family History Centers (often the case with society publications).

If you are an Ancestry subscriber with access to its UK and Ireland Records Collection, you should check the records for the county. There are a few burial or gravestone inscription records among the databases. In fact, some are for other denominations, which of course bring up the question of where to look if your ancestor was not a member of the Church of Scotland. For congregations that seceded look in Registers of the Secession Churches in Scotland (Diane Baptie, 2000, pub. by the SAFHS). For other denominations, check with local libraries and societies; you may have to get in touch directly with the church. It is also possible that the only burial ground was that of the Church of Scotland; never ignore it.

Some municipal or private cemeteries were established before 1855. You can find the dates of establishment of cemeteries in towns and cities in the Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland (F. Groome, 1883-85) and the Topographical Dictionary of Scotland (S. Lewis, 1841). Both are available through Family History Centers. Checking for transcriptions and indexes follows the same steps outlined above.