Monday, April 9, 2012

Searching For Our Roots With A New Slant

Did you know that there is a new TV series which started in March called “Finding Your Roots,” on your PBS station at 8 and 9 p.m. Sundays? It will continue through May 20 (check local listings). It is hosted by Henry Louis Gates and while it isn't totally geared toward race it does cover racial issues in many of the hour long episodes:
• The first hour featured Branford Marsalis and Harry Connick Jr.  The second had John Lewis and Cory    Booker.
• A wide range of others, including Sanjay Gupta, Barbara Walters, Samuel Jackson, Martha Stewart, Michelle Rodriguez, John Legend, Margaret Cho, Wanda Sykes, Kevin Bacon and Condoleezza Rice are scheduled for future episodes.

I watched my first episode last night and found the genealogy process a bit scanty (although he did address the use of  DNA in searching in genealogy), but was fascinated by the history lessons he gave to put the genealogy data in context.  You might want to take a peek and see what you think.

If you have found new sources - like the 1940 Fed. Census being on http://www.ancestry.com/  please share with the rest of us on this site in the comment area.

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