The next AIGS General Meeting will be held Tuesday September 21, 2010 at 7:00 PM in the Fernandina Beach Police Department Community Room on Lime Street.

Our speaker for the September 21st 2010 meeting of the Amelia Island Genealogical Society is Karen Rhodes, and her topic is “Navigating the National Archives Website”. Karen’s talk will be about how to use the National Archives website to find information about your ancestors. She will take us on a guided tour of the genealogically important portions of the large and highly complex NARA website. Her talk will cover guideposts for getting around the website and how to use “trail markers” to help keep them from getting lost. Emphasis will be on finding genealogically relevant document series, how to order copies (as well as cost), and how to access other related NARA information and publications.

She has presented programs for various groups interested in genealogy including one on Black Sheep Ancestors at a previous AIGS meeting. Karen has undertaken various roles in her lifetime including nursing and serving in the US Coast Guard where she started as Yeoman Third Class and ended as a Lieutenant (JG) before leaving for medical reasons. Now, in her early 60s, she is back in college working on a post baccalaureate degree in history and Spanish at the University of North Florida. She is currently conducting grant- funded research on the family structure of St Augustine during the Second Spanish Period (1783-1821). Karen also is the author of the recently-published Non-Federal Censuses of Florida, 1784- 1945:A Guide to Sources.