Vita Brevis

If you patronize your local library or historical society to research your ancestors, analyze censuses, or dive into 19^th-century marriage records, you may have more in common with a modern pop star than you think. In her hit song “Picture You,” Chappell Roan ponders,..

When I lived just outside of Boston, Mt. Auburn Cemetery was my favorite place to walk and explore. Among the thousands who are buried there are members of Boston’s esteemed Revere family. While Paul Revere is best known for his exploits during the American Revolution,..

This kinship chart is something I have been trying to determine for almost thirty years! As teenagers, my friends and I would watch Late Night with Conan O’Brien. We watched an episode on October 23, 1996 with guest Denis Leary, who told Conan that “my grandfather and..

It seems that every headline these days touts Artificial Intelligence (AI) as the future, and even genealogy isn’t immune to the call of AI. While AI can make some roles easier and provide some benefits, it is a tool that should be used with scrutiny.

My paper for the AAIHS meeting had to contribute to an exciting atmosphere of deep intellectual thought amongst people who are also enthusiastic about demonstrating the importance of the past to the present. The theme of the entire conference was “Preserving Histories..

There is a particular reason why historical reenactments and living history museums are so popular. They connect us with a time that is hard for us to imagine; therefore, we play it out so that we can see, feel, and listen to what our ancestors experienced. Some of our..

This year I was honored to have a paper accepted by the African American Intellectual History Society (AAIHS) for their annual meeting, held in Pittsburgh on March 27-28, 2026. Some of you may remember that I attended the conference as a spectator last year to learn as..

The Wyner Family Jewish Heritage Center (JHC) at American Ancestors houses an archival collection of more than four million documents specializing in Boston and New England Jewish history. These records include everything from institutional documents from synagogues,..

"I thought I came to God's country and that I would be alright. But the same time I did not find very much improvement,” wrote Feliks Skibicki in a 1933 affidavit while requesting another increase in his pension.¹ A Prussian-Polish immigrant, Feliks had been working in..

My interest in genealogy, and in my own family history, stemmed from my family name: Laxague. I was always told that this name, pronounced differently by every unknowing substitute teacher who encountered its jumble of vowels and further confounding “x,” was Basque...