Patrons must commit to attending the first two classes and must have basic computer skills. Preference will be given to Groton residents up to one week prior to the start of the series.

Ready to take the plunge but haven’t any idea how to start researching your family history? Register for this course and join in one of America’s most popular hobbies, second only to gardening! Getting started is the hardest part!

Beginning with “Six Key Steps to Launching Your Family Search” learn the basic skills, especially how to get organized from the beginning, to save time and frustration later in your research. Understand the many things you can, and should, do first in the comfort of your home 24/7. Prepare to take advantage of the many opportunities to learn from your family connections as you interview family members. Begin to add to your basic skills as you are introduced to free as well as major online commercial tools and the wealth of resources available to you in the metro area.

Linda B. MacIver is an educator, lecturer, librarian and genealogy researcher. She retired from a 27-year career at the Boston Public Library where she inaugurated the BPL patron genealogy classes and taught the multi-week beginners’ genealogy course. She also organized two extremely popular seasons of the Local and Family History series and developed the Intermediate Genealogy Summer Lecture series. Linda is the past Secretary and Director of Federal Records of the Massachusetts Genealogical Council, a member of the Massachusetts Society of Genealogists (MSOG) and the Essex (MA) Society of Genealogists (ESOG.) She serves as the New England Representative for the Essex (England!) Record Office. Linda has a BA in History from the University of New Hampshire, an MEd from Boston University and earned her MLIS at Simmons College. She has several lecture topics and is also available to teach BEGINNERS AND INTERMEDIATE GENEALOGY COURSES.

Linda was the 2018 recipient of the Richard S. Lackey Scholarship to the Genealogical Institute for Federal Records (GEN-FED) and the inaugural recipient of the 2019 Senior at the Center of Excellence Award sponsored by Xerox Corporation and the City of Boston.

Class Meets:

September 15

September 22 NO CLASS

 September 29

 October 6

 October 13

 October 20 

October 27

Generously sponsored by the Groton Public Library Endowment Trust.