His interest in genealogy began when he was 14, on a trip to a family Cemetery in Corinna, Maine with his father and started asking who were the various people buried in the lot and how they were related to him. This led to a meeting with his great-aunt who told him family stories of his ancestors, got him started in tracing all lines of his family. His passion for DNA began in 2016 after DNA testing revealed that his maternal grandfather was actually a neighbor to his grandparents and so began a journey to find his new relatives and ancestors and share his story of discovery with others. Peter lives in South Gardiner, Maine, but his roots are mostly in Penobscot and Piscataquis Counties and most of his family ancestors were early New England settlers and pioneers. |
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As a member of Maine Old Cemetery Association, Penobscot County Genealogical Society, Taconnett Falls Genealogy Library and Washington County Historical & Genealogical Society, I’ve seen the power of volunteerism firsthand. Visit the Library at Winslow or the new Heritage Center at Machias, or any formerly forlorn cemetery after a MOCA workshop, and you’ll see for yourself. My interest in family history started when I spent childhood summers with my grandparents and went with them on their rounds to visit (i.e. check in on) older relatives in Downeast Maine and New Brunswick. Oh, the stories! I’m especially interested in people and families who once thought nothing of moving back and forth across a blurry border. Another interest is bringing to heirlooms to light: i.e. letters, diaries, documents, Bibles, autograph albums, and photographs, particularly of hardscrabble folks who might otherwise have left little record. Toward that end, I’ve been featuring items collected over many years on my blog “Heirlooms Reunited.” |
Directors |
Lynne was born and raised in suburban Chicago and is a graduate of Elmhurst College with a degree in Business Administration. She worked for over 30 years in various phases of horticultural marketing including procurement and sales in the mass market floral area in the Midwest, South and New England. Currently, Lynne is a Community Education Assistant and Volunteer Coordinator for the UMaine Cooperative Extension Master Gardener Volunteer program. She serves on various volunteer boards with a focus on Food Security for all. Lynne lives in Brunswick with her husband Ward and daughter Carolyn.
Her term expires December 31, 2019.
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Helen has been doing family history for over 40 years and is the keeper of her family’s documents and artifacts. She holds degrees in anthropology from Ohio State University and the University of Michigan. As an anthropologist, her approach to genealogy is that of a community-wide study. Her particular areas of genealogical interest and expertise include the federal census, Ohio, New York, and West Virginia. Helen is married to Maine native William “Bill” Chapman; they have two sons. Since retiring to Maine Helen has become active in legislative issues concerning vital records access and cemetery preservation and access for family members. She also compiled an inventory of the records vault at the Lincoln County Courthouse where she was delighted to find original federal population and non-population censuses for most Lincoln County towns for 1850-1870. |
She first became interested in genealogy while still in high school after hearing her grandmother say that her own grandfather had been in the Civil War and was buried down south. She has published three books on her ancestral families of Clark, Hinckley, and Malbon, and also published a book on her “adopted” Oliver family from the Georgetown/Phippsburg region. Prior to this change of career, she worked for law firms in Bath as a legal secretary, and in Rockland as a bookkeeper. In her leisure time, Marlene transcribes images from early church records for the Congregational Library Archives in Boston. She has served on various Councils at her local church and is a member of its hand-bell choir and prayer shawl group. During the warmer months, she enjoys gardening, nature and taking morning walks.
Her term expires December 31, 2020.
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![]() His interest in genealogy was sparked in 2012 when a land survey revealed the identity of the Hatch family that had first settled his boyhood home 200 years before, leaving their mark behind with the old farmhouse and endless stone walls. This led to discovering the wealth of information available on the internet about the Hatches and other early Maine families, including his wife’s deep ancestral Maine roots. Inspired by this, he embarked on a successful multi-year search for his father’s birth parents using internet resources, family lore and documents, paper genealogy, and DNA genetic genealogy. Jesse’s genealogy interests are varied and world-wide, ranging from his Kansan mother’s Welsh ancestry, his father’s adoptive parents’ Spanish and American ancestry, his father’s birth parents’ Mississippi and Montana ancestry, his wife’s Maine and New England roots, local town and county families, and everything in between. |
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Her interest in genealogy began during her college years when she inherited a silver spoon that had passed to her as the seventh generation of youngest daughters. She and her mother set out to discover the identities of those women. She has been researching ever since. Having just about exhausted work on her own family, the move to Maine opened a new avenue to research her husband’s Waldo County ancestors. She has published articles in The Essex Genealogist, The NEHG Register, American Ancestors, Mayflower Descendant and The Maine Genealogist. |
His love for genealogy stems from summer evenings spent sitting on his parents’ outdoor patio listening to his grandparents reminisce about the family. Since 1994, he has been the editor of The Maine Genealogist and editor of the Maine Genealogical Society’s focal Maine Families in 1790 project. Since 2000, he has been a coeditor of The American Genealogist and in 2017 was named a Consulting Editor of Vermont Genealogy. Joe has authored or edited eighteen books on various genealogical subjects and contributed numerous articles to genealogical journals. His genealogical research and publications have been focused mainly on Maine, New England, and New York. In 2000 he was appointed a Fellow of the American Society of Genealogists (FASG). |
I was born in Farmingdale, Maine, with family roots in that area, Belfast area, and the Dover-Dexter-Cambridge area. After asking my parents and grandparents family questions, I started researching my family tree in 1980, staying a week at a time with my grandparents who lived near the Maine State Archives. I have been an officer in the French Family Assn, National Assn of Leavitt Families, Strafford County chapter – NH Society of Genealogists, York County Genealogical Society, MGS Greater Portland chapter, and still wear multiple hats, especially as Leavitt Genealogist trying to sort and compile all the Leavitt families. I have been compiling every-name genealogies for many of my families since the 1980s, mainly for finding new cousins and documenting my ancestors on my RolandRhoades.com website. I am also deeply involved in DNA research and have infected many of my cousins with the genealogy bug. |
Marion’s father passed away when Emily was 5, and the decision was made to move to Thomaston and claim the home place. The “formative years” were spent there, thankfully outside the walls of the state’s penitentiary. Emily left this idyllic setting to attend college at the University of Southern Maine (known then as the University of Maine at Portland-Gorham, or POGO), and managed to get a B.A. in Geography/Anthropology in 1978. She returned to Augusta to work, and spent the last 37 years at Maine State Library in various positions. In 1988, she earned a Master of Library and Information Studies degree from the University of Rhode Island. A co-worker retired in 2007, and she added genealogy to her job duties. Emily is a new retiree! In addition to MGS, Emily is a board member of Kennebec Historical Society, and Secretary from 2003 to the present. She is also a Program Committee member. She lives in South China with her wonderful cats Mindy and Binford. |
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