Discover Family History with Gail Blankenau

Don't miss the next GGS Webinar on August 1st, 2024 at 8pm CT!
Gary Heyn, GGS Treasurer, will share how he traced a FAN club (Family/Friends, Associates and Neighbors) of German immigrants to make family connections.
Register at http://www.ggsmn.org > Events

I was honored to present to the Omaha Public Schools program "Making the Invisible Visible" last week. Great teachers and great students! Next up are book talks in Omaha and Kansas City:

Extra: National Willa Cather Center and Nebraska Brass On this week's Friday LIVE Extra podcast, a look at events at The National Willa Cather Center and a preview of the next concerts by Nebraska Brass.

And April!

March

PublIsher's Weekly!

Journey to Freedom: Uncovering the Grayson Sisters’ Escape from Nebraska Territory by Gail Shaffer Blankenau The bold wintertime escape of two enslaved sisters and the major role their story played in national tensions leading to the Civ...

REGISTRATION IS CLOSED? Contact [email protected] with any questions.

Next Saturday, everything you need to know to start researching your German ancestors. Don't miss this opportunity. Go to https://mngs.org/event-5593720 to register.

KMTV 3 News Now Omaha will air a segment about "Journey to Freedom: Uncovering the Grayson Sisters' Escape from Nebraska Territory" tonight at 6:00. It will probably occur right before the first commercial break! We are standing where the river used to be and pointing up toward the old ferry site at Wyoming Nebraska where Celia and Eliza got into the skiff to be rowed across the Missouri toward freedom.

Article: DNA from enslaved 19th century Maryland girl traced forward to living relatives

“Amazing” link to toddler shows how DNA could help fill in African American family histories lost to slavery

https://www.science.org/content/article/dna-from-enslaved-19th-century-maryland-girl-traced-forward-to-living-relatives

Everybody loves a good story!
Sometimes as genealogists we limit ourselves to data on birth, marriage and death. How can we flesh out our ancestors’ stories with the details that bring them to life?
Join GGS for a webinar with author Gary Heyn who will share he found in Poland. For Gary, those sources led to him writing a book about his Posen immigrant ancestors. You won’t want to miss his insights!
Click below to register for the FREE live webinar on “Posen: Hidden Sources” February 22 @ 8pm

Friendly Fire Friendly Fire is a weekly conversation with Stu Kerns, Senior Pastor at Zion Church in Lincoln. Each Saturday ...

Posen: Hidden Sources! Embark on a journey to uncover the hidden treasures of your ancestry in our February webinar. Gary Heyn will tap into his research experience in Polish archives, which unearthed a compelling family narrative now captured in his book, "Standing at the Grave." Gary will share his expertise, providing a glimpse into the details of genealogy research in the former Prussian Province of Posen (today in Poland). Join us and register at https://www.ggsmn.org/eventListings.php?nm=38

Was your ancestor’s surname Piper or Pfeiffer? Zimmerman or Timmerman? Sometimes spelling variations in your German surnames are based on differences in dialect and provide clues to the surname's geographic origin. Likewise, records can use variants of common words that can impede our ability to decipher them. Fritz Juengling, Ph.D. in German philology, discusses German dialects so we can decode the linguistic mysteries to help us enrich our family histories. TONIGHT! www.ggsmn.org

Was your ancestor’s surname Piper or Pfeiffer? Zimmerman or Timmerman? Sometimes the spelling variations in your German surnames are based on differences in dialect and provide clues to the surname's geographic origin. Likewise, German records sometimes contain variants of common words that can impede our ability to decipher them. Join us as Fritz Juengling, Ph.D. in German philology, discusses German dialects and how they evolved so we can decode the linguistic mysteries that can help us enrich our family histories. Join us TONIGHT at 8:00 CST and register at

The Germanic Genealogy Society Based in Minnesota, we help people research their German Heritage in all the Germanic areas in Europe and around the world. We are here to guide you in finding that data with books and links to online

CORRECTION!!!!!! The webinar topic on January 18 will be on German dialects and how you can leverage them to enhance your genealogical research. Same bat time, same bat registration place. Join us January 18, 8:00 CST and register today at www.ggsmn.org

TOMORROW NIGHT! Register at www.ggsmn.org
Doctor Juengling received his bachelor’s degrees in German Studies and Secondary Education at Western Oregon University, his Master’s and Doctorate in Germanic Philology with minors in both English and Linguistics at the University of Minnesota. Germanic
Philology is a highly specialized field of study, combining languages, linguistics, paleography and history. For his graduate degrees, Dr. Juengling was required to demonstrate competence in English, German, Medieval Latin and two other modern languages. He chose Dutch and Norwegian. He also took courses in Old, Middle, and Early Modern English, Old and Middle High German, Old Norse (Old Icelandic), Gothic, Old Frisian, Old Saxon, and Middle Dutch. He has taught German, English, Latin and Old English (Anglo-Saxon) at the high school and university levels. He is an Accredited Genealogist® for Germany, Austria, The Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Norway, Denmark, and Sweden through the International Commission for the Accreditation of Professional Genealogists, and certified by the Verband deutschsprachiger Berufsgenealogen. Dr. Juengling is a German, Dutch, and Scandinavian Research Consultant at the FamilySearch Library in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Learn the art of delving into historical records to unveil your ancestry from Alsace-Lorraine. Thursday, November 16 at 8:00 CST. Free webinar sponsored by the Germanic Genealogy Society register for your hotlink at www.ggsmn.org

I have two webinars in November. First is Probing the Probate for the Central Jersey Genealogical Club, November 14.

Non-members are welcome with a $5 visitor fee.
www.cjgcnj.com , go to the tab “Join”, then scroll down to “Calling all Visitors”. Instructions are there to email our membership chair, requesting to join the meeting. Right above the Calling all Visitors heading is a link for Venmo to pay the $5 visitor fee. Obviously it is too close to the meeting to mail a check. When payment is received, visitors will be sent a Zoom link for the event.

I have been quiet for quite a while. The manuscript "Journey to Freedom: Uncovering the Grayson Sisters' Escape from Nebraska Territory," is laid out with photos and maps and is about to come back to me for one last "pass." It is scheduled for release in the University of Nebraska Press University of Nebraska Press Spring catalog. It can be pre-ordered here: https://www.nebraskapress.unl.edu/search/?keyword=Blankenau

Better late-ish than never. Just noticed that in honor of German Reunification Day, all 197.5 million German historical records on MyHeritage will be completely free to access until October 5, 2023.

Tomorrow morning I will deliver a webinar "Tumbleweeds in the Window: Three Woman Homesteaders," to the Manatee Genealogical Society. Register at:

Welcome to the Manatee Genealogical Society website! The Manatee Genealogical Society of Manatee County, Florida is proud to offer this website as a gateway to our services, resources, programs, and information on our society.

Peter is back! Join us by registering at www.ggsmn.org
"The Meaning of German Surnames" will be about where a German surname may have occurred and what the meaning is.
Members who plan to attend are invited to send surnames to [email protected] and our speaker will talk about their origin, perhaps including the likely region for the surname. He will try to include as many names as time permits.

IGGP 2023 Conference | Fort Wayne, Indiana

We are excited to welcome Peter Reinkordt, Ph.D., to speak to us about Germanic names in a two-part series on Germanic town names, surnames, and more! Join us May 18 for Part 1! Register at www.ggsmn.org . Send town names or surnames for which you have questions to [email protected] and Peter will discuss YOUR name during our time (we will accept up to 30 first-come, first-served).

From History Nebraska newsletter:
Slavery was legal in Nebraska Territory until 1861, and Eliza and Celia Grayson were among first enslaved people brought here by settlers. Their 1859 escape from Nebraska City and Eliza’s capture in Chicago created a sensation. Even President James Buchanan weighed in with an opinion. (He supported the controversial Fugitive Slave Law, which required people in free states to help capture people fleeing enslavement.)

No one has investigated the story more deeply than Gail Shaffer Blankenau, who received this year’s James L. Sellers Memorial Award for her Summer 2022 Nebraska History Magazine article. Blankenau not only told the thrilling story of the women’s escape via the “Underground Railroad,” but also showed how some Nebraskans sought to make legal slavery a permanent part of the state’s culture. We’ve posted the entire article online (PDF). Read it here. https://history.nebraska.gov/journey-to-freedom-celia-and-eliza-graysons-escape-from-nebraska-slavery/?utm_source=History+Nebraska+Emails+and+Updates&utm_campaign=c6ec42a077-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2023_04_27_04_37&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_-c6ec42a077-%5BLIST_EMAIL_ID%5DSlavery

History Nebraska “Household Plus” members receive four issues a year of Nebraska History Magazine. Learn more.

Journey to Freedom - Celia and Eliza Grayson's escape from Nebraska slavery - History Nebraska Editor’s note: Below is the first part of “Journey to Freedom from Nebraska Territory,” from the Summer 2022 issue of Nebraska History Magazine. Read the complete article (PDF). The author […]

Workshop! This Saturday, join award-winning author and German genealogy expert Gail Blankenau to change the way you look at evidence. Register at www.ggsmn.org For those of you who live far from Mendota Heights, there is a virtual option.

University of Nebraska Press is accepting pre-orders for my book (Spring 2024 release):

Journey to Freedom Publishes books and journals especially in American history, the American West, and Native American studies.