Salt Lake City NGS Conference 2010

Arrived in Salt Lake City on a warm Tuesday afternoon of 27th of April 2010 to attend the annual conference of the National Genealogical Society Conference. The actual location of the conference is the Salt Palace Convention Center adjacent to the Radisson Hotel. I am told the registered attendees number between 2,000 and 2,500. Genealogists from around the world convened to hear lectures as well as mix and mingle with their fellow researchers. There was appropriate time allowed between programs for the visitors to browse through the vendor tables in the large vendor hall containing books, genealogy programs, and all sorts of items of interest to the genealogist.

I was in the vendor hall a great deal of the time because I have the opportunity of managing the booth for the Association of Professional Genealogists (http://www.apgen.org/). The booth is staffed by my fellow APGers who happily greet anyone who might be interested in learning what APG is all about and very capably help complete member applications for anyone interested in joining this organization. Our booth was in one of the best locations to have plenty foot traffic passing by at all times.

One of the local television stations spent some time videotaping activity at our booth and it got to be a part of the evening news on ABC-4.com. The camera gave a good exposure of the APG booth as well as interviewing APG member Bobbi King of Lakewood, Colorado. Bobbi is a well known genealogist who owns "Miss Congenealogy" and lectures around the state of Colorado and at convention gatherings such as NGS and FGS (Federation of Genealogical Societies).

Based upon my several trips around the vendor area I was able to stop and talk with technology folks such as FamilySearch with their high tech means of searching the internet. They had a bank of about 75-80 computer terminals connected directly to FamilySearch online services at no charge to the users. Other vendors were Hewlett Packard and their latest computers, printers, and scanners; Sprint and their high tech telephone communications essential to good genealogical research.

This NGS convention ends on Saturday afternoon, May 1st when things draw to a close for the vendors and all of the genealogists, both professional and hobbyists head back home. A good time has been had by all.

Many thanks to Tim at the Genealogy Assistant (http://www.thegenealogyassistant.com/) for taking this picture! Job well done!