MCGS General Meeting

When
September 28, 2017
7:00 PM - 9:30 PM
Location
Marin Family History Center, 220 North San Pedro Rd., San Rafael

General Meeting:

“DNA Sleuthing - Case Study Lisa Jensen”

Presented by Barbara Rae-Venter

Thursday, Sept 28, 2017 at 7:00 pm

Barbara will discuss a project she is working on with the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Dept Crimes Against Children Detail, as an example of how to combine traditional genealogy and DNA methods to further your research.

This is the well-publicized cold case study in which the victim was kidnapped when she was approximately two years old in the early 1980s. She was recovered at about age five and is the only known survivor of the suspect. The suspect went to prison for murder. The Sheriff’s Dept has been back tracking the suspect for further victims and is trying to find out this victim’s real identity. Without an identity, her parents cannot be notified that she is alive. She was too young at the time of her abduction to know and/or communicate her name.

Barbara Rae-Venter is a volunteer at the Monterey Family History Center, and is involved with DNAAdoption.com, a site created for adoptees to find their birth parents through DNA. She has worked for about ten years on her own family history, which spans the globe from the British Isles to Canada, Australia and New Zealand. She uses primarily online research tools and has made extensive use of genetic testing of herself and multiple family members to supplement her research. She earned a B.A. in Psychology and Biochemistry and a Ph.D. in Biology from UC San Diego. She also has a J.D. from the University of Texas at Austin Law School.

Share & Tell - Members are encouraged to share stories of how DNA helped solve a family mystery or helped break through a brick wall.

About our Meetings:

The Genealogical Society General meetings are open to the public, with no admission fee. Feel free to drop in! Bring your friends as everyone is welcome. Come early and ask your burning genealogical questions of other members before the meeting.

We meet on the 4th Thursday of every month, with a couple of exceptions. November's meeting is held on the 3rd Thursday, due to Thanksgiving. There is no general meeting in May, due to our Annual Picnic, nor in December, due to the holidays and our Winter Holiday Party.

Annually, several of our regularly scheduled meetings have a certain focus: April, we hold our Annual General Meeting and Elections (but there's usually a presentation also); May of each year we hold an Anniversary Celebration or Annual Picnic; and in September, we have a workshop.