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Discovering Your Roots

What is the value of knowing&sharing our family history?Author Lois Farley Shuford & African American Historical Genealogy Study Group of Evanston's Carole Boone discuss their journeys into the past.

What can we learn if we listen to our own ancestors?

October 11th -For the first session, local author Lois Farley Shuford will tell the story of a photograph that inspired a journey of discovery into her family's past. Searching for the path of her Irish great grandfather, Farley Shuford raises the question: what was life like for ordinary people in the midst of epic disaster, war, government mismanagement, and divisiveness? Carole Boone of the African American Historical Genealogy Study Group of Evanston discusses how she got interested in her family history and how you can start to gather your family's information.

October 21st - For part two: Who are those ancestors whose DNA we carry? Come and learn new approaches to research and share your own family history stories. In this 90 minute workshop, we'll talk about how to find those elusive ancestors, the life they lived and why it matters. You'll leave with practical research tools and a renewed appreciation for those who have gone before us. Please bring a loved one to share this experience and knowledge with! 

Carole Boone has been doing Genealogy research since 2020. She is the Co-Chair of the AAHGSGE and the Coordinator of the eighteen month grant
the group received for The Family Sleuth Project. She is also a member of the Afro-American Genealogical History Society of
Chicago and the Coordinator of the NC/SC/GA Study Group in the Society.

Lois Farley Shuford is the author of Finding Home: An Irish American Story. Recently released, this creative non-fiction book braids memoir, history and the unwinding of a 100 year old mystery. Finding Home was described by author and Bloomberg investigative reporter Lauren Etter, as “a moving and poetic tale told with the humor and grace of a story teller, the doggedness of an investigative journalist and the incisiveness of a historian.” Farley Shuford has worked in education for many years, most recently at the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. She lives in Evanston, Illinois.

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