Monthly Program for August

Session 1 presented by Colin Whitney, " California Pioneer Certificate Program"

The California Pioneer Certificate Program is a lineage program honoring early California Pioneers related to selected key historic events: California Statehood, the Gold Rush, the iconic California Missions, and the San Francisco Earthquake of 1906. This talk will provide an overview of California's early history, the records available, where to find them, and a discussion of the features and benefits of the program.

Session 2 presented by Dona Ritchie and Nancy Sprotte, " Early California History and its Pioneers"

The lives of early California pioneers available through biographies and autobiographies provide a glimpse into the daily lives of some settlers. We will provide examples of those heroic individuals illustrating the conditions they encountered as they helped shape this state.

PRESENTER WEBPAGE       

Biographies:

Colin Whitney was born in London, England, and emigrated to the United States in the 1960s to study at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology where he received a Ph.D. in physics and a professorship in the Electrical Engineering Department. From there he accepted a research position in Massachusetts at the Central Research Laboratory of a major corporation.  His research interests brought him to California in the 1970s where he joined an aerospace company. He retired as the Technical Director of an 11,000-person organization.

He has presented technical papers across the globe, including the United States, Mexico City, London, Stockholm, and Grenoble, and holds numerous patents. He was an active participant in several prestigious conferences, such as the Government sponsored Infrared Imaging Symposium (IRIS) in Washington DC in 1998 and 1999. He was a session chair and member of the paper selection committee for the Third NATO/IRIS Joint Symposium in Quebec in 1998. He also hosted the 1998 IRIS Specialty Group in Arizona and chaired both the 1998 and 1999 Electro-Optical Technology Conferences in Washington, DC and El Segundo, California.

Since his retirement, he has attended many major genealogy conferences over the years, such as RootsTech, the National Genealogical Society (NGS) Conference in Sacramento, CA, the Federation of Genealogical Societies (FGS) Conference in Fort Wayne, IN, the I4GG Conference in San Diego, CA, and the Southern California Genealogical Society Conference, Jamboree, in Los Angeles, CA. In 2023 he presented at the Allen County Public Library Lectures Series in Fort Wayne and his work in genealogy was featured in the San Diego Tribune. He has presented genealogical papers to over twenty genealogical organizations including the Southern California Genealogical Society Jamboree Webinar Series in 2024. That year, he presented at the American Library Association Conference in San Diego and the Irish Genealogical Research Society in Dublin, Ireland.

Since joining the San Diego Genealogical Society in 2018, where he is a Board member, Colin has helped expand its educational opportunities and continues to lead the British Isles, the DNA, and the Ask a Genealogist Groups. He also founded and chairs the California Pioneer Certificate Program, an early California lineage program which has attracted over a dozen partner organizations.

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Dona Hale Ritchie has been researching her family history, and that of her husband,
for over 40 years, tracing Colonial New England roots, Quakers and Mennonites, German and Swiss ancestors, Welsh and Scots-Irish.

She was also a desktop publisher/graphic artist for many years, and gained skills in that field that have allowed her to help a number of people publish their family history books (editing and designing the books for printing) and to restore many old photographs for herself and others. She has taught a number of classes for various societies around San Diego County, led several long term Special Interest Groups, and served in positions with the German Research Association, Computer Genealogy Society, British Isles Genealogical Society, and SDGS.

Although she has no early California roots (nor does her husband's family), she is proud to be a Californian and to help share the stories of its pioneers and help those researching their history.

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Nancy Sprotte has been doing family research since middle school. Luckily, she had a great aunt and a grandmother who had saved material that would help with the research. A mystery 2^nd great grandfather was found through a DNA match, leading that line back to a Revolutionary War patriot. She can now show a fan chart with 5 previous generations completed and some lines going back 10 generations to early New England and Virginia.

A long-time member of the San Diego Genealogy Society, Nancy has served on the Audit Committee and is an alternate on the Nominating Committee; she also participates with the Reunion Users Group and the German Interest Group. Nancy is a charter member of the California Pioneer Certificate Program Committee and has received an Earthquake Survivor certificate for her second great grandmother.

Nancy’s other main interest is travel. Some has been for family research, but most of her travel has been to explore the world. Her most recent adventure was to Mongolia.

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