Beyond the Blue Mountains: They Came with a Dream, Their Descendants Followed — Barbara Vines Little

SESSION: NGS2104-LV-01 DATE & TIME: Wednesday, 19 May 2021 at 11:15 a.m.

Barbara Vines Little’s session will focus on where our Virginia ancestors lived and traveled to over time.

Early migration to Virginia was primarily from across the sea or from the north. Some remained for a generation—sometimes many generations—before they moved on primarily to the south and west.

Success in tracking migrating Virginians requires an understanding of the geography and the available transportation routes (roads, canals, etc.) as well as the impact of ethnicity, economics, war, and other events. Our exploration will lead us down many pathways—narrow trails, wide (and narrow) rivers, roads, ferries, fords, bridges and canals; barriers—mountains, rivers and swamps, and even rouges who preyed on the unwary. But most of all we’ll look for the links that bring us home again to Virginia.

Join us as we travel the tracks of our ancestors and look Beyond the Blue Mountains!

BIO: BARBARA VINES LITTLE, CG, FNGS, FUGA, FVGS, professional genealogist, has lectured over the past thirty years at conferences in thirty-two states on research methodology, Virginia and West Virginia resources and writing and publishing. Editor of the quarterly Magazine of Virginia Genealogy since 1996 and winner of the NGS Quarterly Award of excellence in 2001, she has written articles for a number of publications including the New England Historical and Genealogical Register, the National Genealogical Society Newsletter, the Board for Certification of Genealogists’ newsletter, OnBoard; and the Association of Professional Genealogists Quarterly. The current editor of National Genealogical Society’s Research in the States series, she is the author of the West Virginia volume and has published three volumes of Virginia court records and edited others for publication. She served as coordinator and instructor for VIGR (Virginia Institute of Genealogical Research) Track II, 1996–2004 and as the coordinator and instructor of the Virginia track for Samford University’s Institute for Genealogy and Historical Research from 2007–2012 and the 2017 and 2020 Virginia track at SLIG (Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy). A member of the board of the Library of Virginia and a former board member of the Orange County Historical Society, she is a former board member and president of both the National Genealogical Society and the Virginia Genealogical Society.

To learn more about the NGS 2021 Virtual Family History Conference’s week-long events, 17-21 May, visit the conference and download a copy of the program brochure. A discounted Early Bird registration fee is available through 15 March 2021.