Symposium Success!

The first ever Scottish Symposium hosted by the Scottish Special Interest Group of the Ontario Genealogical Society was held in Vaughan on Friday August 22, and by all accounts it was a rousing success!

The day started off with Piper Rory Sinclair leading the procession of speakers into the hall. Once the speakers were in and seated, Rory played a medley of Old Scottish Tunes and then asked the audience to name the songs he had played. It was a brilliant start to the day.

 

The opening welcome address was given by Anne Moir, president of the Toronto St Andrew's Society who gave an overview of the Society and its roll in assisting Scottish immigrants in settling in the Toronto area.

 

Our first lecture was on Basic Scottish Research and was given by James FS Thomson. James is always very thorough and provided a number of very helpful, very useful places to research in our attempts to find out more about our Scottish ancestors.

 

Our next speaker was Linda Reid who talked about a Scottish Pedigree and how she has used DNA to assist her in her genealogical research. Linda also provided a terrific amount of information for us to use in our quest to find our Scots ancestors.

 

photo courtesy L-D Crawley

 

Before we knew it, it was lunch time.

 

photo courtesy L-D Crawley

  

This gave the participants time to browse the marketplace.

photo courtesy L-D Crawley

photo courtesy Sandra Joyce

 And then it was time to return to the big hall for the afternoon lectures. First up was Dr Kevin James who spoke about why our ancestors left Scotland and things to consider when trying to understand what compelled our ancestors to leave their homeland and make a new life for themselves in Canada.

photo courtesy L-D Crawley

 

 Next up was Ruth Blair who gave us some very useful information of searching for our Ulster Scots ancestors.

 

 

photo courtesy L-D Crawley



  

 

Another short break and it was time for the last lecture of the day. Christine Woodcock gave us an overview of various online and offline databases to consider in searching for our Scots Emigrant Ancestor.

 

  

Our next SIG event will be a bus trip to the University of Guelph Library and Archives to see their very large collection of Scottish documents and books. This will likely take place in the spring. We are already looking forward to the trip.

 

One great thing about any gathering of the descendants of the Scots Diaspora is that when they get together there is ALWAYS great craic!