The Wait is Over! Their Roots Are Showing Tonight at the Del Valle Theater

After a year of preparation, hundreds of hours of research and planning by more than eighty volunteers and affiliated societies, and the Herculean efforts of the leadership team, Their Roots Are Showing! is tonight.

Don't miss this special night of surprise and discovery for our three Bay Area celebrity guests: Billy Beane, Vice President and General Manager of the Oakland Athletics; Natalie Coughlin, winner of twelve Olympic medals and most-decorated female medalist of all time; and Tim "Herb" Alexander, drummer for the Grammy-nominated rock band Primus. 

Prior to the show, at 7:00 a.m., there will be the silent auction of memorabilia donated by our celebrities. In addition, members of the society will be on-site to answer questions about discovering your own family roots.

I've included the map graphic above because we've become aware of some confusion about the venue. The show is at the Del Valle Theatre, 1963 Tice Valley Boulevard, Walnut Creek, California. 

7:00 p.m. – Doors open and the Silent Auction begins

7:30 p.m. – Doors open for seating

8:00 p.m. – Silent Auction ends and curtain up.

The show runs approximately 90 minutes.

Tickets are still available online at the Lesher website or you can purchase them tonight at the door at the Del Valle Theater. See you there!

Copyright © 2013 by Kathryn M. Doyle, California Genealogical Society and Library.

San Francisco Bay Area Genealogy Calendar: November 2013 Published

November 2013 events have been published on the San Francisco Bay Area Genealogy Calendar – a collection of local genealogical society classes, workshops and meetings within a 75 mile radius of San Francisco.

The November calendar lists twenty-five events at various venues around the Bay Area, sponsored by thirty societies, libraries and archives.

If you would like to add your group's events to the calendar, please email the information by the 15th of each month. (Please include "SFBA Calendar" in the subject line.)


Copyright © 2013 by Kathryn M. Doyle, California Genealogical Society and Library.

Genealogy Field Trip to Oakland Main Public Library

Wednesday, November 20, 2013
11:00 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.

Oakland Public Library – Main
125 Fourteenth Street
Oakland, California 94612

For members only!

Join Past-president Jane Lindsey for a tour of the Oakland Main Library. Senior Librarian Kathleen DiGiovianni and Dorothy Lazard, Principal Librarian in the Oakland History Room, will discuss the resources available at the Oakland Public Library to assist you with your family research.

The Oakland History Room is an important center for the study of the history and current development of the East Bay. Its collection contains a wide variety of materials relating to the history of Oakland and the larger Bay Area, including books, magazines, pamphlets, newspaper clippings, photographs, postcards, sheet music, trade catalogs, and scrapbooks. Following the ninety-minute tour, you are encouraged to stay and do research on your own. The library is open until 8:00 p.m. on Wednesdays.

Metered street parking is available in the area and there are several public parking lots nearby, including at the Oakland Museum.

Register online.

This field trip is organized for members of the California Genealogical Society. The maximum group size is thirty members.

There is no fee for the field trip but preregistration is required. Registration confirmations will be sent to the first thirty registrants. Additional names will be collected and placed on a waiting list in case of cancellations.

About the Main Library

Located between downtown and Lake Merritt, Oakland's Main Library is one of the largest public library facilities in the Bay Area. In addition to large collections of over 350,000 reference and circulating non-fiction and fiction books, the Main Library offers hundreds of current and historic magazines and newspapers, a major collection of sheet music, and thousands of maps.

There are federal, state, and local government publications and a large collection of compact discs, videocassettes, DVDs, and audiobooks. Oakland Main is home to the Oakland History Room, a significant resource on the history of the area, a large and active Children's Room, and the TeenZone.

The branch is equipped with thirty-three computers with Internet access available for public use, available on a drop-in, first-come, first-served basis. Adaptive technology is available, including screen readers and enlargers for those who are blind or who have low vision or learning disabilities.

Copyright © 2013 by Kathryn M. Doyle, California Genealogical Society and Library.

Their Roots Are Showing Silent Auction: Be Keen – Buy Beane!

Come One – Come All – to our 2013 fundraiser: Their Roots Are Showing!

AND come early and bid often at the Silent Auction that precedes the on-stage presentation.

Your ticket to the show gives you bidding rights on a number of items generously donated by our celebrities for this event. The doors open and the bidding begins at 7:00 p.m., on Saturday, October 26, 2013.

For you baseball fans out there, Billy Beane (General Manager of the Oakland A’s and the subject of the bestselling book and movie, Moneyball) has generously donated such items as:

• The Game Suite (seats between 8-12 people) at the Oakland Coliseum for a 2014 Oakland A’s game – with Billy Beane in attendance for the 1st 30 minutes!! 
• An Oakland A’s team jersey, signed by the whole 2013 team 
• Signed copies of Moneyball—both the hard cover book and the DVD 
• Billy Beane’s personal rookie baseball card (his last one)—personally autographed for the winning bidder at the show!! 

The silent auction also feature items from Natalie Coughlin and Tim "Herb" Alexander. These items were donated by our celebrities for the benefit of this 2013 fundraising event—so come early and bid often!

For more information and to purchase tickets online, visit the Lesher theater website.


Photographs by Todd Armstrong.

Copyright © 2013 by Kathryn M. Doyle, California Genealogical Society and Library.

Their Roots Are Showing Silent Auction: Alexander’s Drum Beats

Autographed Primus and Tim "Herb" Alexander memorabilia

Curtain’s up at 8 p.m. Saturday, October 26, 2013, for our 2013 fundraising event, Their Roots Are Showing!

Don’t miss this chance to see live, on stage, three Bay-Area celebrities (Billy Beane, Natalie Coughlin, and Tim “Herb” Alexander) learn about ancestors they never knew of – and benefit the California Genealogical Society Library at the same time.

But wait, there’s more: Doors open at 7:00 p.m. for the Silent Auction of celebrity-signed memorabilia! Only ticket holders are eligible to bid in the auction. If you haven’t done so yet, purchase your tickets today!

For you rockers out there, Tim "Herb" Alexander, world-ranked drummer and member of the recently reunited rock band Primus, has donated:

• Drum cymbals
• Primus CD: Miscellaneous Debris
• Primus CD: Suck on This
• Primus DVD: Hallucino-Genetics, Live 2004

All the above items were personally autographed by Tim Alexander for this event.

The silent auction will also feature items donated by Natalie Coughlin and Billy Beane.

Tickets are going fast, so purchase yours online today at the Lesher website.

Photograph by Todd Armstrong. 

Copyright © 2013 by Kathryn M. Doyle, California Genealogical Society and Library.