National Grigsby Family Society Grigsby Gazette Vol. 25, No. 1 March 2007 Editor’s Comments NGFS Presidents Report – New E-Mail Communications and 2008 Triennial Hello to all of you. Better communications to the membership was a subject of discus- The reprinting of The Smoked sion at the October 14th Board of Directors meeting at Memphis , Yank with this issue of the newslet- TN. Tom Grigsby, our past president, stepped up to the plate and ter. In the next couple of months, I volunteered to establish an e-mail list of all those members that are will have the full reprint of it to- gether and linked off of the page on the internet. This is a supplement to the newsletter, “the Grigsby for Melvin Grigsby. I did get a digi- Gazette”, the NGFS web-site www.grigsby.org and the internet chat tal copy of the book I was looking rooms. for, “Grigsby’s Cowboys: Third United States Volunteer Cavalry, Announcements of a general nature to all the membership will be Spanish-American War—A Histori- transmitted to the members on the list.. The announcements will be cal Review of the Regiment and information regarding upcoming Triennial and Southwest meetings, Compendium of Biographies of the sicknesses, deaths, NGFS projects, etc. This is a one- way commu- Noted Men Comprising the Same.” nication path, not a two-way path such as the chat rooms on While this is an interesting book Grigsby.org or [email protected]. The chat rooms are de- and continues the life of Melvin signed to promote a back and forth dialogue on Grigsby genealogy Grigsby, I don’t believe that it is suitable for reprint in the newslet- and history whereas this new list will be giving out information rela- ter. At some point, it will also be tive to the whole membership. make available on the website. Tom will be sending out a trial message soon so if you have just re- (Continued on page 3) cently gone on the web and now have an address, or if you have changed your address and not let the society know then drop Tom a What's Inside note [email protected]. Also contact him if you have an 2 Membership Renewal & Dues announcement that concerns the whole society. Increase 2 In the next issue of The Grigsby Another major decision made was the location and time of the 2008 Gazette Triennial. Reunions of this size now take much more advance plan- 2 DNA Testing ning and coordination than in the past so it requires that a place and a coordinator be selected about two years in advance. The Board 3 Melvin Grigsby’s book, part 6 selected the San Francisco area with the possibility of Napa Valley 4 The Smoked Yank, chapter XXIII being the location. Northern California is very important in Grigsby 6 The Smoked Yank, chapter XXIV history. 11 The Smoked Yank, chapter XXV This would be just the second time that the NGFS has had a Trien- 15 The Smoked Yank, chapter XXVI nial on the West coast, the other being at San Diego. The tentative 19 The Smoked Yank, Appendix time was set for July so that more families could attend. Tracy Knight 25 Analysis of Genealogical Data - volunteered to head up the Triennial but she will need help as she Chapters XXIII to Appendix of The doesn’t live in the San Francisco area, she lives in the state of Wash- Smoked Yank ington! Thanks Tracy! 27 New Internet Resources Available 28 List of Grigsby Obituaries I am sure that each of you will be hearing more from both the internet and the planning for the next Triennial very shortly! 32 Officers and Directors Brian Grigsby Grigsby Gazette 1 DNA Testing There has been some questions addressed to individuals about the possibility of DNA testing being performed by the society to help identify the lineage of unconnected lines. I have been doing a lot of research on this topic since it was first brought up and will have a briefing to the Board of Directors at the meeting in October. While it will be financially unfeasible to test all available members of the society, as well as impractical due to the restraints in the tests, there can be benefit to the society in selected targeted testing from each of the known lines. Of course, once a project is established, any member is free to participate on their own and I’m sure there will be quite a few who will want to. This type of testing will not necessarily identify the exact person who is the connection, but with targeted testing, each line can be reasonably certain of where the connection is established. Once the Board has been briefed, I will make the presentation available on the website for review; along with the Board’s decision. Matt Beard must pay. After much deliberation and soul searching Membership Renewal your Directors came to that conclusion at the October Board meeting in Memphis. Please check your mailing label on the envelope When the Society was chartered in 1981 the dues for a that this newsletter was delivered in. If the date sustaining member (annual dues) were set at $15.00.and states anything other than 2007, LIFE or HON, that figure has remained the same. Everyone knows that then your membership is past due. in twenty-five years-plus the cost of living has gone up significantly and, in fact, the costs have risen to an extent that the dues cannot support the operation of the Society. National Grigsby Family Society: For the past few years the expenses have been over a • $25 annually thousand dollars greater than the income. This is in spite of the fact that steps have been made to curb costs and Send to: that the Directors themselves donate much of the ex- Mrs. Judith Doughty pense of their positions, including their travel expenses to NGFS Administrator Board Meetings. 4418 Kiowa St. Pasadena, TX 77504 Some of the costs are associated with new services that were not even thought of when the society was formu- lated! For example, many of our genealogy files have Southwest Chapter: now been transferred to digital format and can be viewed • $12 annually through the internet on the Society website. The goal is the have all of the data archived in that manner. Other Send to: costs, such as printing and postage have skyrocketed Sharon Braden well past that of a quarter century ago. The Society re- 11525 400th St. serve funds were being depleted with no end in sight. Macedonia, IA 51549 Realizing that one of the primary duties of the Board of Directors is fiscal responsibility a unanimous decision Remember that the memberships in the National was made to increase the annual membership dues to Society and the Southwest Chapter are separate, $25.00 beginning with the 2007 year. While it is a signifi- but you must be a member of the National to be cant increase the dues are still below that of many other able to join the Southwest Chapter. similar organizations. This level of increase is felt to be sufficient to maintain the Society through the near term Dues Increase for 2007 It is the hope of your Directors that you, the members, will Brian Grigsby, NGFS President respond favorably to the new dues structure. Your sup- port is necessary to continue the activities of the Society One of the most difficult decisions that a Board of Direc- for you and your descendants. tors can make is to increase the dues that the members Grigsby Gazette 2 (Continued from page 1, Editor’s comments) If you have looked at the website recently, you will notice that I have began the “enhanced” version of the pedigrees. I have started with Immigrant John Grigsby and his children and have tried to identify source material and their correct documented nota- tions. Links to the source material can be found on the various pages, as well as, links to parents, spouses, and children. I have also inserted pictures when available. To the left is part of the display for Melvin Grigsby. There is a lot more for his material than can be displayed here. I will also be putting a map for each individual identi- fying the significant locations of events in their life. As I build these maps, I will also have a set that shows the migration of the Grigsby family across America. I would like to also expand this to include the Grigsby’s in other countries and try to show the connection to those lines. In the last issue, I discussed about needing help with the newsletter and there has been a recent volun- teer. I have not pursued this as I was trying to finish up this issue, but I hope to soon. There has also been a volunteer to host the Southwest Chapter’s reunion this summer and I hope to contact that indi- vidual before they receive this issue in the mail. A letter will be sent out to the chapter members with the details once they have been finalized. I will also put the information on the website. As we go into this summer, please remember that the society runs on volunteers doing each job. There will be some new Board of Directors needed for both the national and chapter levels. There also is a need for articles and stories to be sent in for the newsletter so that it is not dependent on only a couple of people.