User:WilliamsDa

Biography Darris G. Williams
I began tracing my family history in 1983 while stationed in England with the United States Air Force. During my three years in England I visited various archives in England and Wales.

After my time in England I began studies at Brigham Young University and eventually finished a degree in Family and Community History. I started work at the Family History Library in 1991 as a British Reference Consultant. Bert Rawlins, Paul Smart and and others mentored me extending my education well beyond what was available at university. The opportunity to attend a course in Welsh family history at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth under the direction of John and Sheila Rowlands helped mold my passion for Welsh family history.

I took the genealogical accreditation test for England administered by ICAPGen and after a few years of recovery took the Wales accreditation test passing it also.

In 2004 I transferred from the Family History Library to Worldwide Support where we provided support to family historians throughout the world. Our effort to develop wiki.familysearch.org started as a tool for providing better and more efficient research support.

In the fall of 2008 I transferred to the Collection Management team where priorities are set for acquiring and publishing digital records. A reorganization in December 2009 placed me on the Content Strategy team. My responsibilities have expanded from British to a much larger portion of the world's countries. Content Strategy helps FamilySearch prioritize records based on their ability to help researchers find ancestors.

Publications

 * Monumental inscriptions, Baran Welsh Independent Chapel, Llangyfelach
 * Monumental inscriptions, Capel y Gwrhyd, Llangiwg, Glamorgan
 * Monumental inscriptions, Saron Independent Chapel, Rhydyfro, Glamorgan
 * Material for the Genuki website
 * Material for wiki.familysearch.org

Conferences Attended
2020 Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy

2019 Roots Tech London

2017 British Institute: Scottish Family History Research by Bruce Durie

2012 Association of Professional Genealogists Professional Management Conference (1 February)

2011 Digital Past at Llandrindod Wells, Powys, Wales

2006 Putting Flesh on the Bones: A Study of the Common Man (1-5 September), University of Northampton, England. Sponsored by the Bedfordshire &amp; Northamptonshire Family History Societies in association with the Federation of Family History Societies

1996 Eleventh Family History in Wales Course at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth, Instructors: John Rowlands, Sheila Rowlands, Sandra Wheatley, Chris Pitt-Lewis, Muriel Bowen Evans, John Dilwyn Williams, Dr. Lewis Lloyd

Organizations

 * Society of Genealogists
 * Guild of One-Name Studies
 * Society for One-Place Studies
 * The Family & Community Historical Research Society
 * Utah Genealogical Association
 * Glamorgan Family History Society
 * Friends of the National Library of Wales
 * Welsh National Gymanfa Ganu Association

My Reading List
Michael Whitfield Foster. "A comedy of errors" or the marriage records of England and Wales 1837-1899 : throwing light for the first time on the story of the GRO records of the 19th century. Wellington, New Zealand : Michael W. Foster, 1998.

David Russell Barnes. People of Seion: Patterns of Nonconformity in Cardiganshire and Carmarthenshire in the century preceding the Religious Census of 1851. Llandysul: Gomer Press, 1995.

R. M. &amp; G. A. Benwell. Interpreting the Census Returns For Rural Anglesey And Llyn. Anglesey Antiquarian Society and Field Club Transactions (Denbigh: Gee &amp; Son, 1973), 111-136.

R. M. &amp; G. A. Benwell. Interpreting the Parish Registers and Bishop's Transcripts For Anglesey And Llyn. Anglesey Antiquarian Society and Field Club Transactions (Denbigh: Gee &amp; Son, 1975), 69-140.

Dafydd Ifans. Nonconformist Registers of Wales. Aberystwyth: National Library of Wales &amp; Welsh County Archivists' Group, 1994.

David Jenkins. The Agricultural Community in South-West Wales at the turn of the Twentieth Century. Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1971.

Major Francis Jones. An Approach To Welsh Genealogy, The Transactions Of The Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion Session 1948 (London: Honourable Society Of Cymmrodorion, 1949), 303-466.

 

Beginner: Wales

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