Writing Your Family Legacy Conference LEARN HOW TO RESEARCH, WRITE AND PRESERVE YOUR FAMILY LEGACY. Share the expertise of nationally renowned authors, genealogists and editors, including Will Weaver, Peg Meier, Annette Atkins, Kathryn Kysar and Joel Turnipseed. SAT., SEPT. 12, 2015 Minnesota History Center, St. Paul

SCHEDULE AT A GLANCE 9 AM

Conference check-in begins

9:30 AM Keynote address with Will Weaver

Keynote by Will Weaver:

10:45 AM Breakout Session One:

FAMILY MATTERS

• Legacy Writing: Captured Moments for

Future Generations (W, L)

• Finding a Life in the Records (G, R)



• The Stories Things Tell (W)



• Introduction to Gale Family Library Resources (G, R)



• Behind-the-Scenes Library Tour (G, R)

12 Noon

Lunch

1 PM

Breakout Session Two:



• Finding the Story in Your Family Stories (W, L)



• Rewriting Our Myths (W)



• Adding Leaves and Flowers to the Branches of

Your Family Tree (W, G, R)

• Sisters, Aunts, Mothers - Women in Your Family Tree (G, R)



• Behind-the-Scenes Library Tour (G, R)

2:15 PM

Breakout Session Three:



• Front Page, Lonely Voice (W, L)



• Building a House History (G, R)



• Family Feasts: Fact or Fiction? (W, R)



• Working with a Publisher (W)



• Behind-the-Scenes Library Tour (G, R)

3:30 PM

Next Steps for Legacy Writers

Will Weaver is an award-winning fiction writer. His 2010 memoir, The Last Hunter, is an examination of personal identity through writing about family. All families are different, but Weaver will offer ideas and share tips on how to clarify personal legacy through writing. These include our need to accept, forgive and celebrate in order to write the full—and true— story of who we are. Bio: Will Weaver’s debut novel, Red Earth, White Earth, explored the culture clash between white farmers (Weaver’s own background) and local Native Americans. His 1989 short story collection, A Gravestone Made of Wheat and Other Stories, won many awards, including the Minnesota Book Award for Fiction. The title story was produced in 2006 as the independent feature film Sweet Land, featuring Ned Beatty. He has also won numerous awards for his young adult fiction. Formerly an English professor at Bemidji State University, Mr. Weaver lives in northern Minnesota, a region he writes from and loves. He is an avid outdoorsman and would-be pianist.

SESSION FOCUS KEY W: Writing L: Writing with The Loft Literary Center

G: Genealogy

R: Research Writing Your Family Legacy Conference

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BREAKOUT SESSION ONE: 10:45-11:45 AM

103: The Stories Things Tell

101: Legacy Writing: Captured Moments for Future Generations

Peg Meier and Annette Atkins have both written and published extensively on Minnesota history. Both identify stories as the most meaningful way into (and out of) the past. In this hands-on workshop, Peg and Annette will talk about the storymaking and story-inspiring nature of photographs and objects and offer examples of how to use such things in telling your own stories.

Are you determined to write your life stories, but find yourself overwhelmed or unsure of how to proceed? In this session, you will learn how to construct written vignettes or “captured moments” of your life. Brenda Hudson, PhD, will guide you in practical and creative ways to help you write, using a number of journaling techniques. At the end of class, you will have a “captured moment” or two and the know-how to continue your legacy writing. Bio: Brenda Hudson is a teacher, editor, writer and a credentialed journaling instructor through the Center for Journey Therapy. She holds an MS in journalism from Boston University, and a PhD in rhetoric from the University of Minnesota’s Department of Writing Studies. Helping others express themselves through writing is her passion. She regularly offers classes in legacy writing at the Loft Literary Center and through Voiced Life.com. FOCUS: WRITING WITH THE LOFT

102: Finding a Life in the Records Good family history should be much more than a collection of birth, marriage and death dates and places. It should be a tapestry of life stories enriched with as much detail as possible. These details are to be found in the whole array of records created over a person’s life. These include vital and church records, records of land dealings, military service, tax payments, court cases, births/deaths of children, the daily weather, local and national events, organizations joined, and of course wills and probate. There are many lives rich in details waiting to be discovered in the records. Bio: Tom Rice is a full-time genealogy researcher, lecturer and writer. His research focus is on families who have settled in or passed through the upper Midwest. He also researches Ireland, Scotland, England and Scandinavia.

Bios: Peg Meier wrote for the Star Tribune for 35 years. She has researched and written seven books including three drawn largely from historical photographs: Bring Warm Clothes; Too Hot, Went to Lake; and Wishing for a Snow Day. Bring Warm Clothes is one of the best selling books on Minnesota history. In 2011 she edited the 1927 diary of 13-year old Coco Irving when Irving lived in what is now the Minnesota governor’s residence on Summit Avenue. The History Theatre turned it into “Coco’s Diary” and presented it in its 2012 season. Annette Atkins taught history at Saint John’s University/ College of Saint Benedict for 34 years. Now she teaches regularly for the Selim Center at the University of Saint Thomas and Alexandria Senior College. She has written numerous articles and four books, including Creating Minnesota: A History from the Inside Out, a history of the state. In addition to letters, newspapers, diaries and genealogy, she uses objects—shoes, maps and food, for example—as paths into understanding the past (and our connection to it). In 2015 she received a Minnesota Historical and Cultural Heritage Grant to offer a writing workshop for MNHS staff.

104: Introduction to Gale Family Library Resources The library contains an amazing array of sources for finding your family history; looking into the history of your house, business, organization or neighborhood; or just finding out more about Minnesota’s rich past. This class will highlight the variety of family history resources and collections that can be found at the library. You’ll also get tips on getting started on your research, using the catalogs/ databases and accessing materials.

FOCUS: GENEALOGY, RESEARCH

Bio: Brigid Shields is a reference librarian at the Gale Family Library. She has an MA in library science from the University of Minnesota. She has attended national and local conferences regarding genealogy/family history and has presented to many local groups and organizations on the topic of family history research at the library. She enjoys working with family history researchers and helping them connect with their past. FOCUS: GENEALOGY, RESEARCH

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105: Behind-the-Scenes Library Tour

202: Rewriting Our Myths

Collecting since 1849, the Minnesota Historical Society’s Gale Family Library is the world’s premier library for research about Minnesota’s people, places, history and culture. Join a staff-led tour of this impressive collection featuring 500,000 volumes, directories, atlases and plat books of the state, along with the largest collection in the world of Minnesota fiction, works from local private presses and nearly every newspaper published in the state.

We have family stories that shape who we are; some of these stories are funny while others are tragic; some are secrets while others are retold to new generations; and those stories most memorable become family myths. No matter whichever culture, religion, race, gender or socio-economic background you are from, family myths are the body of stories and legends that people perceive as being an integral part of their identity. This session will focus on writing down your family myths. Through a series of interactive writing exercises, participants will focus on bringing one family myth to life through creative writing. Using the myth framework of mythologist Joseph Campbell (1904-1987), this critical examination of the power of myths is designed to help participants tell their story in unique ways.

FOCUS: GENEALOGY, RESEARCH

BREAKOUT SESSION TWO: 1-2 PM 201: Finding the Story in Your Family Stories You have a multitude of wonderful stories from your family’s past; perhaps you have even begun to gather these stories together. But how do you shape this material into a compelling narrative? Sometimes it’s a matter of finding a thread that runs through it all. Discovering a hidden shape under the surface of the past is a joy for both writer and reader. Bringing that shape to the surface can be the key to avoiding a dull chronology (and then this happened, and then and then…). In this breakout session we will look at examples of contemporary writers who’ve written compelling multigenerational stories. Participants will then explore themes or patterns that emerge in their own family story. Bio: Laura Flynn is the author of Swallow the Ocean—a memoir of growing up in the face of her mother’s catastrophic mental illness (Counterpoint, 2008). Swallow the Ocean was a finalist for the Minnesota Book Award and a BookSense Notable Pick for March 2008. She was born and raised in San Francisco, California, received her BA from Wesleyan University and her MFA in creative writing from the University of Minnesota. She was a participant in the 2006/2007 Loft Mentor Series, a recipient of a 2008 Jerome/SASE Award for emerging artists, and a 2009/2010 Bush Foundation Artist Fellow. She is the editor of Eyes of the Heart: Seeking a Path for the Poor in the Age of Globalization by Jean-Bertrand Aristide (Common Courage Press, 2000). Her essay “Carrefour” was selected for The Best Women’s Travel Writing 2011 (Traveler’s Tales). She teaches in the graduate creative writing program at Hamline University and at the Loft Literary Center. FOCUS: WRITING WITH THE LOFT

Bio: Ka Vang is a Hmong American writer, born on a CIA military base, Long Cheng, Laos, at the end of the Vietnam War. A fiction writer, poet, playwright and former journalist, Vang has devoted much of her professional life to capturing Hmong folktales on paper. She is the author of the children’s book Shoua and the Northern Lights Dragon, a finalist for the 23rd Annual Midwest Book Awards in 2012. She is included in several Minnesota Historical Press anthologies including Bamboo Among the Oaks and Riding Shotgun: Women Write about their Mothers. She is a recipient of the Archibald Bush Artist Fellowship and several other artistic and leadership awards. She was recognized in the book Hmong History Makers (published by Holt DcDougal) for her work collecting and preserving Hmong folklore from the Hmong people across the globe from Australia to Germany. FOCUS: WRITING

203: Adding Leaves and Flowers to the Branches of Your Family Tree When you’ve done your genealogy research and collected basic data about your ancestors, how do you make their stories seem interesting? What can you do to move beyond just the birth, marriage and death dates? This workshop will give you ideas for turning those family group sheets into fascinating stories that your family and friends will want to read. Bio: Linda Coffin has been doing genealogy research for more than thirty years as a hobby, while pursuing a career in publication design. In 2004, she discovered the field of personal history and started her business, HistoryCrafters, to help save individual, family, business and community histories in print formats. Personal history combines Linda’s business skills with her beloved genealogy and is definitely the most rewarding work she has ever done. FOCUS: WRITING, GENEALOGY, RESEARCH

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204: Sisters, Aunts, Mothers - Women in Your Family Tree Adding female ancestors to a family tree can be challenging. But women’s lives also produce unique sources and clues to unlock family history. Come take a new and deeper look at your research problems by focusing on the women in the family! Bio: Alice Eichholz, PhD, CG, is a nationally known family history researcher, writer and adult educator. She is best known for her publication Ancestry’s Redbook: American State, County, and Town Sources (Provo, UT: Ancestry, Inc., 2003) and as a mentor to doctoral students at Walden University. FOCUS: GENEALOGY, RESEARCH

205: Behind-the-Scenes Library Tour Collecting since 1849, the Minnesota Historical Society’s Gale Family Library is the world’s premier library for research about Minnesota’s people, places, history and culture. Join a staff-led tour of this impressive collection featuring 500,000 volumes, directories, atlases and plat books of the state along with the largest collection in the world of Minnesota fiction, works from local private presses and nearly every newspaper published in the state. FOCUS: GENEALOGY, RESEARCH

BREAKOUT SESSION THREE: 2:15-3:15 PM 301: Front Page, Lonely Voice It’s daunting to think about your own life in the context of history’s “big events:” the wars and floods, politics and protests that make up our front pages. Even if we are a part of or witness to those events, those of us inclined toward writing memoirs probably weren’t the movers and shakers behind “the news” as it happened. Moreover, there is always the problem of other people—like war, they may or may not be hell, but they sure do complicate our stories. But it’s a big mistake to think that this places our stories at a discount—or that we should shy away from telling them as we experienced them. This workshop will explore the power of what Frank O’Connor calls “the lonely voice” in literature—and how using it in your own life story can make the biggest news of all: the singular experience of seeing the world through another’s eyes.

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Writing Your Family Legacy Conference

Bio: Joel Turnipseed studied philosophy at the University of Minnesota and served as a Marine in the Persian Gulf War. His memoir, Baghdad Express (Borealis Books/Penguin), was a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers selection and a finalist for the Minnesota Book Award. He got his start as a writer by winning one of The Loft’s Creative Nonfiction Mentor Series awards 20 years ago—and has since won awards from The Minnesota State Arts Board and the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference. His work has appeared in Granta, GQ, The New York Times Book Review, The New York Times Magazine, Rain Taxi, Revolver, Salon.com, Star-Tribune, Virginia Quarterly Review and many other publications. FOCUS: WRITING WITH THE LOFT

302: Building a House History Investigating the history of some of the significant homes where family members lived can yield another dimension to the story of your family and may provide additional information and avenues for research. The history of the building, its architecture and construction, and the stories surrounding a family’s tenure there can reveal more about the living conditions, neighbors and other tenants, a family’s economic circumstances, and in some cases, the family’s changes to the structure, which reflect their skills and heritage. Bio: Tracey Baker has masters degrees in women’s history and library science. She worked at the Minnesota Historical Society in a variety of positions, and retired as head of reference in June. She served for seven years on the Saint Paul Heritage Preservation Commission, including one year as chair, and was a founding board member of Historic Saint Paul. She was a member of the development team for Placeography, a wiki where anyone can share information about the history of buildings. Tracey has spoken to a variety of groups about house history and developed the online House and Building History research guide available on the MNHS website. FOCUS: GENEALOGY, RESEARCH

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303: Family Feasts: Fact or Fiction? A conversation with poet Heid Erdrich and historian Debbie Miller about how to talk and write about food traditions. Bios: Debbie Miller is a historian and aficionado of community cookbooks who works as a reference specialist at the Minnesota Historical Society. She is the co-author of Potluck Paradise: Favorite Fare from Church and Community Cookbooks. Heid E. Erdrich writes, teaches and collaborates with other artists across genres. She is the author of four poetry collections, most recently Cell Traffic: New and Selected Poems. A recipient of awards from The Loft Literary Center, the Archibald Bush Foundation, Minnesota State Arts Board and First People’s Fund, among other honors, Heid won a Minnesota Book Award for National Monuments in 2009. She is a 2013 Artist of the Year honoree from City Pages Minneapolis. Heid’s newest book, Original Local: Indigenous Foods Stories and Recipes from the Upper Midwest, was a 2014 City Pages Top 10 Food Book. FOCUS: WRITING, RESEARCH

Kathryn Kysar is the author of two books of poetry, Dark Lake and Pretend the World, and she edited Riding Shotgun: Women Write About Their Mothers, published by MNHS Press. She has received fellowships from Banfill-Locke Center for the Arts, the Minnesota State Arts Board, National Endowment for the Humanities and the Anderson Center for Interdisciplinary Studies. Kysar serves on the board of directors for Rain Taxi Review and teaches classes about publication at Anoka-Ramsey Community College, Hamline University and The Loft Literary Center. She lives with her family in St. Paul. Will Weaver is an award-winning fiction writer. His debut novel, Red Earth, White Earth, explored the culture clash between white farmers (Weaver’s own background) and local Native Americans. His 1989 short story collection, A Gravestone Made of Wheat and Other Stories, won many awards, including the Minnesota Book Award for Fiction. The title story was produced in 2006 as the independent feature film Sweet Land, featuring Ned Beatty. He has also won numerous awards for his young adult fiction. Formerly an English professor at Bemidji State University, Mr. Weaver lives in northern Minnesota, a region he writes from and loves. He is an avid outdoorsman and would-be pianist.

304: Working with a Publisher You’re starting to write your family’s story, and you’re wondering about sharing it more broadly. Two writers and an editor address some of the questions that arise along the way. How do you give yourself permission to publish—and prepare yourself for what family members may think or say? Are there specific ways in which you can make your manuscript more appealing to wider audiences? And what is involved in working with a publisher, who may ask you to make changes in your own story? Bios: Ann Regan is editor in chief at the Minnesota Historical Society Press—the oldest publisher in the state and the largest historical society press in the country—where she has worked for many years. She works closely with authors to develop their manuscripts into books.

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Writing Your Family Legacy Conference

FOCUS: WRITING

305: Behind-the-Scenes Library Tour Collecting since 1849, the Minnesota Historical Society’s Gale Family Library is the world’s premier library for research about Minnesota’s people, places, history and culture. Join a staff-led tour of this impressive collection featuring 500,000 volumes, directories, atlases and plat books of the state along with the largest collection in the world of Minnesota fiction, works from local private presses and nearly every newspaper published in the state. FOCUS: GENEALOGY, RESEARCH

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BECOME A MEMBER

The Minnesota Historical Society MNHS preserves Minnesota’s past, shares our stories and connects people to history. Your membership support helps MNHS use the power of history to transform lives. Learn more at mnhs.org/members or call 651-259-3131.

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ACCESSIBILITY ASL interpreters are available upon request with a minimum of three weeks’ notice. Call 651-259-3400 for more information. Wheelchairs are available at no charge on a first-come, first-served basis from the ticketing desk on Floor 1. Electric scooters are also available with valid ID. For more information about accessibility see minnesotahistorycenter.org/accessibility

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