Zalman Usiskin, who has been interested in genealogy for more than 50
years, will speak on 'Making a Family Tree Coffee Table Book' at the
Sunday, Feb. 22, 2015, meeting of the Jewish Genealogical Society of
Illinois at Temple Beth-El, 3610 Dundee Road, Northbrook. In his
presentation, which will begin at 2 p.m., he will explain how to
collect, collate and organize one large family tree into a handsome
volume worthy of calling a 'coffee table book'.

The JGSI meeting facilities at Temple Beth-El will open at 12:30 p.m. to
accommodate members who want to use or borrow genealogy library
materials, get help with genealogy websites, or ask genealogical
questions before the main program begins at 2 p.m. For more information,
visit http://jgsi.org/ or phone 312-666-0100.

There are many ways of letting people on a family tree know of their
ancestors and cousins. Some people put the information online. Others
have gedcom files that they distribute to interested relatives and
friends. In this talk, Usiskin, a mathematician, will describe how he created a
book, printed in 2010, that is centered around a tree of descendants of
one couple born in the early 19th century, Velvel and Chaya Rachel
Marinker, great-great-grandparents of the speaker. This presentation
will deal with such questions as how to organize 1,150 direct
descendants and over 2,200 total names in a coherent way, what features
to consider adding to a tree to make it more interesting, how desired
information might be obtained, and how to make the book 'look nice.'
The speaker is not a professional genealogist but has been interested in
the genealogy of the various branches of his family for over 50 years.
In 2002, he spoke to JGSI about writing and distributing a family tree.
His work on the tree, which is the subject of this talk, began in 1975.
The design of this tree book was created and implemented by Shira
Epstein, one of the descendants on the tree.

Submitted by Sandra Schon Kiferbaum
JGSI Publicity VP
events@...