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Sunday, March 29, 2026 SFBAJGS Presentation ZOOM Free and everyone interested is welcome. Time and Place: 1:00 pm until 2:30 pm, Pacific Time At Your Home Topic: Unlock Hidden Family Records with FamilySearch's AI-powered Full-Text Search Speaker: Todd Knowles Todd Knowles will dive into FamilySearch's powerful new Full-Text Search feature and show you how to use it to uncover records you never knew existed. This tool can help you by searching the entire contents of historical documents — not just the indexed parts but unindexed text also. Full-Text Search reads through millions of scanned documents, such as handwritten records and old letters. If your ancestor's name was not included in the index, you might not ever think to look at a document, but Full-Text Search reads every word, note, and scribble in that document. You can now discover hidden family connections, mentions in court records, and names tucked into wills, land deeds, and old meeting notes. You are no longer limited by what appears in the index. (Like what Google used to do!) W. Todd Knowles is a Deputy Chief Genealogical Officer at FamilySearch, where he has been for 23 years. After being introduced to family history at the age of 11, he soon discovered his Jewish roots. The journey to find his Polish Jewish ancestors led to the creation of the Knowles Collection (https://knowlescollection.blogspot.com/), six databases that now contain the genealogical records of almost 1.5 million people. Todd is a former president of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Utah. Todd has spoken throughout the world and his articles have been widely published. Register for this meeting. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting. You do not have to have a Zoom account to attend a Zoom meeting. You will be prompted to download the software, once you have clicked on the link that you have been provided. You may also wish to create an account, but that is not required to participate in a Zoom meeting.

Que sera sera

 

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