By Reece Hanzon
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints will host its ninth annual Hispanic Family History Conference this Friday and Saturday, (Oct. 13-14, 2006) at the Family History Library, located just west of Temple Square in Salt Lake City.
The Friday session will concentrate on more advanced research methods and issues, while the Saturday session will begin at 9:30 a.m. and will concentrate on the basics of family history research and recording.
Attendees will have the option of participating in several different classes, depending on what they want to learn.
Options include classes on how to begin family research, research helps, Latin American resources, Spanish internet resources, how to find records in Spain and Latin America and a hands-on computer workshop.
Legado Latino, a nonprofit organization that promotes Hispanic genealogical re-search, originally organized the conference, in cooperation with BYU.
The goal of the conference is to help Hispanics gain access to and learn how to use family history resources.
“The main problem is that they don”t know where to start,” said Carlos Alvarez, co-president of Legado Latino. “They feel they don”t have the time.”
Ruth Gomez, collection management specialist for Latin America at the Family History Library, said the conference generally attracts crowds of 200-300 people.
In the past, the conference has included an English language track. This year, however, the conference will be taught entirely in Spanish.
