In today’s edition, Emily Donohoe speaks to Echuca-Moama Family History Group.
From tracing back family trees 1000 years to group tours across the region, history buffs have a place in Moama’s Old Telegraph Station.
Echuca-Moama Family History Group provides residents with the tools and guidance to research their genealogy.
Since the first official meeting in June 1980, John Howe has been involved in the group, which began so members could learn how to uncover their family history.
“It was originally formed for the members to learn how to research their families, basically,” Mr Howe said.
“Then, for new members, the existing members to teach the new ones how to go about researching and preparing their own family trees and history.
“(It) also brings in local history once you start dealing with people living in an area, so a lot of local history comes into it as well.”
The group has spent a significant amount of time copying and digitising records to preserve this local history.
This includes gathering names from honour rolls, gravestones, church records and even personal notices advertised in Rivs gone by.
“A late member, Betty, indexed over 700 names relating to marriages performed primarily from Pinegrove, Lockington and Bamawm areas,” Mr Howe said.
“Then she cut out, from The Riverine Herald in particular and the Rochy paper, all the personal notices — births, deaths and marriages.
“We used to stick them on cards ... we had 60,000 of them, and now we’ve scanned them all.”
Since DNA ancestry testing has become widely accessible, family history has become easier to trace.
Through her own research and DNA testing, Echuca Moama Family History Group president Judy McCleary has discovered generations of her lineage.
“DNA has revolutionised family history,” she said.
“You can find exciting things, like my two great-grandmothers signed the suffrage petition in 1893.
“My mother said, ‘I think there might be French in our family’, and I found it going back two centuries, and then her line goes back to 1066.”
Mr Howe makes it a priority when he travels to connect with distant relatives and find ancestral ties across the world.
Closer to home, the group runs tours around the region, often visiting local historical societies and touring cemeteries.
It is planning a trip to Nurmurkah this year, paying a visit to the Numurkah and District Historical Society.
“We go on excursions, we’ve been to a lot of places around Bendigo, Yarrawonga,” Mrs McCleary said.
“Local places are just full of history. Mitiamo was really interesting.
“We always tend to include a cemetery somewhere if we can.”
The group provides support for people to do their own research, but it also offers a paid service.
It has access to online genealogical websites, along with a library full of records collected over its 45-year history.
“If people want to come and find out about their family history, we set it up for them,” Mrs McCleary said.
Mr Howe said members could show people how to use the internet to do further research.
“If they don’t want to do it themselves, we can do it for them for a fee, or they can join,” he said.
The group meets at the Old Telegraph Station in Moama from 11am to 3pm every Monday and Friday.
To connect with Echuca-Moama Family History Group, email emfhg9@hotmail.com or phone 0467 066 593.
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