Family ChartMasters Changes Hands

What a privilege this last 20 years has been.  When we started Family ChartMasters we had no idea the love and sweat and tears that we would invest.  But we especially didn't know how much we would adore the people we would get to spend this period of our lives with.  It has been my joy to help you share your family history, honor your ancestors and inspire the next generations in your family.  Thank you for everything.  What a tremendous ride it has been. 

I'm now going to go work on my own family history.  I'm going to preserve Kim's history.  I'm going to create a new family with a wedding to Dean Olsen in June. And I'm going to absolutely love having the time to be a genealogist myself.  So much love to you all.  I'll see you at a genealogy conference soon.  I'll be there in the audience with you.  

Family ChartMasters Announces New Ownership to Preserve and Display Family History Legacies

4 Apr 2024 - FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

[Pleasant Grove, Utah] — Family ChartMasters, the leader in custom genealogy chart design and printing, is excited to announce a new chapter in its history. Crista Cowan, known online as The Barefoot Genealogist, has acquired the company from Janet Hovorka, continuing and expanding the vision of making family history more visible and cherished in homes around the world.

Founded by Janet and Kim Hovorka more than 20 years ago, Family ChartMasters has become synonymous with high-quality, personalized genealogy charts, helping thousands of families create conversation pieces showcasing the family history they have uncovered. Following the passing of co-founder Kim Hovorka in 2021, Janet continued on with their team, but Kim was such an important part of Family Chartmasters that it was difficult to go forward without him. Fortunately, Crista's passion for genealogy and commitment to the company's values and mission have paved the way for a promising future.

Janet expressed her gratitude and optimism, stating, "It's with a heart full of optimism that I pass the torch to Crista. Knowing her dedication to family history and her vision for Family ChartMasters, I am confident she will continue our legacy of preserving family stories with the same love and care we've poured into this company."

Under Crista's leadership, Family ChartMasters will continue to offer a range of family tree printing and design services.  Blank charts, to be manually filled in, are a great way to get started. Set style charts allow digital family tree data to quickly be imported for printing.  Working charts are a favorite for displaying the family tree at the next reunion.  The signature custom designed chart service offers an opportunity to work with a designer to create archival quality heirloom pieces that engage all generations.

Crista Cowan shared her enthusiasm in taking on this new role, "I am deeply honored to continue the legacy that Janet and Kim built. Their work has touched so many lives, including my own. I'm committed to maintaining and enhancing the services we provide. My goal is to see a family tree on the wall of every home, providing a visual representation of the stories that live in us and the bonds that connect us."

For more information about Family ChartMasters and its offerings, please visit FamilyChartmasters.com.

About Family ChartMasters:

Family ChartMasters is the leading provider of custom genealogy charts, with a mission to preserve family memories. Offering a wide range of design and printing services, they have helped create more than 40,000 charts for clients in 64 countries around the world, turning complex family history data into beautiful, meaningful artwork.

Contact:

info@familychartmasters.com

Great Sale to learn more about your DNA

Diahan Southard is THE person to teach you about DNA. She is so knowledgeable and is great at making hard things understandable. And she is just a delightful person. So, we've partnered together to give you a great deal on her book for one week only.   

Between September 27th and October 4th
Family ChartMasters' clients and friends can get 20% off 
Your DNA Guide-the Book
Just use the promotional code FALLBOOK when you order here 

The print edition is only $31.99.  You can also get the ebook for the low price of only $16.99 if you would prefer. 

Understanding your DNA test results,  can help you with questions like: “Who is
that DNA match?” or “Who are my birth relatives?” or “Who is my mystery ancestor that I’ve
been trying to find for years?”

Your DNA Guide—the Book guides you through these and other common DNA questions. You
simply pick a question, then follow a clear, step-by-step plan to explore it. Learn key DNA
concepts on a need-to-know basis so you can stay focused on your question. Diahan
Southard’s fun, easy-to-read writing sounds like she’s talking right to you. She is! Your DNA
Guide—the Book empowers you to start making more confident and accurate DNA discoveries.

If you don't believe me, check out a few of these other testimonials:

• [Diahan’s] friendly, familiar tone could convince anyone that they can figure out this whole “DNA thing,” and with Southard’s clear, step-by-step instructions, they can. – -Mary Kircher Roddy, FGS Magazine
• “It’s definitely not a ‘big overview of DNA testing’ book, but instead a ‘let’s get down and dirty and solve a brickwall problem’ book. And we definitely need a book like this.” – Drew Smith, The Genealogy Guys Podcast and Genealogy Connection Podcast
• “Diahan Southard is...funny and down to earth. Her presentations are always filled with color and graphics and explain the sometimes overwhelming topic in a simple and easy way to understand. She’s put her style into her first book on DNA.”
• "This book is unique. My first thought was this is just like the choose your own adventure books I used to read as a kid. It’s almost like having Diahan there to hold your hand while you work your way through your matches and find your family!” – Cheri Hudson Passey, Carolina Girl Genealogy

I'd highly recommend you pick up your copy today.  

The Search Party Course--fill the holes in your family tree.

You should subscribe to our e-newsletter, (if not, you can sign up here)

If you have been receiving our emails, you know that this summer I partnered with two of my good friends, Diahan Southard and Crista Cowan, to create a new method for doing family history research.  It is a breakthrough system that can solve any kind of research problem, but is easy enough for the most basic beginner. 

We tested out the system with several webinars that were wildly popular.  Everyone felt like this new process was really helpful in clarifying and making it easy to find your family.  So now, we've decided to expand your options for learning and using the system.  

We've put together an online course that combines all of our years of experience for your benefit--and makes it really easy to follow along.  There's a series of modules including videos and a workbooks along with a sample problem we tackle together as a class, as well as guided homework so you can try it out on your own family history problems.  That's quite a package! We can't wait for you to join us.  

The course opens for registration on September 28th.  Check out all the details here and watch your email for the time to enroll.

Christmas Deadlines

 

In order to avoid any rush fees, and to get your holiday charts in time for Christmas, you'll need to take note of the following deadlines.

 Custom Charts:

• Submit your final file by November 19th. 
• Complete your order by December 10th.  

Set Style and Fill in the Blank Charts:

• Order by December 15th.

Family History Month Giveaway

Did you that know October is Family History Month?  The U.S. Congress created it by resolution in 2001.  While we think Family History is great year-round, we're happy that we have a month to really celebrate the benefits it brings.  Family History gives us comfort in knowing where you came from and teaches us about the people who left their mark on us and formed our culture.   Some of the benefits of Family History include:

• A sense of identity in the world
• A more secure foundation for healthy relationships
• A knowledge of traits that run in our families--health, emotional, traditional and etc.
  

Understanding our family history is just a better way to have a healthy life. 

 

So, we're participating with our good friends in a Family History Month Giveaway.  There are some amazing prizes.  Check them out:

• New Search Party Course with Diahan Southard, Janet Hovorka and Crista Cowan ($97 value)
• Family History Coaching Consultation with Kenyatta Berry ($200 value)
• Family ChartMasters Gift Certificate ($200 value)
• Diahan Southard's DNA Guide Mentoring Session ($129 value)
• 5GB storage at Permanent.org
• One year subscription to Memory Web ($99 value)
• Family History Writing Consultation with Michael LeClerc the Genealogy Professor ($175 value)
• Maureen Taylor's Identifying Family Photographs course, ebook handbook, and a copy of Vivid-Pix ($180 value) 

Each prize is awarded separately so you have 8 chances to win.  What a great way to kick off celebrating Family History Month!  

Register at https://maureentaylor.com/family-history-month-giveaway by October 2nd

And join us on October 4th at 2pm EST for a Facebook Live on Maureen Taylor's Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/photodetective

Working Chart Sale: Time to get serious about your research!

From our newsletter (Have you signed up yet? You can on our newsletter sign up page.)

Fall is a great time to work on your family history. The busy vacation season is over, kids are in school and we aren't heading into the holidays just yet. It is time to get organized, call some cousins, and pull some all-nighters getting lost in the internet. (We get you!) Charts are a great way to get organized. And even though they aren't here yet, you might even start thinking about gifts for the holidays. These are sure to inspire a budding genealogists in the family. Or, if you are thinking about creating decorative charts for gifts, a quick working chart right now would help you make sure you have the data right so that you're ready to create the heirloom chart of your dreams.

This is a super quick sale. So you'll want to keep track of two deadlines:

• Send in your final file between now and August 30th. We can't accept any submissions for the offer after this date.
• Order by September 3rd at midnight.

Use the code GETTOWORK to take 30% off any working chart.

A new genealogy research help you should take a look at: Goldie May

We met Richard Miller at the NGS conference in May and this seems like the research tool I would design.  He has lots of really useful tools, you need to especially see the Goldie May Subway Map 

If you like charts, you may like the visual approach to genealogy research provided by Goldie May's Subway Map. The Subway Map is a new timeline tool, showing both the time and place of your ancestor's life events. As timelines go, the Subway Map is a work horse, not a show horse. You can check the consistency of your work, find problem areas, and zero-in on new records. It integrates with your existing FamilySearch or Ancestry tree. 

In the past, the Subway Map was available through Goldie May subscriptions plans, but as of this week, the Subway Map is available to all Goldie May users 5 times per month for free. After choosing 5 individuals to research, you can use the Subway Map all month long with those people. 

But check it out: Goldie May has other free and paid tools that can help you in your research, such as an automatic research log (seriously, it keeps a log as you browse the Internet), project management & tasks, and the ability to save and restore all your browser windows and tabs.

Goldie May is being developed by Richard Miller. He previously worked in technology roles at three genealogy companies, but only recently started doing his own genealogy research. Goldie May is the tool he's building for his own research and hopes it's helpful to others as well.

Visit https://www.goldiemay.com/ to learn more and get started.