Attention all family history enthusiasts and those thinking about starting on their research! Put Saturday 28th September in your diary. The Bristol & Avon Family History Society will be holding its Family History Fair at the Bristol Aerospace Welfare Association (BAWA) Leisure Centre, Southmead Road, Filton.
The day will be an opportunity for anyone who needs help or advice on family history matters to have face-to-face sessions with local experts and representatives of Bristol & Avon Family History Society and other societies including Devon, Gloucestershire, Gwent, Hampshire, Dorset, Somerset & Dorset, Weston-super-Mare & District, and Wiltshire. Over 30 exhibitors have signed up to attend.
Representatives from Bath and Bristol Archives will be on hand to give information and advice. A number of local history societies and museums will also be attending to allow visitors to gather more information on the work and living conditions that their ancestors may have experienced. New and second-hand books, postcards, maps, family history CDs, software and accessories will be available from a range of commercial exhibitors.
The Bristol & Avon society itself will be launching its new CD of transcriptions and indexes of Bristol Apprentices Books in the Bristol Archives covering the period 1532 to 1724.
There will be free introductory talks on ‘Starting your Family History Research’ and ‘Using the Internet’. These will be aimed at those who want to get started on researching their families. These will start at 10.30 am and attendees will be given free informative handouts, magazines and other useful research and recording tools.
There will also be a number of other talks during the day, the subjects including the suffragette movement and its effect in the Bristol / Bath area and Canadian research.
Also planned is an updated presentation of the ‘Know Your Place West of England Historic Mapping Project’, the project which started in Bristol but which now covers historic Gloucestershire, Somerset, Devon and Wiltshire as well as Bristol and Bath. The talk will be tailored to how the mapping system can be used in family history research. Full details of talks and times will be advertised nearer the date.
Prizes on offer in a free raffle staged at the event will include subscriptions to commercial websites and publications, DNA kits and books.
Doors open at 10am and admission is £2.00, children FREE. This gives access to the fair, entrance to all talks and a ticket for the free raffle. The fair closes at 4pm.
There is ample free parking at the venue. A range of refreshments will be available or you can bring your own. If you have an interest in, or a question about, your family’s history, this is an event you cannot afford to miss.
For more information, a full list of exhibitors and details of the talks, please visit the Bristol & Avon Family History Society website at www.bafhs.org.uk
Photo: Scene at a previous fair organised by Bristol & Avon Family History Society.
This article originally appeared in the September 2019 issue of the Bradley Stoke Journal magazine (on page 33). The magazine is delivered FREE, EVERY MONTH (except August), to ALL 8,700 homes in Bradley Stoke. Phone 01454 300 400 to enquire about advertising or leaflet insertion.
