Committee Chair Mary Ostiguy
Occasionally RIGS recognizes members or non-member Rhode Island residents who
have made a significant contribution to the genealogical community. Mary Ostiguy and Sally Hilton recommend various people for these awards. Hospitality Committee Committee Chair
- Sally Hilton
Sally Hilton, Mary Ostiguy, Geri Clarke, and Mary Jane Johnson bake and serve the morning refreshments for the RIGS meetings and workshops. Occasionally when
RIGS hosts all-day workshops they enlist a local food provider to serve lunch. All of these committee members have been interested in genealogy for over thirty years.
Library Committee
Committee Chairs Pat Long & Pat Chappell
Pat Long & Pat Chappell coordinate a group of RIGS volunteers that seek out, organize, track, and catalog various books and publications purchased or donated
for the use of our membership and other researchers. Our main collection is housed at the Greenville Public Library, Greenville, Rhode Island; other area libraries are
being considered as secondary repositories. Alden Saunders, a founding member and president of RIGS for many years, is Chairman Emeritus of this committee.
Membership Committee Committee Chair
Pat Long
A family funeral and the discovery that her Sheldon family roots could be found only a few blocks away from her home jumpstarted Pat's interest in genealogy. Born and
bred in New England, Pat brings 30+ years of research experience to the RIGS Board. In the past Pat has served as Director. More recently she planned and organized the Sheldon Family Reunion of 2007.
Nominating Committee - Committee Chair Sally Hilton
Sally Hilton and Pat Chappell are active on several committees but also have the
annual responsibility of finding and nominating candidates for the RIGS Board of Directors.
Publications Committee Chair - John E. Sterling
Robert Allen Green, John E. Sterling, and Cherry Fletcher Bamberg oversee the process of publishing RIGS-sponsored books. Robert was one of the founding members of RIGS and over the years has mentored many Rhode Island
genealogists. John Sterling, the dean of Rhode Island gravestone studies, created the Rhode Island Historic Cemetery Database Project which has now collected burial
information on over 425,000 gravesites and greatly increased the number of registered cemeteries since 1991. Working with a variety of co-authors, John has
written books on the historic cemeteries in Exeter, Warwick, Coventry, Providence, and South Kingstown. He is a former co-editor of Rhode Island Roots.
Reception Committee -
Committee Chair Pat Chappell
Pat Chappell is the friendly face that meets and greets RIGS workshop attendees. Her long time interest in genealogy has taken her over the "pond" to France several
times.
Rhode Island Roots Committee Chair - Cherry Fletcher Bamberg
Cherry, author and editor of many books and articles on Rhode Island genealogy, edits Rhode Island Roots
, the journal of the Rhode Island Genealogical Society. Many of RIGS informational brochures have been designed and developed by Cherry. Deby J. Nunes is the queries editor and Christine L. Lamar is the book
reviewer for Roots.
RIGS Reporter - Committee Chair - Neil Dunay
The fresh new look of our newsletter, RIGS Reporter, is the work of Neil Dunay. For
more than fifteen years Neil has been researching his Rhode Island ancestors and in 1996 he completed the National Genealogical Society's American Genealogy course.
His research on the Shippee family of East Greenwich was published in Roots in June 2000. Neil has also served as President of the Smith Castle Cocumscussoc
Association. Pat Wyatt, Mary Ostiguy, Sally Hilton, Geri Clark, and Pat Chappell work as a team to collate, stamp, and distribute the Reporter.
Transcription Committee
Committee Chair Tom Clarke
Tom Clarke is the one and only member of the Transcription Committee and for the past fifteen years has recorded most of the RIGS quarterly and annual workshops.
These recordings are available for purchase for RIGS members who are unable to attend specific workshops but wish to hear the various presentations.
SPECIAL PROJECTS & PROGRAMS
Cemetery Research
John Sterling, Tom Wilber, and many others have been inventorying and documenting various Rhode Island Cemeteries for many years. Several of the books
that RIGS published have been based on this research effort. A cemetery database index of their work can be found on Rootsweb and the New England Genealogical
Society websites. At this point they have completed researching over 90% of the graves found in Rhode Island.
Mentoring Program
Our volunteer mentor program in cooperation with the Rhode Island Historical Society Library is currently on hold as we are recruiting new volunteers. Let us
know if you are qualified and would like to help new researchers find information at the library on Hope Street, Providence.
New England Regional Genealogical Conference (NERGC) Delegates
Otis Wyatt and Patricia Long are RIGS delegates to NERGC. Pat Chappell has designed the full-page camera-ready ads for this conference. The next NERGC conference will be in Manchester, NH, April 22 - 26, 2009.
