Sign up for Meridian’s Free Newsletter, please CLICK HERE
The following was written by Jan Mayer for Family Search.
A beehive-buzz of excitement and anticipation grows the deeper you move into the crowds of RootsTech, a trending international conference held in Utah with up to 30,000 in-person attendees and another 50,000 online. It is hands-down, the largest family history-related event in the world. Very impressive for a nonprofit organization. (RootsTech is hosted by FamilySearch, an international nonprofit subsidiary of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints).
It’s come a long way from its humble roots as a computer genealogy conference in 1998 on the campus of Brigham Young University with 400 attendees. Today, the world-class conference extends over 4 days and encompasses the entire convention center in downtown Salt Lake City. Every corridor of the facility, including the expansive expo hall, are crammed with congenial crowds examining the latest family history-related products, larger-than-life photos towering overhead, or using the show’s robust mobile app to check the current status of their daily class schedules or to download electronic copies of a few of the over 300 syllabi for the sessions they will attend.
SEE THE FREE BROADCAST SCHEDULE
You can’t help but notice the constant roar of enthusiastic chatting that fills the air as the throngs of smiling people—family, friends, colleagues, and total strangers—snap selfies and group photos, engage in discussion over a new family history discovery, or discuss personal goals for the show or where they picked up some cool swag. The instant camaraderie feels as if you’re hanging out with ten thousand of your closest friends, or even family. And that’s not an exaggeration. For this crowd, they are really into family connections—and belonging. They resolutely believe that the more we build our family tree—either through DNA or historical sources, in time, we are all connected—literally one big family from the grand perspective of things.
To read the full article on Family Search, click here.