Category: News

On Monday 29th September Helen gave a presentation on Irish family history research to a group of 30 people at the National Learning Network in Mullingar, County Westmeath.

As part of Heritage week celebrations, Helen Kelly delivered a lecture entitled How can I research my family tree at Blanchardstown Library in west Dublin on Saturday August 30th at 10.30am. Almost seventy people attended the lecture which was organised by Fingal County Libraries.

In her role as Genealogy Butler to the Shelbourne Hotel, Helen Kelly participated in a New Zealand breakfast TV programme on Irish ancestry in June 2008. The programme arose as a result of a competition sponsored by Tourism Ireland, Fáilte Ireland, Air New Zealand and Television New Zealand. From the 2,000 entrants to the competition, the granddaughter of a County Tyrone emigrant was declared the winner, and the prize was a trip to Ireland. As part of the prize, the winner and her husband had a two night stay at the Shelbourne Renaissance Hotel where she met with the Genealogy Butle Helen Kelly to discuss her Irish ancestry.

Tourism Ireland, in conjunction with Fáilte Ireland and TVNZ, sponsored a competition for television viewers with Irish ancestry. The competition attracted over 2,000 entries, and was won by a young New Zealand born woman with ancestral roots in Counties Louth, Armagh and Tyrone. Her prize was a trip to the Irish ancestral homelands, and included a two night stay at the Shelbourne Renaissance Hotel in Dublin, where the winner, Melissa, met with Helen Kelly, the hotel’s Genealogy Butler. In summing up her trip, Melissa stated that meeting with cousins at two surprise dinners was all way beyond her widest dreams for the trip, and that among the most moving moments for her was getting her grandfather’s birth certificate during her Dublin stay. Five short clips of Melissa’s trip were shown on a breakfast programme aired by TVNZ in late June.

The Genealogy and Local Studies (GenLoc) Group of the Library Association of Ireland held a seminar on newspapers in the National Library of Ireland on Friday the 7th March 2008. Among the speakers was APGI member Helen Kelly who delivered a lecture entitled Genealogy in Newspapers.

On Tuesday, 12th February 2008, Helen Kelly gave a lecture on Irish genealogy at the Family Records Centre in London. This was the last of a series of presentations Helen has given at the Family Records Centre, in conjunction with Irish journalist and broadcaster Angie Mezzetti, before the FRC holdings transferred to the National Archives at Kew on Monday 17th March 2008.