Last week, Ancestry® was a proud sponsor of the 2024 National Association of Black Journalists Convention in Chicago, IL. On Thursday afternoon, roughly 150 journalists from across the country gathered to attend Ancestry’s panel discussion on “Genealogy & Journalism: Leveraging Primary Source Records to Amplify Storytelling”.

Moderated by The Grio reporter and author Natasha S. Alford, panelists Nicka Sewell-Smith (Ancestry), Nikole Hannah-Jones (New York Times Magazine, The 1619 Project) and Keyaira Kelly (ELLE Magazine, Refinery29 Unbothered) explored how to harness the richness of historic record collections to craft inclusive and factual storytelling.

Panelists from left to right: Natasha S. Alford, Keyaira Kelly, Nikole Hannah-Jones, and Nicka Sewell-Smith

The conversation tapped into a range of topics from professional reporting anecdotes and advice to personal family history discoveries, followed by a thoughtful Q&A session with the audience.

When asked about the advantage journalists have when exploring their family history, Sewell-Smith noted, “Journalists are always looking at the less obvious angle and going one step deeper – they ask themselves about the history of where their story takes place and the histories of its characters.”

After using Ancestry to explore her own family history, Kelly advised the audience to talk to someone they trust when digging into potentially difficult stories. “Sometimes when you’re digging into the records you will find things that are unexpected and emotional,” she said. “Also know that these are your origin stories and it’s crucial we highlight the stories of the everyday Black person.”

Attendees also previewed the new free collection of newspaper articles on Ancestry that illuminates how slavery shaped day to day life in the US. Sewell-Smith offered an overview of the collection’s never-before-seen information about enslaved individuals pre-1870 in communities where courthouse and community records were otherwise destroyed or lost.

Reflecting on the importance thorough research had in the completion of her Pulitzer-prize winning The 1619 Project, Hannah-Jones added, “Access to records on Ancestry demystifies that we are people with an untraceable past…If you don’t have access to those documents you are relying on someone else to tell their version of your story for you. Now YOU have the power to find and tell your story.”

Throughout the event, Ancestry offered every member of the National Association of Black Journalists a 12-month, All-Access subscription so that they too can employ the more than 60 billion records available on Ancestry.com, Newspapers.com, and Fold3 to propel their research as journalists and family historians.

Ancestry would like to extend a big THANK YOU to our panelists, our gracious audience members and the National Association of Black Journalists.