The Santa Barbara County Genealogical Society will feature genealogists Rosalyn Tonai and Grant Din at its monthly meeting, Saturday, June 17, at the First Presbyterian Church, 21 E. Constance Ave., Santa Barbara.
Tonai and Din will present Resources Available for Japanese and Chinese American Genealogists and Teaching Pioneers’ Stories to the Next Generation.
The speakers will discuss materials researchers can find about Japanese and Chinese immigration; settlement in the U.S.; World War II incarceration of Japanese Americans; and what they have found in their ancestral homes.
The Genealogical Society meeting, which is free to attend, will also be available via Zoom. Genealogical Society special interest groups meet at 9:30 a.m. (in-person only), followed by a short business meeting at 10:30 a.m., and the featured speakers at 11 a.m.
Tonai has been executive director of the National Japanese American Historical Society for some 30 years. In her role, she has organized local and traveling exhibits about Japanese American history, and art, and trained teachers around the country.
She was a key figure in the development of the Military Intelligence Service Historic Learning Center, at the Presidio’s Crissy Field in San Francisco, which tells the Japanese American wartime story.
Din, Tonai’s husband, has worked with Bay Area nonprofits including the Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation for a number of years, and has conducted extensive research about Angel Island, its immigrants from 80 countries and World War II Japanese immigrant detainees, and Chinese American history since the Gold Rush.
Din was part of the research team for “The Six,” a film about the Chinese Seamen who survived the wreck of the Titanic, and enjoys speaking about Asian American genealogy and history.
The mission of the Santa Barbara County Genealogical Society is to help people discover, document, preserve, and share their family histories in California, the U.S., and around the world.
The society is an all-volunteer organization with more than 500 members, and a 5,000- square-foot genealogical research library featuring some 19,000 books, and a computer lab with access to nine genealogical subscription websites.
Annual memberships start at $40; visit sbgen.org to learn more about membership benefits, events, presentations, or to become a member.