501-918-3025
calsfoundation@cals.org
calsfoundation@cals.org
Connections and Community at the 2025 Genealogy Workshop
Since its beginnings, the Central Arkansas Library System has helped patrons with genealogical research. A donation from the Richard L. Butler family enhanced the collection and elevated the service to the community with the establishment in 1997 of the Butler Center for Arkansas Studies, now housed in the CALS Bobby L. Roberts Library for Arkansas History & Art, across the street from the CALS Main Library in downtown Little Rock.
An introduction to genealogy and materials to advance the basic level of family acknowledgement has always been the goal, with a focus on introducing the public to the joy of discovering details about people connected by blood and love. The challenge has always been to offer new developments in research possibilities while maintaining a foundation of fundamental research.
The CALS Butler Center hosts a free genealogy workshop each year—now held in the fall after many years in the summer. The consistency has been the variety of attendees and the knowledge carried by the speakers who represent a variety of avenues to focus, preserve, and present newly discovered genealogical information.
The 2025 workshop, held in the Darragh Center (now on the 5th floor) of the newly reopened CALS Main Library, welcomed Kate Forry Guanci, a former film industry professional turned entrepreneur, caregiver, and innovator. With over twenty-five years as a prop master, she built a reputation for creativity, precision, and problem‑solving, bringing that expertise to Archoral.com, the platform she founded to help families and communities preserve their histories.
Guided by her experience as a full‑time caregiver to her husband living with Frontotemporal Dementia (FTD), Guanci works to blend caregiving, genealogy, and cultural archiving to uncover the details that define people’s lives. In the workshop, she offered not just abstract ideas, but practical insights rooted in lived experience and collaboration. Her presentation expanded the possibilities of what could enhance the research collected, showed how to connect family research to community history while respectfully allowing the elder generation to uniquely participate, and encouraged all to find new ways of presenting the information in ways that benefit and respect the community.
The audience consisted of first-time genealogy researchers as well as decades-long collectors of genealogical materials. Small-business owners and those looking for business opportunities for using their skills also attended.
Organizations focused on genealogy represented social and professional opportunities for those looking for a research community—Heritage Seekers, Afro-American Historical & Genealogical Society, and Arkansas Genealogical Society have been annual partners in this event, connecting CALS with historical leaders in the fields of genealogy and local history.
Even if attendees do not always see immediate use in the topic presentation as it relates to their personal research goals, they do find value in the intermingling of so many people interested in the research.
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Come visit the Research Room of the CALS Roberts Library to start your own genealogy research; visiting info is here. And find online genealogy resources here.
By Rhonda Stewart, genealogy and local history specialist for the Central Arkansas Library System’s Butler Center for Arkansas Studies, housed in the CALS Bobby L. Roberts Library of Arkansas History & Art
