Colleen Fitzpatrick Books

This book is fantastic for dating photographs. I have bins of photos that I have no clue when they were taken. The tables in here help you to pen point the dates using things you'd never think of. Once Miss Fitzpatrick was able to use a cash registar and some old ads to determine the date of a picture! The more meaty sections are when she uses the light of day to name the exact location. Now that was amazing!
Last year I had the oppurturnity to meet Colleen. She is the nicest woman and ever so intelligent! Her passion flows throughout her work and makes the book enjoyable and fascinating to read. A genius in her field, Miss Fitzpatrick gives you the tools, the websites, and the frame of mind all in this book.
Inside are charts and tables giving you dating for when each type of photograph was made, describing to a tee how to distinguish your photo.
Also included, though I've not had much time to examine that section, are chapters on reading between the lines in directories and census images, ect.
Without this book I would still be clueless. It truly is a must have.

Forensic Genealogy is a unique contribution to genealogical studies that will enable the novice genealogist (and even the experience genealogical researcher) to utilize diverse resources and methods for developing their genealogical family histories that combines established and conventional genealogical research techniques with cutting edge advances in forensic investigation techniques to identify, understand, correlate, and detail their ancestry. Enhanced throughout will illustrations, this 182 page instructional reference shows how to create a "database" to construct a family story (including cultural profiling). An avid genealogist, Colleen Fitzpatrick offers a thoroughly "reader friendly" introduction to the subject of identification and analysis using everything from surname studies to non-paternity events, to cladograms and pairwise mismatches. Readers will learn how to become a kind of "digital detective" in analyzing documents, photographs, and records of all kinds. Concluding with a chapter on "There Will Always Be Mysteries Left", Forensic Genealogy is a welcome and seminal addition to personal and professional genealogical reference library collections. Also very highly recommended is Colleen Fitzpatrick's related instructional reference DNA & Genealogy (0976716011) with its focus on the genetic trail an ancestor leaves behind which can be traced through Y-chromosome and mitochondrial DNA testing, offering heretofore unavailable genetics-based expertise to genealogical inquiry for non-specialist general readers with an interest in developing their own genealogical inquiries.

Don't put away those old photographs and documents. You are not through with your families history until you have read Dr. Fitzpatrick's book "Forensic Genealology". There may be many hidden secrets in all those old items. This book will teach you to look at them like a "crime scene" and discover their meaning for your ancestor.

You will never look at a photo in quite the same way after reading this book. Many of us have so few photos from our families past that it makes every one of them important to telling our families history. The author helps us to be critical and wise examiners of the clues we have from our past. As one reviewer already said, the same pictures are examined as you progress through the book. There is just too much to learn to get it all in one place. Even if you didn't have any photos, there are excellent resources mentioned that could be used in any genealogy research. The book encourages the reader to extend family research beyond the usual sources like the census and city directories and dive into what the location was like where they lived, what was their occupation, what was the weather like and many other similar questions that can be pursued by extending our view of our family who lived in a location at a given time in history. I think the enthusiasm of the author is catching. It encourages that driving force to figure out and analyze the photos as evidence of our history. It is that push to go beyond the obvious for more clues.

This is not your usual basic family history book. It effectively teaches one how to think and analyze way outside the box. Once you have gathered all your family's pertinent material, this book will take you way beyond birth, death, and marriage records. The author brilliantly demonstrates how to use city directories, weather data, photo intelligence mensuration techniques, sleuthing approaches, and even a chapter on DNA testing and tracking. This is a wonderful teaching vehicle and reference manual. We would recommend it to all serious genealogists.

The author takes a highly technical subject area and transforms it into understandable tools for one to use with excellent examples from her own family investigations. This book is a mind expanding read, and we rated it a high four hearts.

After having my Y and mtDNA analyzed, I wanted to be able to get an overall perspective and understanding to intrepret results and to understand the logic of the terminology. It is an excellent book for a layman who wants to grasp the subject. Too often technical books begin and delve right into the technology which in turn is discouraging and a turnoff. Fortunately this text proceeds at an acceptable pace and doesn't require too much re-tracing until the later chapters. Each chapter is sprinkled with anecdotes that are interesting, but can break one's concentration. I found it best to finish a chapter and then return and read the anecdotes.
I usually want to be advised of the background of authors and would have preferred some explanation of their background and basis for expertise.

This is a great book for all of us folks who are new to this DNA testing business for genealogy. It's written in a style that, for the most part, cuts through the techno-jargon as much as possible and speaks to me in my own language. The sidebar stories are fascinating. Super book!

With the advent of DNA testing genealogy research has been propelled into the 21st century. Get ready to be captivated and conveyed along with it as the authors take you through the subject.

This is a great book and there is a lot to be learnt from it whether you are still just thinking about using DNA or have already dived in. It is written in plain language that anyone can comprehend and it explains the whole process of how to use DNA as a genealogical tool. It is both a book that you can't put down and one that you'll continually refer back to after you have received your test results and are working with them.

DNA testing is easy to understand after you've read this and you'll realise what DNA can do for your research. Without it I would be struggling to appreciate the concept of this new topic and would not know what to do with my results or nor how to interpret the information they provide. Highly recommended.

Serious genealogists hobbyists and professionals will be excited by this new resource, which thoroughly explains the new science of DNA testing and how it can be applied to family history research. Although this book is not for everyone, if you have successfully passed high school biology, you should be able to manage the information and its technology in this excellent reference. Wouldn't it be interesting for a man and his wife to go back in time to discover about when they might have had an ancestor in common? DNA testing and analysis had give you that and much more. It can even give you an idea what part of the world your pre-historical ancestors lived and migrated to. The authors practice what they preach and tell how we can do it too, with many DNA labs and companies listed and compared. We rated this book four hearts.

I have not completed reading this book, but thus far I have found it so very helpful and informative. As a administrator for our Blassingame DNA project and a newbie to DNA & genealogy, I needed and still need all the help I can get. This books provides this help. I highly recommend it. Barbara L. Eades

The initial sight of Leslie Nielson's snow-white hair immediately brings a smile to my face, and I know I'm in for a ride. Check out that wobble of his too - those inwardly bent leg-strides reminds me of someone who has just stepped out of doggie doo-doo. Drebin's assignment this time 'round? To find the man responsible for planting a bomb inside the Meinheimer institute. It'll take all his wit power to accomplish this, for no one else around seems to be of any help. Consider his partner, Nordberg, who arrives at the crime scene, takes a good panoramic gander around at the rubble, and comments, "This is one helluva explosion. I'm still trying to figure out what they used."

This follow-up spoof to the 1988 measuring-stick doesn't come close to hitting the three-quarter mark; the glass is either half-full or completely empty depending on how much of a fan you are of Nielson and lampoonery. For me, I've always viewed it as something of a treasure watching grown adults - even if they are 'in character' - having enough innocence left within themselves to shed their publicly-correct exterior for a little game of let's-not-take-ourselves-so-seriously for a while. It takes both maturity and a shameless awareness of one's childish origins for one to be willing to do this. The cast of the Naked Gun series have the needed self-security to be able to do this successfully. They are to be commended for being good sports.

The crime for the boys down at the precinct this time centres around a dubious businessman, a Quentin Hapsburg, who sees the world populated by dollar bills as opposed to people. He likes the money he's making off nuclear energy, and intends to stop a Dr. Meinheimer from publicizing his new cleaner energy theory. The doctor is due to make known his research to the president of the United States, at an upcoming formal engagement. Thus the reason for the aforementioned attempt on his life. The bomb was meant for the good doctor but wound up instead in the hands of two not-so-bright security guards: having found the curiosity inside a trash-can, and merely assuming it as so, with the ticking device in hand (bandaged together with duct-tape and explosives) the one guard stares at its face and ponders aloud to his partner: "Hey, that's a pretty nice clock. Wonder why they threw it out?" To which the other man grabs it from him, commenting, "It's probably because it's four minutes too slow. Here, let me fix it." (I hesitate to relate that the guy actually winds the piece forward 4 minutes.)

With a couple of dead guards in the news, the Washington D.C. police commissioner assigns Lt. Frank Drebin the task of tracking down the killer. Any evidence thus far that points to a possible suspect, you may be wondering? Apparently so. It seems, so relates the crime-scene investigator to Drebin, they found a wallet perhaps belonging to the suspect on a curb just outside the building, but they haven't had a chance to examine it thoroughly as of yet. (It's still in the lab undergoing analysis.)

The movie was written and directed by David Zucker, (or as the opening credit puts it, un film de David Zucker). He brings back the same actors from the first entry and renews the romance between Frank and his love-kitten, Jane (played by the strikingly attractive - for her age! - Priscilla Presley). The film's opening scene has Drebin, as guest at a White House luncheon, being honored by his captain for his 1000th drug-dealer killed. Frank has to interrupt and politely rephrase the truth of the matter. "In all honesty," he humbly admits, "the last two I backed over with my car. Luckily they turned out to be drug-dealers." Uttered prideful of this good stroke of luck.

There are no burst-out moments of mention (unlike the good belly-laughing received from the first film, watching Drebin undercover as an umpire), but the movie does have its amusing parts: Frank and Jane's pas de deux on the dance floor during a social function (note who Frank takes over from, as he cuts in to take ahold of Jane: Mel Torme). Then there is the side gimmick that has Norberg being dragged about the city on a mechanic's wheelboard from underneath the suspect's van ... only to be flung neath a bus heading for Detroit. We also find Jane cooperating with police in describing as best she can to a sketch artist the appearance of the suspect in question, but to no avail since the artist can only picture her. A standout sequence takes place inside the Blue Note bar, a watering hole for the utterly depressed; on its walls hang pictures capturing some of the 20th century's most infamous disasters, in an attempt at empathizing with the patrons and to make them feel right at home. I also couldn't help but chuckle whenever either Frank or Ed would react to a baffling statement made with a bit of rendered-speechless horizontal eyeballing.

The film as a whole, admittedly, isn't much of a hoot. The movie seems to work better as individual scenes, than if we were to expect our interest sustained through each one strung together in its entirety. In other words, one might find more enjoyment watching the movie in piecemeal fashion - for scenes do hold up on their own, but the lot of them combined make the various gags seem overdone and may work to overwhelm even the most appreciative of viewers.

And speaking of the viewer, regardless of one's opinion of the movie, it cannot be said that the writing is poor. Gags go by so quick and are placed so meticulously in each scene that half-hearted or half-fatigued viewers have no one to blame but themselves for any failing grade they may hand the movie in the effort department.

Deadpan may not be one's cup of tea, but, this acknowledged, for lovers of such humor one's respect for the movie becomes stronger amid second viewing when all the previously missed sight gags are noticed, either in the fore- or background of shots. It is always the sign of a good movie when more can be gleaned from it through repeated viewings.

The question becomes then, does our straight-faced accident-prone hero go on to save the day? When it comes to Frank Drebin such a question is always rhetorical. The world would have gone up in a mushroom cloud if it weren't for his investigative prowess and police skills, and we all know it. So what if in reality he unwittingly detonated the time bomb Hapsburg had set in motion, upon tripping over the machine's power cord. The truth of the matter is, in retrospect he wasn't out-smarted, and to someone as conniving as Hapsburg, that fact hurts, doesn't it? "Oh, sure, maybe not as much as jumping on a bicycle with a seat missing. But it hurts."

I was lucky to find these movies for cheap, but it's definitely one of the best trilogies I have ever seen. The 2nd and 3rd are no match for the first...but the sequels are hardly ever as good as the first in any case.

Es un clasico, se debe tener en casa para ver por lo menos una vez al año. Gracias a Leslie por la serie y las 3 peliculas Naked Gun y al director David Zucker por la imaginacion tan graciosa de las situaciones de la vida.

En esta 2da parte, los Bush son la burla y el tema la energia atomica y los contaminantes es el ambiente en el cual se desenvuelve nuestro personaje.

The Naked Gun 2 1/2 - The Smell of Fear~ Lloyd Bochner is just as good as the first Naked Gun movie. Leslie Neilsen is absolutely hysterically funny and the gags are many of them are just on the mark. The scene at the blue note is just great with photos of titanic and a singer that sings about feeling blue. The drink that is impossible to drink and the waiter with a bare backside. They also make fun of Casablanca with Sam playing the piano. I love the dialog and the screen play is great. Once again we get to see O.J. Simpson star in the movie and then we have to remember that at the time of the movie he was only known as a former football player and did not have the dubious reputation that he does today. I highly recommend this movie and I give it the 5 stars that it deserves.

The Naked Gun 2 and ½: The Smell Of Fear is directed by David Zucker. The film stars Leslie Nielsen and co-stars Priscilla Presley, George Kennedy, O. J. Simpson, and Robert Goulet. Ira Newborn contributes the musical score.

The Smell Of Fear is the second film in The Naked Gun series. This time around, Frank Drebin has gained a promotion with Police Squad, but it has come at the price of his relationship with Jane Spencer, the woman he was romancing in the first film. Drebin's work is never done. This time around, he and his partners on the force must deal with a group of environmental terrorists, aiming to profit immensely from their crimes. As if it wasn't bad enough that a new threat had entered the fray, Jane has developed a relationship with one of its top leaders.

The second installment in The Naked Gun series is more of the same zany stuff the first movie served up. While not a superior product by any means, it's still a good sequel. And like the original, it's impossible to write a conventional review for this film. While there is a plot here and entertaining characters, this is more-or-less a showcase of well-written, fast-paced jokes - just like the first time around. The writers keep the puns and gags flying at you from start to finish. Normally putting the jokes first and the characters and plot second is a recipe for disaster. But The Naked Gun series pulls it off nicely. Much like the first movie, there are very few scenes that won't have you in stitches.

Leslie Nielsen reprises his role of Frank Drebin from the first film. And his acting here is no less excellent than it was in the first film. He steals every scene he takes part in, delivering the fast-paced comedy with an unusual level of seriousness, never cracking a smile no matter how comical or inappropriate what he says is. The Naked Gun is probably Nielsen's best-known series of films, and it won't be long into the movie before you see why that is.

Like the original, there's really not much point in going too in depth about the supporting cast and what they do. This movie belongs to Leslie Nielsen. But amongst its ranks are O. J. Simpson as Drebin's long-time, loyal partner on the force, Priscilla Presley as the now-estranged love interest, and Robert Goulet as one of the evil geniuses behind the film's sinister plot. Everyone does well in this film, but no one steals the show the same way Nielsen does.

The style in which this film is presented stays true to the original, and that`s a good thing. The writers/director throw the jokes at the audience endlessly - there's not a single scene in this movie without something to make you laugh. And with Leslie Nielsen usually in charge of delivering these cleverly-written puns and gags, with his signature serious nature, you know the laughs won't let up.

The musical score for the film is written by Ira Newborn. Easily, the most recognizable piece of music in the film is its classic opening credits theme, which was also uses as the theme for Police Squad!, the show that the film was spun off from. Newborn's score is largely a jazzy, big-band one, which fits the cop/detective atmosphere well. It only helps to make the product feel more like a spoof/satire. Much of the score is rehashed from the original, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.

This isn't a perfect movie, I won't kid you. The original was a comedy masterpiece. It was fresh, and easily one of the best spoofs ever made. The problem with the second film is that it's, to say the least, more of the same. And the jokes, while still downright hilarious, don't quite hit as hard and fast as they did the first time around. That's not to say this isn't a great comedy film in its own right, though - it is.

Sadly, the DVD is a huge disappointment. Like the first film, the only extras available are a commentary track and trailers. Why couldn't they include interviews with cast and crew, or anything of that sort? I'm sure there's plenty of good material that could have been used on here.

In the end, second film in The Naked Gun series isn't quite the comedy masterpiece that the first one was, but it`s still a worthy addition to the Leslie Nielsen catalogue, and definitely worth your time. Although it`s not as good as the original, I`m still recommending it. If you liked the original, it's a good bet you'll like the sequel.

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