The regular monthly meeting of the Cannon Valley Civil War Roundtable will meet on Jan. 19. It will be at the Faribault Senior Citizens Center, 19 W. Division St. in Faribault.  The meeting starts at 7 p.m., according to a press release.

Jan Stevens, a charter member of the roundtable, will discuss her DNA mystery about her Civil War-era ancestors and how she solved it with ancestry.com.  Relatives turned up in U.S. Census data with information about household members, location, age, education and race. Together — with the information about the area in Jersey County, Illinois, where she grew up — Stevens was able to put together the Civil War activities of her family and the general community.

This area is just north of Alton, where abolitionist newspaper editor and Presbyterian minister Elijah Lovejoy was murdered in 1837. 

“I never realized how much history had happened there because no one really talked about it  for 150-plus years, feelings are still so strong that I am not at all comfortable presenting  this talk in Jersey County,” Stevens said.

The public is invited at no cost. Decaf coffee and treats will be provided with a question and answer session.

For more information, call Dan Peterson at 507-459-3140 or dnl1.peterson@gmail.com; or Karl Fredrickson at 507-222-0168 or kfredson@gmail.com.