One of the most important parts of a family reunion is choosing a keynote speaker for the main dinner. This speaker should be someone who is both entertaining, but can also teach about the family, life during that time or genealogy. It may be difficult to choose who to speak as well as the focus. First you need to determine the focus of the meeting.
If you want to focus specifically on an individual a family member may be the best speaker. He or she can take the time to research some traditional family stories. You may choose to send out an email asking for photographs of the family you will be focusing on for this reunion. The main focus of this speaker may be to share the family stories of the particular generation.
Another option is to hire a genealogist to come and speak at your reunion. You may request that the genealogist speak on the origins of the family. A genealogist would be able to speak about where this line of the family came from. Often they can fill in background information according to the reasons for most people’s reasons to immigrate at the time. This can be an informative session for the adults.
You may also choose to have individual short presentations done to let the different lines of the family get to know each other. This is especially good if it is the first family reunion of this particular line. You can have a presenter for each of the children of the person you are focusing on. That presenter can give a brief history of each child’s life and explain the number of descendents and introduce who is attending the reunion from that line of the family.
The keynote speaker or the presentation during the dinner can be one of the key points of the reunion. If it is not a child friendly event, you should state this on the invitation so that everyone is aware of that. You may also conduct business at this meeting and begin a collection to fund future reunions. Many families form organizations focused on having reunions and encouraging further research.