LEWISTON – Local Franco-Americans will have the opportunity to learn hands-on how to use the Internet to trace their Canadian heritage in a pair of free workshops scheduled this week at the Lewiston Public Library and Lewiston-Auburn College.

Sophie Morel, archivist at the Canadian national archives in Trois-Rivires, Quebec, will speak on “Your Family, Your History: Following the Path of Your Quebecois Ancestors Through Cyber-Space,” at 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 16, in LPL’s Callahan Hall.

Following the multi-media presentation, attendees will be invited into the library’s 15-station computer lab to try their hand at searching for their own family roots on-line, assisted by Morel and a cadre of computer-savvy community volunteers.

Morel will give the same program at 10:30 a.m. Saturday, Oct. 18, in Room 170 at L-A College, across the hall from the college’s Franco-American Collection reading room.

Afterward, those interested may test their high-tech roots-sleuthing skills on computers located nearby in the LAC library, aided by members of the Maine Franco-American Genealogical Society, which is cosponsoring Morel’s talk at the college.

The Franco-American Collection will also be open to the public that morning, and an exhibit of vintage photos of local Franco life will be on display at the LAC café.

Morel has served since 2006 as regional archivist at the Centre d’Archives de la Mauricie et du Centre-du-Québec and the Bibliothque et Archives nationales du Québec in Trois-Rivires.

Prior to that, she was archivist at the Eastern Townships Research Centre at Bishop’s University in Sherbrooke. She earned a bachelor’s degree in history and archives management from the University of Quebec in Montreal, and is currently a master’s degree candidate in the culture and tourism program at the University of Quebec in Trois-Rivires.

The mission of the Bibliothque et Archives nationales du Québec (BAnQ) is to assemble, preserve and provide democratic access to Québec’s published documentary heritage. Through its Web site, www.banq.qc.ca, BAnQ offers free, easy access to numerous comprehensive genealogical resource books, such as the venerable Dictionaire Tanguay, as well as geographic maps and family monographs listed in the Iris Catalogue, and the PISTARD data bank’s extensive holdings of vintage provincial postcards and posters as well as documents and archival records of the French Regime.

In her local presentations, Morel will provide an introduction to the BanQ Web site and demonstrate how, with a few simple clicks of the mouse, anyone can access information on their Quebecois forebears as far back as the 1600s, when the first boatloads of French soldiers came across the Atlantic to Quebec, then known as New France.

Morel sees BanQ’s Internet portal as a convenient way for Franco-Americans of Quebecois descent to reconnect to their French-Canadian past regardless of where they now live, and – since the site is bilingual – whether or not they speak the French language.

On the Web site’s “Welcome” page, BAnQ General Director Lise Bissonnette said, “By bringing all of our resources to you and guiding your search through the maze of document-related networks, we intend to fully play our role as a crossroads of cultural exchange and allow each of you to enrich your free time, build your knowledge and find what meets your specific educational and informational expectations.”

More information on Morel’s local presentations is available by contacting the Lewiston Public Library at 513-3135, the Maine Franco-American Genealogical Society at 786-3327 or the Franco-American Collection at L-A College at 753-6545.