Dave Obee is the owner of Genealogy Unlimited and Interlink Bookshop. He has been a newspaper reporter or editor for several different newspapers in British Columbia or Alberta since 1972 and is currently editorial page editor of the Victoria Times Colonist. An author/compiler of five books on genealogy research, David has been a family history researcher for twenty-five years. Dave has traveled extensively in Russia, Poland, Ukraine, and Germany, visiting major archives and libraries in five countries for genealogical research. He is the current president of the Victoria Genealogical Society.

Dave was born in British Columbia, and his roots there go back to the arrival of his great-great-grandfather from Manitoba in 1890. Some of his paternal ancestors arrived in North America two centuries ago. His mother was born in a German colony in Russia, and came with her parents to Canada in 1928.

Dave has been a guest speaker at several genealogy society meetings and conferences in recent years. A detailed list of topics (along with their links and some of the handout information) may be found at the Dave Obee page on the Interlink site.

Personal Research Interests

Dave has collected extensive information on the German Baptist colonies in the Neudorf area of Volhynia, in the Ukraine. His personal family tree includes names such as Weiss, Scheffler, Tiedtke, Reschke, Tiede, Menzel, Hartmann, Schindler, and Boehnert. Villages include Iwanowitsch, Solodyri, Pulin, Neudorf, Florowka, Skolobow, Rogowka, and Wjasowitz; all are near Zhitomir.

Dave's Volhynian ancestors went there in the 1860s. They had lived in East Prussia, Posen and Poland. Specific towns include Albrechtsdorf, Bartenstein, and Pr. Eylau, in East Prussia (Ostpreussen); Nakel and Bromberg in Posen; and Dabie, Drzewce,
Lodz and Konigsbach in Poland.

His father was born in Canada. On that side, his primary interests are in the Obee line (from Kent to Ontario, 1870s) as well as Mayers (Bucklebury, Berkshire); Spring (Watford, Hertfordshire) Montgomery (Fermanagh, Ireland) and McKennitt (Donegal, Ireland).

His wife has English and Irish ancestry. Names of interest there are Bambrick and Liddell, both from Ulster, as well as Chatfield and Gladman (from Sussex) and Hoare and Christmas (from Hampshire).