Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter

California Considers Restrictive Marriage Records Access

The following announcement was written by Liz Stookesberry Myers of the California Alliance of Genealogical Societies:

Assembly Bill 130 will be heard in the Senate Appropriations Committee very soon.  It was introduced by  Kevin Jeffries (Republican ) of the Temecula area.  The Bill was presented at the request of the Recorder Association of California.  They want to be able to handle Marriage Records the same as Birth and Death Records.  That means that they can black out the Mother's Maiden name, if the County Recorder chooses.  The Recorder also has the option of sending out an informational copy only.

The main concern is what the Recorder of each county may or may not choose to do.  At least that is the way it is written today.

US Tries to Stop Geronimo Lawsuit

According to the BBC, US officials have moved to block a legal bid by descendants of Apache leader Geronimo to have his remains reburied. Geronimo's relatives say some body parts were stolen almost 100 years ago by members of a society linked to Yale University to keep in their clubhouse.

The relatives want to rebury the warrior, who died in 1909, near his birthplace in New Mexico. But the justice department has asked a federal judge to dismiss their lawsuit.

The society, known as Skull and Bones, is alleged to have stolen some of Geronimo's remains from a burial plot in Oklahoma in 1918.

Government lawyers want to remove the U.S. goverment as a defendant in the case, saying that the government was not involved in the alleged theft of bones. The same lawyers have no objection to the lawsuit's claims against the other defendants: Yale University and the Order of the Skull and Bones.

New York City Restricts Access to Vital Records

Sad news: "The public is no longer permitted to look at the birth and death indexes at the New York City Department of Health."

The following was written by Jan Meisels Allen who has given permission to distribute it elsewhere:

The New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH) has restricted access to the indices for vital records (birth, death) effective April 8, 2009. Only authorized personnel are now  permitted to research the indices.

PAHR Legislation

Texas State Archivist Chris La Plante, Secretary of the Society of State Archivists, asks that this be forwarded to as many genealogical list serves as possible and to contact your representatives.

Now's the time to step up for PAHR.

Congressman Maurice Hinchey (D, NY) and Congressman John McHugh (R, NY) have just sent a "dear colleague" letter to the members of the House of Representatives inviting them to sign on as original sponsors for the "Preserving the American Historical Records" bill.

Church Issues Cease & Desist Order to Genealogist

Genealogist David Shannon found the graves and tombstones of several relatives, including his great-grandparents Julia and Lloyd Harp, in the Old Union Christian Church Cemetery in Lexington, Kentucky. Shannon began to compile the names, birth and death dates on the tombstones, which date back to the early 1800s. "Once I got into it, I figured other people trying to find ancestors would find information in the cemetery helpful," he said.

Shannon then created an independent research Web site, www.oldunioncemetery.com, where he's posted the information on the 475 documented burials collected and a photograph of each visible stone. But the church board at Old Union took offense.

Open Access to Public Records: A Genealogical Perspective

The Records Preservation and Access Committee (RPAC), a joint committee of the Federation of Genealogical Societies and the National Genealogical Society, has published a White Paper dealing with access to vital records.

In a post-9/11 world, the requirements of open access to records and information often conflicts with the perceived need to ensure national security, combat terrorism and to respond to the privacy needs of everyday citizens.

A Copy of the Declaration of Independence is Not a Public Record?

An interesting legal case has just been decided involving a copy of the Declaration of Independence made in 1776. A judge ruled that the copy, made by a public official and sent to public officials, is not a public record.

In the summer of 1776, the state of Massachusetts had copies of the Declaration printed by Ezekiel Russell, then working in Salem, and apparently a copy was sent to each town within the state. What is now the State of Maine was still a part of Massachusetts at that time, so a copy was sent to the town clerk of Wiscasset, Maine. The Wiscasset town clerk copied the Continental Congress’s words into Wiscasset’s official records.

MGC Protests Plan for Drastic Cut in Massachusetts Vital Records Research Hours Available

The following was written by the Massachusetts Genealogical Council:

To Massachusetts Genealogical Community:

The Massachusetts Department of Public Health has announced a drastic cut in the research hours available to genealogists and the public at large. The notice reads:

DUE TO BUDGET RESTRICTIONS AND STAFFING REDUCTIONS, THE REGISTRY OF VITAL
RECORDS AND STATISTICS WILL BE REDUCING RESEARCH ROOM HOURS EFFECTIVE
FEBRUARY 23, 2009. NEW RESEARCH HOURS WILL BE:

MONDAY: 2:00pm - 4:30pm    TUESDAY: 9:00am - 12:00n
WEDNESDAY: NO RESEARCH HOURS
THURSDAY: 2:00pm - 4:30pm     FRIDAY: 9:00am - 12:00pm

We apologize for any inconvenience.

Ex-archivist Gets 4 Years in Prison

The former archivist at The Mariners' Museum in Newport News, Virginia who stole thousands of museum documents and sold them on the Internet was sentenced Wednesday to four years in prison.

Lester F. Weber sold at least 3,500 documents — from collections he was supposed to oversee — on eBay under his wife's name. The items included everything from brochures and boarding passes for old ships to a lawsuit against the company that owned the Titanic.

Who Owns the Copyrights on Obituaries?

According to the Times-Tribune, a newspaper in Scranton, Pennsylvania, the newspaper owns the copyrights on all obituaries that they write. I'm no lawyer, but I think that newspaper has a strong case.

It seems that the Times-Tribune sued the Wilkes-Barre Publishing Co. and The Times Leader on Wednesday, claiming the Wilkes-Barre paper plagiarized more than 50 obituaries written and published in The Times-Tribune starting in late October. The suit, filed in Lackawanna County Court, lists seven claims, including misappropriation, unfair competition, fraud, breach of contract and unjust enrichment.

Update: CIGO's Campaign to Open the Irish Republic's 1926 Census

The following message was written by Steven Smyrl, Executive Liaison Officer of the Council of Irish Genealogical Organisation and is re-posted here at his request:

Dear Friends of CIGO,

Just a quick note to thank you for your support for the Council of Irish Genealogical Organisation's (CIGO) campaign to open the Irish Republic's 1926 Census. Access to this valuable resource, the first census taken after the foundation of the State, will prove to be of immense help to those seeking ancestors born in Ireland before the commencement of civil registration in 1864.

Follow-up: Church Records Re-Opened at National Library of Ireland

Three months ago I wrote about the National Library of Ireland's actions to  remove access restrictions to its microfilm copies of Catholic parish registers. These restrictions had applied only to records from three dioceses - Cashel & Emly, Cloyne and Kerry - while those of all 23 other dioceses had been on unrestricted access for several years. You can read my earlier article at http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2008/05/church-records.html.

Genealogists cheered when the restrictions were removed.

California Woman Uses RootsWeb to Commit Identity Theft

Federal prosecutors this week charged a Southern California woman with aggravated identity theft and other crimes for allegedly using a popular genealogy research website to locate people who had recently died, and then taking over their credit cards.

Tracy June Kirkland, 42, allegedly used Rootsweb.com to find the names, Social Security numbers and birth dates of people who, shall we say, had no further need for their consumer credit lines. She then "would randomly call various credit card companies to determine if the deceased individual had an … account," according to the 15-count indictment filed in federal court in Los Angeles Tuesday.

NARA's Hours Now May Be Cut – Again

UPDATE: See the comments posted by Lee White of the National Coalition for History. You can read his words in the comments section that follows this article.

Privacy International Files Complaint Against Ancestry.com/The Generations Network

London-based Privacy International (PI), a human rights group that serves as a watchdog on surveillance and privacy invasions by governments and corporations, has filed a complaint with the UK Information Commissioner's Office. The complaint questions Ancestry.com's new DNA services.

Privacy International believes that Ancestry.com's new DNA service should be stopped immediately until the company clearly defines the service and describes how it is being handled. Privacy International states that questions must be answered satisfactorily before people can have confidence in this new service. Until then, P.I. believes the service presents a number of substantial dangers for customers.

Ethics in Publishing Family Histories

Under U.S. copyright laws, facts cannot be copyrighted. Recent legal opinion has even decided that certain compilations of facts, such as telephone directories, are not subject to copyright.

But what about compiled genealogies? What can I include in a published genealogy without infringing on someone else's rights? And what rights do I have to the compilations I produce?

Draft NARA Digitizing Plan Available For Public Comment

The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is seeking public comment on its draft Plan for Digitizing Archival Materials for Public Access, 2007-2016. This draft plan outlines the planned strategies to digitize and make more accessible the historic holdings from the National Archives of the United States.

To Cache or Not to Cache: The Definitive Answer

Message boards on genealogy sites and blogs lit up this past week as Ancestry.com announced the new Internet Biographical Collection. The pros and cons have been discussed ad infinitum elsewhere, so I won't repeat them here. If you have not yet read about this controversy, perform a Google search on the words "Internet Biographical Collection."

Many of this week's discussions debated claims and counterclaims about copyrights, legalities and such. I read a lot of these messages but never found any written by anyone who claimed to have a law degree or other appropriate credentials. It seems a lot of people, including me, were writing about legalities without having the academic qualifications to back up their claims. To be blunt, I don't know if anyone was correct. I also noticed that nobody cited legal precedent, at least not with a case title and source citation.

Shame on all of us! We genealogists should know better than to make claims without source citations.

I have now found one case where a court ruled on the exact issue of the legality of caching other web sites' content and on the copyright laws involved. This landmark case should be required reading for all of us who posted messages either for or against the recent ill-fated Ancestry.com product.

Ethics in Publishing Family Histories

Under U.S. copyright laws, facts cannot be copyrighted. Recent legal opinion has even decided that certain compilations of facts, such as telephone directories, are not subject to copyright.

But what about compiled genealogies? What can I include in a published genealogy without infringing on someone else’s rights? And what rights do I have to the compilations I produce?

Irish Privacy Bill Could Block Family Tree Research

Genealogists have written to Michael McDowell, the Irish justice minister, to complain that his proposed privacy bill could put them out of business. They say if the bill is passed they could be denied access to public registers, such as the records of births, marriages and deaths, an essential resource for biographers, social historians and genealogists.