The DAILY genealogy technology newsletter for genealogy
consumers, packed with straight talk - hold the sugar coating - whether
the vendors like it or not!
The following announcement was written by FamilySearch:
Included are 19 new collections: 7 from Napoli, Italy, 7 from the United States, 4 from Germany, and 1 from Netherlands. Among these collections are the United States Draper Manuscript Collection from 1740 to 1960 (more information can be found here), the Germany, Brandenburg, Bernau bei Berlin Jewish Records from 1688 to 1872, and the United States Revolutionary War Rolls from 1775 to 1783. See the table below for the full list of updates. Search these diverse collections and more than 3.5 billion other records for free at FamilySearch.org.
Prepared by the team at The In-Depth Genealogist, the premier issue of Going In-Depth was introduced to subscribers earlier today. Filled with over 70 pages of guest articles, regular columns and free resources, it is a great publication for every genealogist, no matter the age, stage or focus of your research.
The owners of this new, free new online magazine plan to issue a new edition on the 15th of each month. Sign up today for your free subscription so you do not miss an issue.
Many cemeteries are now computerizing their records. The more forward-thinking cemetery managers are even making their records available on the World Wide Web. One of the best efforts I have seen is that of the Riverside Cemetery in Macon, Georgia.
Riverside Cemetery was established in 1887 as a private cemetery located above the Ocmulgee River and has operated as a not-for-profit entity since the 1940s. The cemetery is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is the final resting place for more than 18,000 people representing many ages, faiths, races, and national creeds. Many Civil War veterans from both sides are interred in Riverside Cemetery's 125 acres of landscaped property. Careful records, including thousands of obituaries, have been kept and maintained since the cemetery's inception in 1887.
A new Mennonite genealogy search engine has gone online that should be a huge help to anyone searching for Mennonite ancestors. The new web site already claims to have more than 2 million names in its database.
The search mechanism is super simple. You can see the search page in the image to the right. (Click on the image to see a larger picture.) You can perform a search, then use the "Narrow By Category" menu to refine the results.
The following announcement was written by FamilySearch:
February 7, 2013
FamilySearch added 8.5 million new, free indexed records and images this week to its collection. Included are 2,897,940 additional index records and images for the new New York State Census of 1855 collection, the 1,070,807 index records and images from the Texas Birth Certificates collection from 1903-1935, and the 554,541 images from the Italy, Catania, Diocesi di Caltagirone, Catholic Church Records collection from 1502-1942. See the table below for the full list of updates. Search these diverse collections and more than 3.5 billion other records for free at FamilySearch.org.
A newsletter reader posted a comment expressing dissatisfaction that a set of images of Cook County, Illinois, birth records has been removed from FamilySearch.org. Indeed, removal of any online records of genealogical value is sad, but not unusual. Changes such as these are quite common on FamilySearch, Ancestry.com, Fold3, MyHeritage, FindMyPast, and most all other online sites that provide old records online. Removal of datasets has occurred dozens of times in the past, and I suspect such things will continue to happen in the future. I thought I would write a brief explanation.
The Canada 1921 Census was a detailed enumeration of the Canadian population taken on 1 June 1921 when the total population of Canada was about 8.7 million people. Census returns remain at Statistics Canada until 92 years after the taking of a census and are not available to the public.
On 1 June 2013, the 1921 Census will be transferred to Library and Archives Canada and will be made public shortly after that date. Estimated availability dates haven't been published yet. I wouldn't expect the Canadian 1921 census to be available on the morning of June 2, but it should appear on the Web within a few months after that date.
My Genealogy Hound is a new, free website that makes available thousands of biographies extracted from numerous pre-1900 county history volumes. The biographies are organized for easy viewing by county or by family surname. Currently, bioraphies are available for Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri, and Tennessee with many more states to be added soon. In addition, My Genealogy Hound also features a selection of free, vintage county maps from Arkansas, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma (including Indian Nations), and Tennessee with additional states to be added soon.
The following announcement was written by Findmypast.com:
Collection includes more than 6 million pages with original images
LOS ANGELES (Feb. 6, 2013) – Findmypast.com, an international leader in online family history, today announced the addition of more than 6 million pages from British newspapers, including original images, to its extensive historical records collection. The British newspapers include local and regional titles from England, Scotland and Wales from 1700 to 1950, and encompass nearly 200 titles. The British newspapers are part of an exclusive partnership with the British Library to digitize 50 million pages over the next 10 years.
In the January 3, 2013 edition of this newsletter at http://goo.gl/tYRPT, I mentioned that a new daily genealogy would soon be launched. The future has now arrived and the Family History Daily is now online.
Here is a brief announcement with the major details:
The following announcement was written by FamilySearch:
January 29, 2013
FamilySearch added 211,909 additional images for the United States Mexican War Index and Service Records collection, which includes a large portion of the war’s 78,718 American servicemen. Other notable additions include 514,562 browsable images in the Netherlands, Groningen Province, Church Records collection from 1595-1864, and 21,529 browsable images for the new United States Confederacy Navy and Marine Service Records collection from 1861-1865. See the table below for the full list of updates. Search these diverse collections and more than 3.5 billion other records for free at FamilySearch.org.
The following announcement was written by brightsolid, the company that manages ScotlandsPeople for the National Records of Scotland:
From tenements to palaces - these records offer a fascinating snapshot of Scotland during the Edwardian era and are a major new genealogy resource
Over 2 million names of Scots included in the property records for 1905 are being released today online for the first time via ScotlandsPeople, the official government family history website. The new records, known as the Valuation Rolls and comprising over 2.4 million indexed names and over 74,000 digital images, cover every kind of building, structure or property in Scotland which were assessed as having a rateable value.
Ancestry.com and BillionGraves.com have a new agreement in which
BillionGraves is now searchable on Ancestry.com. In the past, the only
way to search BillionGraves.com was to go directly to the
BillionGraves.com web site. The new search adds "one stop searching"
from the popular Ancestry.com web site. You also can directly search
only the BillionGraves.com database by going to http://search.ancestry.com/search/db.aspx?dbid=70734.
The records are freely searchable and accessible without any registration or sign-in required.
The Pennsylvania State Archives publishes a quarterly newsletter that is available in digital format on the Web. Editor Joshua Stahlman obviously spends a lot of time producing this high-quality publication.
One article in the latest edition that interested me was Death Certificate Digitization, a project underway now to digitize and index historically valuable documents from the Pennsylvania State Archives' collections. Other articles in the current edition include:
Ancestry24.za is, or has been, a genealogy web site in South Africa. It seems to have two URLs, using both Ancestry24.za and Ancestry24.com. The site contained many Anglican Church marriage and baptism records. I have written about the site several times. You can see my past articles by starting at http://goo.gl/1n7z0. Now the owners of Ancestry24.za have announced they are closing the web site.
Family historians will be able to access 21 million birth, marriage, and death records free of charge, on Thursday 24th of January.
Findmypast.ie based in Dublin, at the heart of Irish family history are hosting the inaugural “Irish History Family Day," to celebrate the launch of the records online. The family history website will publish records covering the island of Ireland from the 1800’s right up to the 1950’s.
Amy Tanner Thiriot has written an in-depth guide describing recent changes made to www.FamilySearch.org. She writes:
"The Church genealogical database NewFamilySearch (NFS) has been frustrating for so many people, particularly those who do actual genealogical research and care about accuracy. NFS allowed people with no particular skill to upload sketchy aggregated online family trees (usually culled from Ancestral File, Ancestry, and RootsWeb) and have their data look as valid as the correct information.
The Ancestry.com blog at http://goo.gl/DjWpJ lists a new addition to the Ancestry.com web site: Support Communities. The announcement states, "We are pleased to inform you that Ancestry recently introduced a new online destination for learning and problem solving – Ancestry Support Communities – it’s our latest addition to the world’s largest online genealogy community. Whether you’re looking to share your experience and knowledge with other members, or want to connect with other product enthusiasts for help with your questions, our new Support Communities are there for you."
The following announcement was written by WikiTree:
January 8, 2013: WikiTree is proud to announce its new GEDMatches tool, open to all genealogists. This tool enables anyone with a GEDCOM to compare their family tree with the worldwide family tree being grown by the WikiTree community.
GEDMatches does an automatic search for each individual in a GEDCOM (up to 5,000 individuals). Each one is compared with the names and dates of the 4.3 million people in the shared tree. Suggested matches are presented in a convenient, sortable table.
The following announcement was written by Archives.com:
With the holidays behind us, it's time to dig into finding more ancestors and Archives.com is here to help. We recently added more than 58 million United States vital records. These 27 new collections contain birth, death, or marriage information from 21 states.
To learn more about these collections and to begin your search, please visit the Collections page.
Recent Comments