• Our friend Photo Detective Maureen Taylor is holding a funny family photo contest. Upload your photo with a little information, and get your friends and family to vote it the "SOS" (Silly Old Snapshot). Prizes include a free photo consultation sponsored by VoiceQuilt.com, a copy of Fashionable Folks: Bonnets and Hats, and more. Get details here.

• Ancestry.com has added more than 7 million records from 300 years of Pennsylvania history. The records, from the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, are in the databases Pennsylvania, Naturalizations, 1794-1908 and Pennsylvania, Church and Town Records, 1708-1985.

• Subscription site British Origins has added the Middlesex Baptisms Index: 1538-1751, which records nearly 100,000 baptisms—about 300,000 names when you add in parents and sponsors—in Middlesex and London.

• Free genealogy search engine Mocavo has made two big hires: Michael Leclerc, who spent 15 years with the New England Historic Genealogical Society, as Chief Genealogist; and Ryan Hunter, a former Wall Street analyst who covered companies including Ancestry.com, as COO.

Friday, January 27, 2012 3:57:39 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• Findmypast.ie, the Irish website that FindMyPast.uk introduced earlier this year, has added a feature that lets you build your family tree on the site for free (you’ll need to register for a free account with the site). According to the announcement, it’s the first step in the site’s development of a fully integrated family tree program where you can store photos and historical information.

• Archives.com has partnered with Family Tree DNA to add genetic genealogy testing to its offerings. Archives.com visitors can now purchase Family Tree DNA’s Y-chromosome, mitochondrial and Family Finder tests (they’re up to 30 percent off on Archives.com for a limited time). Read the full announcement on the Archives.com blog.

• The National Genealogical Society has released its 2012 Family History Conference Program in searchable form. The conferene is May 9–12 in Cincinnati (our hometown—will we see you there?). Registration opens soon: This Thursday, Dec. 1.

Monday, November 28, 2011 12:15:58 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• The Genealogists for Families project, coordinated by genealogists Judy Webster and Joan Miller, uses the microfunding website Kiva.org to make small loans to those in need around the world. Borrowers use the funds for businesses that support their families, for example, a man in Rwanda used a Kiva loan to buy raw materials to expand his carpentry business. So far, Genealogists for Families has made 61 loans totaling $1,525. To get involved, sign up with Kiva. You can lend as little as $25. As the loan is repaid, you can lend to someone else.

• Did your relative die in service to the Prussian army during World War I? The Prussian Army Project database at Genoroots lets you search 100,000 names (and growing) on the Deutsche Verlustlisten—the list of the army's personnel losses during World War I. Go here to search.

• The Genealogical Society of Ireland and the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland are working together on a DNA project to learn more about the Irish population. Coordinators will collect DNA samples and genealogical information from participants. Participants won't receive results unless important health information is discovered. You'll find more details in this article on TheJournal.ie.

• The Federation of Genealogical Societies is offering two new benefits to member societies: a website review and a newsletter review (whether print or digital). Evaluations may include suggestions on improving design, layout, ease of use, content and more. See the FGS Voice blog for more information.

Friday, October 28, 2011 4:22:51 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [2]

The prison registers, which came the National Archives of Ireland, cover bridewells (places of detention), county prisons, sanatoriums for alcoholics and other institutions. Most records give the prisoner’s name, address, place of birth, occupation, religion, education, age, physical description, name and address of next of kin, crime, sentence, and incarceration start and ending dates.

Drunkenness accounted for more than 30 percent of crimes reported and more than 25 percent of incarcerations. Other common offenses in the registers are theft (16 percent), assault (12 percent), vagrancy (8 percent) and rioting (4 percent).

You can access the records with a FindMyPast.ie subscription or with PayAsYouGo credits. 

For help finding Irish ancestors in court and other records, check out Family Tree University’s Irish Research 101 and 102 courses, as well as our $4 Irish Heritage Research Guide from ShopFamilyTree.com. 

Friday, October 21, 2011 10:47:02 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• Archives.com is sharing an interesting infographic for Family History Month, showing US immigration numbers through the years and stats on the origins of immigrants from 1910 to 1919 and from 2000 to 2009, among other information. Check it out on the Archives.com blog.  

• The Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy (SLIG), taking place Jan. 23-27, 2012, is having a contest for genealogy bloggers. Just blog about why you would like to attend SLIG before Sat., Oct. 15 at midnight (Mountain Time) and you could win free tuition. See entry details here. 

• British genealogy site GenesReunited has added more than 35 million baptism, marriage and burial records for England and Wales dating back to 1538. The parish records include Boyd's Marriage Index 1538-1840 and Boyd's 1st Miscellaneous Series 1538-1775, supplied by the British Society of Genealogists. You can view the records on a pay per view basis or Genes Reunited Platinum members can add one or more of the record sets to their package.

• Blogger Dick Eastman wrote about a neat site called Old S.F. with 13,000 historical San Francisco photos plotted on a Google map. Read Dick’s post here and visit the site here.
  

• The Federation of Genealogical Societies announced its new board members and directors, including George G. Morgan (Family Tree Magazine’s Document Detective columnist) as Vice-President Membership, Curt D. Witcher as Vice-President Development, Loretto “Lou” Szucs as Director, Kim Kasprzyk as Treasurer, Polly Fitzgerald Kimmitt as Director, Angela Walton-Raji as Director and Randy Whited as Director.

• The National Genealogical Society also announced a new board member: Teresa Koch-Bostic, of Mineola, NY, a professional genealogist in addition to her extensive background in business.

Friday, October 14, 2011 11:53:56 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [4]

• The National Archives NARAtions blog has a helpful post today for browsing 1940 census records (set for release in April 2012). When people weren’t home during the censustaker’s first pass, or were living in a hotel or other temporary location, enumerators would list them on separate pages. You’ll find these pages at the end of the records for that enumeration district. So if you’re browsing for your ancestors and don’t find them, be sure to check the last pages of records for that district.

• More from the National Archives: The official dedication of this National Archives and Records Administration’s new National Personnel Records Center at 1 Archives Drive north of St. Louis, Mo., will take place Saturday, Oct. 15, at 10 a.m. Read more about the new NPRC here. 

• And still more: You now can get the archives’ lesson plans, Presidential Libraries' podcasts and more through iTunes U. (iTunesU is part of the iTunes store that lets you access thousands of free lectures, videos, books and podcasts from institutions all over the world.) Right now, there’s a selection of World War II films, Presidential historical documents and podcasts, and several "Inside the Vaults" videos.

• British subscription site Findmypast.co.uk published 1.3 million Manchester family history records in the Manchester Collection.
  

The records, provided by Manchester City Council's Libraries, Information and Archives, include prison registers (1847-1881), industrial school admission and discharge registers (about 1866-1912), school admission registers (about 1870-1916), apprentice records (1700-1849), baptism and birth registers (1734-1920), cemetery and death records (1750-1968), marriage registers (1734-1808) and workhouse registers.

Friday, September 30, 2011 1:42:59 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• FamilySearch released more searchable records this week, including  more than 6 million Hungarian Catholic Church records, 4 million Mexican civil registrations, 1 million new Chinese genealogies (1500 to 1900), and Quebec notarial records (1800 to 1900). US additions come from California, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland, Minnesota, Montana, New York, Washington and the Virgin Islands, plus 1942 WWII draft registrations. See the full list and link to each database here.

• Family tree site Geni introduced its $4.95-per-month Geni Plus service as a level between the free Basic and $12.95 Pro memberships. Genealogists’ frustrated feedback after changes to those memberships led to Geni Plus, intended for social genealogists who want to collaborate with other researchers. It's "designed to give these members more power to build their personal family trees while discovering some of the benefits of working with others on their family history," says CEO Noah Tutak. Features include unlimited relatives in your tree and GEDCOM exports for any profile you can view on Geni (up to 100,000 records). See Geni’s blog for more details. 

• Subscription British records site Findmypast.co.uk added a million 20th century merchant navy seamen records—the first time they’re accessible online. They list crew members of UK merchant ships from 1918 to 1941 and include photos.
  

• This from the New York History blog: If you’re planning to visit Ellis Island and see where many immigrants first entered America, you can download a $1.99 cell phone tour taking you through the immigrant experience. Read more here.
  

Friday, September 16, 2011 4:49:42 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [1]

Those include veterans applications for military headstones, records of headstones for deceased Union veterans, Confederate POW records, registers of homes for disabled soldiers, service records and more.

Also newly added are notarial records from Canada, church records and civil registrations from Mexico, and a variety of records from England.

You’ll find a chart here listing the new collections and linking to the individual databases. Note that not all of the collections are searchable. Indexes haven’t been completed for some, such as U.S., Records of Confederate Prisoners of War, 1861–1865. In that case, you’ll need to browse collections by date or place.

Wednesday, September 07, 2011 10:04:00 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [6]

• The Family History Library (FHL) is starting to roll out online microfilm ordering in the United States and Canada, meaning you soon won’t have to visit a FamilySearch Center to order microfilmed records (you’ll still need to go in person to view them, of course). First, you’ll find the film you need in the FHL online catalog, then you'll order it here. California, the Pacific Northwest and other points West were first to get online ordering, with the rest of us still to be added in phases.

• UK subscription genealogy site FindMyPast.co.uk is adding a million 20th-century merchant navy seamen records (Britain’s Merchant Navy Day, is Saturday, Sept. 3). The records name crew members of UK merchant ships from 1918 to 1941, offer physical descriptions and include photos.

• Genetic genealogy company FamilyTreeDNA discovered through its Family Finder test that NFL players Xavier Omon of the San Francisco 49ers and Ogemdi Nwagbuo of the San Diego Chargers are half brothers. You can read more about their story on ESPN.com. 

• As an update to our November 2011 online newspapers article, which highlighted the subscription website Paper of Record in addition to other online sources, Rick Crume gave me a heads up about some improvements to the site: First, highlighting of your search terms has been restored on the digitized newspaper pages in your search results. Second, you now have the option to search a broader date range than five years within a single title.

Friday, September 02, 2011 10:34:42 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [11]

The Ancestry.co.uk collection includes many of the same records: arrivals at US Atlantic and other ports, records of early US immigrations, US naturalizations, the Irish Emigrants in North America collection, etc. To see the list, go here and scroll down to the Included Data Collections box.

Click here to start searching the Ancestry.co.uk immigration collection.

Monday, August 29, 2011 8:41:17 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [6]

The collection includes arrivals at US Atlantic and other ports, records of early US immigrations, US naturalizations, the Irish Emigrants in North America collection and more. To see the list, go here and scroll down to the Included Data Collections box.

Click here to start searching the Ancestryco.uk immigration collection.

Monday, August 29, 2011 8:41:11 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [22]

• FamilySearch added to collections from seven countries, including 6 million record images from Mexico. Other additions include parish register records from Belgium and England, and church book records from Russia. New records were added from eight US states: Maryland, Montana, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Tennessee, Vermont, and Virginia. Click through to the new and updated collections from here.
  

• UK family history site Genes Reunited has released a variety of military records from WW1 and the Second Anglo-Boer War. Collections include Royal Naval Officers' Medal Roll 1914-1920, New Zealand WWI Soldiers, Soldiers Died in the Great War 1914-1919, and records with 258,800 names of men and women who fought during the Second Anglo-Boer War, 1899-1902.

• Subscription genealogy site Ancestry.com has expanded its US school yearbook collection, adding nearly 25,000 new yearbooks. It now totals more than 35,000 books with 155 million records from 1884 to 2009. The books come from high schools, junior highs, academies, colleges and universities. They're also are available on the Canadian-focused Ancestry.ca.

• Jill Barone of St. Petersburg, Fla., won the Red Star Line Museum's "Do You Know This Girl?" social media contest. Barone wins a trip to Antwerp, Belgium, for the official pre-opening festivities of the Red Star Line Museum in May 2012, and a $1,000 shopping spree at Diane Von Furstenberg's Antwerp boutique. The museum will open in spring 2013.

Friday, August 26, 2011 1:14:46 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [5]

• Canadian subscription site Ancestry.ca, in partnership with The British Postal Museum and Archive, has added a database of Post Office Appointment Books, 1737-1969. The 1.5 million records name British Post Office employees, including the “femails” who kept the office open during wartimes. (These records also are on Ancestry.com.) 

• Our local Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County has launched a website that lets you explore the first panoramic image of an American city (Cincinnati, of course). You can zoom way in on the daguerreotype to see remarkable detail of storefronts, steamboats, streets and more along two miles of the city’s Ohio Riverfront. Click yellow markers on the image for pop-up windows with information about places depicted.

• British genealogy subscription site FindMyPast.co.uk, with the Society of Genealogists, has added a Business Index Collection listing Britain's shopkeepers, businessmen and women, and captains of industry from the early 1890s through 1927.

• The new Black Sea German Research site is for those tracing families who migrated from Germany, Alsace, Poland or Hungary to the Black Sea region of South Russia (now Ukraine) in the early 1800s. Search a database of names, upload your GEDCOM and share historical information at this free, volunteer-run site.

• NBC is re-running “Who Do You Think You Are?” season 2 episodes Saturday nights this summer. Check your local listings if you missed an episode or want to watch your favorite again.

Friday, July 22, 2011 2:14:46 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [8]

• Subscription genealogy site Archives.com has added 17 million new US vital and military records. Vital records come from Texas, Colorado and South Carolina; and the military records provide information about individuals who served in the Air Force, Army, Marine Corps, Navy and National Guard during the Vietnam War and Gulf War eras. Click here to see more details on the Archives.com additions. 

• FamilySearch has updated 55 of its online record collections, for a total of 25 million new images of records from 16 countries. Many of the collections haven’t yet been indexed, so you’ll need to click through to the individual database and browse by place, year or however the records are organized. Click here to see a list of the record additions and link to the updated collections. 

• Deceased Online, a pay-per-view site for burial and cremation records in the UK, is adding millions of records from Scotland. You can check out participating cemeteries and crematoria here. 

Friday, July 08, 2011 3:14:20 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [6]

• On its History Happens Here site, the Missouri History Museum is sharing the Civil War saga of soldier James Love and his letters to fiancee Eliza Mary "Molly" Wilson. Museum staff post each new letter 150 years to the day after it was written. Catch up on the letters you’ve missed here. 

• The free FamilySearch site has added records for 10 countries. The additions come from Germany, Mexico, Brazil, Canada, Guatemala, Italy, Norway, Sweden and the United States (Iowa, Indiana, Louisiana, Ohio, Vermont and Wisconsin). Click here to see details and links for the updated collections. 

• British subscription site FindMyPast.co.uk has published the records of over half a million men who served in the British militia, the precursor to the UK’s Territorial Army. The militia was made up of men who held everyday jobs, but took part in regular military exercises and on occasion, fought. You can search the Militia Service Records, covering 1806 to 1915, here.
  

• The National Genealogical Society has created The NGS Weekly, a “newspaper” that pulls feeds from various genealogy blog posts. You can subscribe to get e-mail notifications when the page is updated.

Friday, June 24, 2011 1:21:58 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [1]

• The renowned genealogy portal site Cyndi’s List has been upgraded with improved navigation, a custom database, and a custom administrative interface to make using the site quicker and easier for both visitors and Cyndi. Visit the site at CyndisList.com.

• British subscription/pay-per-view site GenesReunited has added passenger departure lists from British ports from 1890 to 1960. These records, also on FindMyPast.co.uk, cover the period of mass migration to Australia between 1947 and 1960, when an estimated 710,000 people traveled there from Great Britain. Search the departure records at GenesReunited.co.uk. Read the GenesReunited press release about the new database here.

• MyHeritage.com released an update to its free Family Tree Builder software. You can learn more about version 5.1 and download it at Myheritage.com. 

• Who’s the only man to be both father and son to US presidents? The answer is in the fun fatherhood facts gleaned from family tree site Geni’s database, which Geni is sharing in honor of Father’s Day (this Sunday). Another sampling: Worldwide, fathers average 3.5 children apiece, with Malaysia coming in at the highest, 3.8, and Germany bringing up the rear at 2.7. See all the Father's Day facts on Geni’s blog.
  

• The Britain-based Guild of One-Name Studies plans to offer a special membership rate of $26 for membership through Nov. 1, 2012. The offer will be available next Friday, June 24, to Sunday, June 26, on the guild's website. The guild is a clearinghouse for information about surname studies. Click here to see if its registry your surname is included in .

Friday, June 17, 2011 11:38:07 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [3]

Fulmoth Kearney (“Falmoth Cainey” on his passenger list), age 19, arrived in New York March 20, 1850.

This Irish Times article explains how the connection was made to Obama’s Irish roots through professional researchers in the United States and local church officials in Ireland. 

There’s even a song about the president’s ancestry: “There’s No One As Irish As Barack O’Bama” by Ireland’s Corrigan Brothers. 

The song is the soundtrack for a documentary called Barack Obama's Irish Roots,  which just premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. You can see a promo clip here. 

You can get Irish genealogy tips from the articles in Family Tree Magazine's Irish Research Toolkit or download our $4 Irish Genealogy Guide.

Monday, May 23, 2011 9:30:52 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [1]

• A new website called Unknown No Longer: A Database of Virginia Slave Names will launch in September. The site will contain free, searchable information about enslaved Virginians named in manuscripts at the Virginia Historical Society. Read more about the project here. 

• FindMyPast.co.uk has completed its two-year project to make the English and Welsh birth, marriage and death records on its site easier to use. This final installment of the project makes more than 85 million death records searchable at once, with as little as a surname. The site’s death records include England & Wales deaths, 1837-2006; British nationals who died overseas, 1818-2005; British nationals armed forces deaths, 1796-2005; and British nationals who died at sea, 1854-1890.

• The Holisso Center, a research facility for Chickasaw Nation history, will open May 28 at the Chickasaw Nation Cultural Center in Sulphur, Okla. The Holisso Center also has technology to repair and preserve damaged historical materials.
  

• The latest celebrities found to be relatives: Lady Gaga and Madonna, who share roots in Quebec (if you have French-Canadian roots, you’re probably also related to both women),  and Johnny Depp and Queen Elizabeth. Also, genealogists from Irish historical research company Eneclann have identified President Obama’s closest living Irish relatives in Ballygurteen, Co. Tipperary. 

Friday, May 20, 2011 4:05:58 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [1]

The site has more than 4,000,000 records dating from 1400 through the 1920s, including:

• Landed Estates Court Records (1850-1885), detailing more than 500,000 tenants living on estates all over Ireland
  

• Griffith's Valuation (1847-1864), which lists approximately 80 percent of householders in Ireland and names more than 1,400,000 individuals
  

• Directories Collection of national, provincial and local directories, which have information about towns and names of businesses, tradespeople and residents

FindMyPast.ie was developed in partnership with Eneclann, a Dublin-based company that offers Irish genealogy services, as well as digital publications and other services.

You can subscribe to Findmypast.ie for 6 months for 37.95 EUR (about $55) or 12 months for 59.95 EUR (about $88).

Thursday, May 05, 2011 1:26:44 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• Puritans who settled in New England
• Quakers (often Welsh) in Pennsylvania
• Scots in mid-Atlantic states (some in Virginia)
• Anglican “cavaliers” in Tidewater Maryland, Virginia and South Carolina.

Having a sizable number (50 to 100) of immigrant ancestors in one or more of those areas is a good indication you have royal roots. Also look for ancestors with gentry-level occupations such as a wealthy farmer or merchant, governor, minister or military officer.

If you suspect royal roots, your research strategy will be similar to that of any ancestry: Work backward generation by generation, keeping an eye out for the link to a royal family. But watch out for forged published genealogies, which might've been created as families tried to prove distinguished heritage.

Here are some free FamilyTreeMagazine.com articles with royal roots resources:

• Tips and resources for tracing royal connections 
• Royal research websites
  
• Using Burke’s Peerage and Gentry, a resource for tracing titled families 
• Researching coats of arms 
• Resources for heraldic genealogy 

You’ll find our guide to researching royal roots in the Spring 2011 Discover Your Roots (also available as a digital issue). 

And check out the books Colonial Americans of Royal & Noble Descent: Alleged, Proven, and Disproven by Patricia Scherzinger and, for more-distant royal links, Blood Royal: Issue of the Kings and Queens of Medieval 1066-1399: The Normans and Plantagenets by T. Anna Leese. 

I'd love to hear about your genealogical connections to the royal family!

Wednesday, April 27, 2011 9:36:01 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [3]

• Searching for an ancestor’s marriage in England or Wales from 1837 to 2005? This is your week. To mark the occasion of Britain’s royal wedding, Ancestry.co.uk is offering free access to its English and Welsh marriage indexes through April 30. The records from 1837 through 1915 already were free, but this is a good chance to search for 20th-century marriages. You’ll need to set up a free registration with the site to access search results.

• The Federation of Genealogical Societies is debuting an Internet radio show dedicated solely to genealogy societies. It’s called My Society, and it’ll air every Saturday from 2-3pm Eastern (1-2pm Central, 12-1pm Mountain, 11am-12pm Pacific) starting tomorrow, April 23. To listen, go to www.blogtalkradio.com/MySociety (under Upcoming Broadcasts, if you click the blue “more” link, you’ll see a phone number you can use to call into the show).

• The Southern California Genealogical Society has created an interactive smart phone app for the Genealogy Jamboree conference, taking place June 10-12 in Burbank, Calif. The app lets you review lecture sessions and add them to your calendar, search for exhibitors on a trade show floor map, get news updates and more. Download it using the links provided in the conference blog. 

• Genetic genealogy testing company GeneTree.com has introduced a series of specialty DNA tests including Extended Y-Chromosome Haplotype, X-Chromosome, Autosomal STR, and Y-Chromosome SNP test for Haplogroup Classification. Click here for more information about what each test can do.

Friday, April 22, 2011 4:22:17 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

Once again, the Who Do You Think You Are? Live show in London attracted thousands of eager visitors anxious to learn more about their family tree. It was my great pleasure to not only participate as a speaker this year, but also to report on the event for the Genealogy Insider.

The exhibition hall was packed for WDYTYA? Live.

According to Else Churchill, genealogist for the Society of Genealogists in the UK and organizer of the society’s workshops at the event, BBC Magazines Bristol has purchased a major share of the show from Brand Events, who has organized it for the last five years. The new owners will be managing the event from this point forward, and they are already busy making big plans.

I was very excited to bring a technology topic to the event with my Make Google Work Harder for Your Family History workshop. On the heels of RootsTech, WDYTYA? Live will be looking toward technology and social media and their role in genealogy, expanding those topic areas next year.

Lisa teaching her Google workshop at WDYTYA? Live.

Churchill and her team worked tirelessly to organize the Society of Genealogists workshops, and their Ask the Expert booth, spearheaded by Lori Weinstein, was a big hit once again. I participated in a 2 hour shift on Saturday and thoroughly enjoyed working one on one with eager attendees.

Visitors also really appreciated the expanded gallery area upstairs and from what I could see, they made very good use of it. They found more room to roam in the military and photographic exhibit areas, plenty of tables and seating (where my husband and I held an impromptu family reunion with three other distant British Cooke cousins!), and even a pasty pie stand (which, of course, I felt obligated to taste test – yummy!).

One of the unique aspects of WDYTYA? Live is the inclusion of celebrities profiled on the BBC TV series "Who Do You Think You Are?" Monty Don ("Gardener’s World"), Hugh Quarshie ("Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace"), and celebrity chef Ainsley Harriott kept audiences riveted as they recounted their personal family history journey.

Additional News:

• The British Library announced its digitization of the India Collections
• Deceased Online has added Scottish MIs
• FindMyPast.co.uk will be adding transcriptions of Scottish census records only
• The Genealogists is adding war memorials
  
  

Ancestry.com scanning booth

Lisa with Photo Detective Maureen A. Taylor.

Association of Scottish Genealogists and Researchers in Archives booth

Lisa interviews a representative of the Western Front Association.

Wednesday, March 02, 2011 9:14:25 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [1]

The $99 early bird registration ends Jan. 15 for the RootsTech 2011 conference, taking place Feb. 10-12 in Salt Lake City. Learn more about the conference and register on the RootsTech website. 

RootsMagic is offering several free webinars to help you use your RootsMagic genealogy software. You can view the available classes and register on RootsMagic.com. Classes are limited to the first thousand people; a recordings will be available for viewing after a class takes place. 

Ancestry.com has made Family Tree Maker For Mac available for download from the new Mac App Store for $99.99. Learn more about the program at FamilyTreeMaker.com. The software also is available from Ancestry.com’s online store. 

A TV show in the works is looking for “families who reinvent traditional dishes to reflect their unique cultural backgrounds and their love of American cuisine.” The show also seeks family stories that revolve around food. See the casting call and instructions for responding on the Geneabloggers blog. 

The British genealogy subscription website Findmypast.co.uk has published more than 9 million records from the Society of Genealogists in London. They include Boyd’s Marriage Index (1538 to 1840), Boyd’s London Burials (1538 to 1872), Faculty Office Marriage License Allegations (1701 to 1850), Prerogative Court of Canterbury Wills Index (1750 to 1800) and more. You can search indexes and transcriptions with a FindMyPast subscription or pay-per-view credits, then order copies of some original records from the Society of Genealogists. More of the records will become available during 2011.

Monday, January 10, 2011 9:33:30 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• FamilySearch has added records to its overhauled website, including the Social Security Death Index, US state censuses and vital records, and records from Canada, Spain and Venezuela. Click here to see the full list  and search the collections here. 

• FamilySearch also has started several new volunteer indexing projects, including US censuses, tax and vital records, and its first project in Polish. See the FamilySearch blog for details on each project and a contact link if you can volunteer.

• FamilySearch’s RootsTech conference, taking place in Salt Lake City Feb. 10-12, has announced its lineup of keynote speakers. They include two technology types you might not expect to hear at a genealogy conference—Shane Robison, Executive VP and Chief Strategy and Technology Officer for Hewlett-Packard; and Brewster Kahle, founder of Internet Archive (where you’ll find digitized books and the Way Back Machine, among other delights)—as well as Curt Witcher, manager of the nationally known Allen County (Ind.) Public Library Genealogy Center (which has digitized documents and databases on its website); and Jay Verklar, CEO of FamilySearch International. Learn more about these speakers and get conference details on the RootsTech website. 

• British genealogy site Genes Reunited has added the original householder schedules for the entire 1911 UK and Wales census. The records are available by subscription or on a pay-per-view basis.

• A.C. Ivory, one of the young genealogists profiled in the November 2010 Family Tree Magazine (in one of my most favorite articles I’ve worked on), has given his Find My Ancestor website and blog a new look. You’ll find new downloads and resources, a new logo, easier navigation, social media integration and more.

• Those named to new positions in the genealogy world include Matt Wright as editor of the Federation of Genealogical Societies’ electronic quarterly, FGS FORUM; and Laura Murphy DeGrazia and Karen Mauer Green as co-editors of the New York Genealogical and Biographical Society’s New York Genealogical and Biographical Record. 

Monday, January 03, 2011 5:26:38 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• The Library of Congress has posted a collection of nearly 700 ambrotype and tintype Civil War portraits to Flickr. You’ll notice that letters on hats and belt buckles are reversed in the images because they're “direct positives”—images directly from the camera.

• Library and Archives Canada has put the 1916 census of the Prairie provinces (Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta) online. You can’t search by a person’s name, though. Instead, search the database by province, district name, district number and sub-district number. Or, click here to browse the microfilm reels page by page. 

• Another new database from Library and Archives Canada is Medals, Honours and Awards, containing more than 113,000 references to medal registers, citation cards and records of military awards. It also has digitized images of some medal registers. You can search the database by name, regiment, rank and more; if you find a match, you’ll learn the medal awarded, the related battle or conflict, and a citation for the record containing the information. Because no service files exist for the Canadian military in the 1800s, these records may provide the only proof of service for 19th-century conflicts. 

• FamilySearch has added nearly four million new digital images—nearly 1.7 million of them indexed—to its historical records collection. The additions include records from South Africa, Brazil, Canada, Germany, Guatemala, the Netherlands and the United States. Visit FamilySearch for a list of the collection titles with the new images, and how many of the records are indexed. Unindexed collections aren’t searchable, instead, you’ll need to browse those collections and view the records to find your ancestor’s name.
  

• Richard Heaton e-mailed us about his site called Last Chance To Read, a searchable collection of thousands of pages of scarce British and Irish newspapers and other publications, most printed between 1710 and 1870. Once you register for a free account, you can do a search and order PDF copies of articles for about $4.75 via PayPal. See included titles here (scroll down).  

• RootsMagic released a free update to version 4, version 4.0.9.8., which update adds several user-requested features and fixes a number of issues. Users may be automatically notified to download the update; if not, open the program and go to Help>Check for Updates or click here.
  

Friday, December 17, 2010 4:06:12 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [1]

• In honor of Remembrance Day, Canadian subscription genealogy site Ancestry.ca has added a huge collection of Canadian WWI death and burial records.
  

Canada, CEF Commonwealth War Graves Registers, 1914-1919 details the circumstances of death for more than two thirds of the 60,000 Canadian soldiers who fought and died in Belgium, France and the United Kingdom. Canada, CEF Burial Registers, First World War, 1914-1919 details temporary and final resting places of soldiers who died.

• Ancestry.com and UK website Thegenealogist.co.uk have reached an agreement with the UK national archives to publish the 1911 census of England and Wales, the most recent UK census available to the public. The companies will work together to transcribe the census, creating a searchable database. Ancestry.com will add the records by county, starting in late 2010 and finishing up in 2011. (You can search this census now on subscription site 1911census.co.uk, operated by UK genealogy site FindMyPast.co.uk.) 

• British genealogy subscription site FamilyRelatives.com has added a million records from post office directories. Similar to phone books, these directories name local people and businesses. The growing collection currently covers more than 25 British counties and major cities, and spans nearly a century. Read more on FamilyRelatives.com.
  

• British genealogy website FindMyPast.co.uk is working with FamilySearch to post online indexes and images of Welsh parish registers dating as far back as the 16th century.
  

FamilySearch will digitize about the images containing baptisms, marriages and burials; FindMyPast.co.uk will transcribe them. Over the next two years, you’ll be able to search a free index on FamilySearch, with the records available for a fee on FindMyPast.co.uk. In Wales, users will be able to access the records free through Welsh Archives Services. 

Friday, November 12, 2010 2:26:40 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• British genealogy subscription site FindMyPast.co.uk has released a collection of records from the Second Anglo-Boer War including details on 260,000 British service members and 59,000 war casualties. The database compiles information from more than 330 sources, and resolves errors and conflicting information in some of those sources. The war was fought from 1899 to 1902 between the British Empire and the Dutch-speaking inhabitants of the South African Republic (Transvaal Republic) and the Orange Free State.

• The latest records added to the free FamilySearch Beta site include census records from Ghana (1982 to 1984) and Norway (1875), plus the Minnesota state census (1865 and 1905) and marriage records from Arkansas (1837 to 1957) and Idaho (1864 to 1950). You can see the full list of new records here. 

• The Troy (NY) Irish Genealogical Society has posted the records of Italian midwife Alesandra Matera, who practiced in the Troy area during the early 1900s. The transcribed records span 1909 to 1923 and document mostly Italian births, with some Syrians in later years. You can download the transcriptions as PDFs ordered by the father’s, mother’s or child’s last name (the transcriptions themselves are in chronological order, but you can use the Bookmarks bar in your PDF viewer to see the names in alphabetical order). Originals are in the archives of the Rensselaer County Historical Society.

• The International Society of Family History Writers and Editors (ISFHWE) 2011 writing competition is open to members and—for the first time—non-members of ISFHWE this year. Entries are due by Dec. 31, 2010, and you’ll get a discount on the entry fee for submissions made before November 30, 2010. See the categories, judging guidelines, rules and entry form on ISFHWE’s website.
  

• The River Raisin National Battlefield Park in Monroe, Mich., site of the War of 1812 Battle of Frenchtown, has officially become the 393rd park in the National Park System. You can learn more about the site on the National Park Service website and at RiverRaisinBattlefield.org. 

• The National Archives and Records Administration’s National Personnel Records Center (NPRC) in St. Louis will relocate to a modernized $112 million facility in North St. Louis County. It’ll take about 17 months to move the 100 million-plus records and 800 workers starting in May 2011. NPRC houses personnel records of civilian federal employees, as well as military service members after about World War I.
  

Friday, October 29, 2010 9:48:40 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• In the early 1900s, lamination—now an archival no-no—was a celebrated new tool at repositories nationwide. Thousands of historical documents were laminated, including the Emancipation Proclamation. Find out how archives are working with these documents in the December 2010 Genealogy Insider column. 

• About 125,000 US troops, both Army regulars and new volunteers, served in the Philippine Insurrection from 1899 to 1902. The 1900 US census has information on military personnel stationed in the Philippines, Cuba and Puerto Rico.
  
  Read more in our December 2010 guide to records from America’s lesser-known military conflicts. 

• The Washington State Digital Archives holds more than 90 million records, with 28 million searchable online. Find more state genealogy resources in our guide to 75 of the best state sites for genealogy research (also online). 

• The Irish National Museum has a firkin of butter buried in a peat bog (once a common storage practice) in the late-17th or eary-18th century. The grayish substance no longer resembles butter. Brush up on butter in the December 2010 History Matters column. 

• To help kids learn about your family’s genealogy, you can get Hearth Song’s stick-on family tree wall mural to personalize with relatives’ names and photos. Get more kid-friendly genealogy ideas in the December 2010 article Legacy Lessons.

• Some 250,000 Scots-Irish are thought to have arrived in the United States between 1717 and the American Revolution, with later waves in the 1740s, around 1754, and between 1771 and 1775. Many headed for central Pennsylvania, the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, and the Carolinas, eventually migrating into and across the Appalachians.
  

Learn how to trace these ancestors (also called Ulster Scots) in our December 2010 guide to Scots-Irish Roots.

• Most PCs come with Window Movie Maker, which makes it easy to turn digital photos and videos into family movies. See a tutorial in the December 2010 Toolkit.

Tuesday, October 19, 2010 12:15:50 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• Allison Stacy, Family Tree Magazine’s publisher and editorial director, fills you in on Family History Month events

• Genealogy expert James M. Beidler provides history and research tips from his article "Trace Your Scots-Irish Roots" in the December 2010 Family Tree Magazine. 

• Get started paring down your collection of papers with tips from online editor Grace Dobush on what to keep and what to toss.

• Lisa and I talk about Ancestry.com's acquisition of iArchives, Footnote.com’s parent company, and some questions genealogists are asking.

• Researcher and author Lisa A. Alzo gives you tips for exploring your ancestor’s international origins from her Family Tree University class Tracing Immigrants: How to Research Your Family’s American Arrivals.
  

You can listen to the Family Tree Magazine Podcast in iTunes and on FamilyTreeMagazine.com. You can get the show notes on our website, too.

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Wednesday, October 13, 2010 1:41:35 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• A friendly reader told us about another genealogy app for the iPhone called Traces, which searches the databases at the FamilySearch beta site. beta.familysearch.org. The reader (who’s not affiliated with the product other than using it) recommends it as “far and away the best iPhone app ... I've found to facilitate actual genealogy research and database searching.” See a list of iPhone/iTouch genealogy apps on the MobileGenealogy.com website.

• If you have Minnesota ancestors, you can use the index on the Minnesota Official Marriage System website to search for marriage records. You’ll get the names of the bride and groom, date, county and certificate number; and a link to order a copy of the record. See the County Index Dates page to find out which counties and dates are covered in the index.

• The National Archives is holding a day-long symposium called The Civil War: Fresh Perspectives on Saturday, Nov. 20, from 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m, at its Washington, DC headquarters. It’ll feature panel discussions related to themes from the archives’ special exhibit, Discovering the Civil War. Registration is required, along with a fee of $50. Click here to learn more and register.

• The National Genealogical Society has posted online video that shows you where Civil War Pension files are stored at the National Archives (in an area is closed to the general public) and lets you look inside a pension file with professional genealogist John Humphrey. It’s called Finding Your Family at the National Archives, and you can click here to watch it. 

• UK family history subscription website Findmypast.co.uk and FamilySearch are beginning a project to digitize the Greater Manchester County Record Office’s cemetery registers and institutional records (from gaols, schools and workhouses), which date as far back as the 16th century. When the project is complete, you’ll be able to search indexes free at FamilySearch. The indexed information will link to the records at FindMyPast.co.uk, where you’ll be able to view the record images for a fee.

• There’s more for those with UK roots: Old-maps.co.uk has added 60 more years of town plans and other maps to its collection, which now covers 1850 to 1996. In addition, new spy maps produced by the Russian military from 1950 to 1997 cover 16,000 sq km of the UK, including 103 major towns and cities. You can search and browse maps for free and purchase printed or downloadable PDF versions.

Friday, October 08, 2010 3:10:24 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [1]

• The UK family history subscription and pay-per-view site Findmypast.co.uk has launched a collection of transcribed Devon parish records in association with the Devon Family History Society. The records include baptisms from 1813 to 1839, marriages from 1754 to 1837, and burials for 1813 to 1837.
  

• Mark Tucker, author of the Think Genealogy technology blog, has announced he’s creating a “cousin calculator” app for the new Windows 7 phone (slated for release sometime in October or November). You can read more about the app on Think Genealogy.
  
  
• The Illinois State Genealogical Society will honor five individuals for their genealogical achievements at its fall conference Oct. 23:

• Cheri Hunter of Decatur, Ill. will receive the Community Service Award
• Fred Katko of Peoria, Ill., will receive the Special Recognition Award
• Christian Bender a student from Oglesby, Ill., will receive the Youth Award
• Curt Witcher Senior Manager for Special Collections at the Allen County Public Library in Fort Wayne, Ind., will receive the Distinguished Service Award
• Margaret Collins of Springfield, Ill., and Daniel W. Dixon, of Auburn, Ill., will receive the Individual Writer Award as co-winners.

• Genealogy Gems podcast host Lisa Louise Cooke has released volume 2 of her Google Earth for Genealogy video series. The video helps you use Google Earth’s mapping features to learn more about your ancestors. Here’s a sneak peek:
  

• In a late addition to today's roundup, the New York Genealogical and Biographical Society announced today that all issues of the society's NYG&B Record (563 issues dating back to 1870) are accessible to society members on the society's website. You can search every word of the issues, or use a new surname search engine.

Friday, October 01, 2010 10:30:31 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• Today (Sept. 10) marks the 20th anniversary of the Ellis Island Immigration Museum opening in 1990. More than 35 million people have visited the museum, which highlights the immigrant experience and the growth of America during the peak immigration years of 1880 to 1924. You can read more about the museum on the Ellis Island website.

For help searching online for your Ellis Island ancestors, download our Ellis Island Web Guide from ShopFamilyTree.com or use the book The Family Tree Guide to Finding Your Ellis Island Ancestors (on sale for $12.99).

• Pay-per-view genealogy website ScotlandsPeople.gov.uk was officially relaunched with a new look and and new search features, including search results plotted on maps, to make it easier for you to find ancestors. The site offers records dating to the beginning of civil registration in Scotland in 1855, as well as parish records dating back as far as 1538.

• FamilySearch’s army of volunteer indexers have started work on the 1930 census, currently the most recent US census available to researchers. As with several other FamilySearch census indexes, volunteers will start with Ancestry.com indexes and create a second comparison index from scratch, then arbitrate discrepancies to reduce errors. FamilySearch also will extract additional fields of census data for improved searchability. You can read more about this project on the FamilySearch blog.

Friday, September 10, 2010 10:03:28 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• English research toolkit (contains both free and Plus how-to articles)

• British Genealogy Guide digital download (available from ShopFamilyTree.com)

• Research in Foreign Records: How to Find Your Family Across the Pond Family Tree University course (the next session starts Sept. 13; save 25 percent on any Family Tree University course with coupon code FALL1025 ).

Wednesday, September 08, 2010 10:36:05 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• The Federation of Genealogical Societies has re-launched its Society Hall online directory. If you think you know the name of the genealogical society, historical society, family association or library you want to contact, you can search by keyword; otherwise, choose a state from the drop-down menu for a list of societies in that state (note that the directory might not include every society in the state).

• An Irish library and museum website called Ask About Ireland has posted an important Irish record group free online: Griffith’s Primary Valuation is an accounting of property values in Ireland that took place between 1847 and 1864. You can search by a family name and place, or use the Place Name search to search by just a place. 
  

Each result contains the family name, the first name, county and parish. Click links to see details for the individual (landlord and tenant names, location, and publication information for the original map), the person’s residence plotted on a map, and a copy of the original Griffith's Valuation page entry.

• Tonight you can watch the “Who Do You Think You Are?” episode in which pro football Hall of Fame member Emmitt Smith discovers his roots. It’s on NBC at 8 pm eastern (7 central). (See our “Who Do You Think You Are?” coverage.)

Friday, August 27, 2010 2:42:33 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• Best websites for British Isles researchers (free article)
• English Roots Online Toolkit (free article)
• British Genealogy Guide Digital Download (from ShopFamilyTree.com)

Thursday, August 12, 2010 12:20:23 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• More than 30,000 early-20th century marriage records from Troy, NY, are indexed online at the Troy Irish Genealogical Society. You can read more about the project, a collaboration between the society and the Rensselaer County Clerk’s office, at the New York History blog.

• Families is a new app for the Apple iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad that works in conjunction with  the windows-based family tree program Legacy Family Tree. You can transfer Legacy family files from your PC to your mobile device, then view and edit them. (You’ll need to download a free program called Families Sync to your PC in order to transfer the files.) Families is available at the Apple App store. Learn more on the Families website.

• The National Archives’ Prologue magazine produced a fascinating video short from a recent issue about the Magellans of the Sky, a group of eight Army airmen who set out in 1924 to be the first people to circle the globe by air. You can watch it on the archives’ YouTube channel.
  
  
• British subscription site Findmypast.co.uk has added 180,000 records to its collection of Chelsea Pensioners British Army Service Records. The additions cover men pensioned out of the British Army between 1760 and 1854 (their pensions were administered through the Royal Hospital at Chelsea). Records covering 1901 to 1913 are slated for release in September.

Friday, August 06, 2010 1:40:59 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [2]

• Ancestry.com has completed its acquisition of Genline.se, the leading Swedish family history Web site. Ancestry.com acquired all shares of Genline for approximately 53 million Swedish kronor, about $7.2 million.

• Ancestry.com also has updated its New Search screen to add maps you can click to browse data collections associated with a state or county, as well as access to your recent searches and recently viewed data collections. To use these features, click the search tab on Ancestry.com’s home page (if you see a New Search link in the upper right, be sure to click it—these updates aren’t in the old search). See more details and screen shots on the Ancestry.com blog.

• Historical newspaper subscription site GenealogyBank has added new content from 186 newspapers in 40 US states. You can view the titles that have been added or expanded on GenealogyBank.com (starred titles with have the just-added content). GenealogyBank’s search page has a dropdown menu that lets you search just new content: 

• British subscription site FindMyPast.co.uk has made it easier for you to find birth records on the site. More than 100 million records were re-indexed.  Now, your search results will be in a list of individual names, rather than a range, so you won’t have to view pages and pages of records in order to find your ancestor. In the advanced search, you can now search records from one or more counties. Search FindMyPast.co.uk birth records here. Fully indexed marriage and death records should follow later this year.

• Subscription site Ancestry.ca has launched 16.3 million Parisian birth, marriage and death records dating from 1700 to 1907. French is the second most common ancestry in Canada. Use these links to access the records:

Paris, France & Vicinity Marriages, 1700-1907
Paris, France & Vicinity Births, 1700-1899
Paris, France & Vicinity Deaths, 1707-1907

Friday, July 16, 2010 1:58:26 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [1]

• FamilySearch has added records from Brazil, Canada, Czech Republic, Guatemala, Mexico, Spain, and the United States to its Record Search Pilot site and Beta Search site. US additions include indexes to the 1910 census for several states, Massachusetts death records, Minnesota probate court wills.

• Michigan residents can access state history-related documents (such as personal narratives, memoirs, pamphlets and political speeches) and historical essays through Gale’s collection Michigana, Sources in U.S. History Online, available as part of Michigan eLibrary. (Some eLibrary material is accessible to only those who log in with a Michigan library card, driver’s license or state ID.)

• Got Scottish ancestors? The pay-per-view service DeceasedOnline, a database of burial and cremation registers for the UK and Ireland, recently added 192,000 burial records from 10 cemeteries in Aberdeen, Scotland. You can search for free; viewing records costs about $2.20 to $3.

Friday, June 18, 2010 2:55:30 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [1]

• British civil registrations (akin to US vital records) starting in 1837
• 1841 to 1911 English and Welsh census records
• passengers leaving British ports (which includes those whose journeys originated elsewhere in Europe but brought them through British ports, such as Liverpool)
• death duty registers of probates generating taxes (1796 to 1903)
• British Army Service Records 1760-1913
• National Roll of the Great War 1914-1918
• Army Roll of Honour 1939-45
• specialist records (civil service records, directories of the medical professions and clergy, crew lists, shareholders of the Great Western Railway)

Monday, June 14, 2010 8:46:25 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• FamilyTreeMagazine.com Irish Genealogy Toolkit (contains both free and Plus articles)
• Irish research guide digital download (from ShopFamilyTree.com)
• The Everything Irish History and Heritage Book by Amy Hackney Blackwell and Ryan Hackney (from ShopFamilyTree.com)

Thursday, June 03, 2010 8:24:35 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• Going to the National Genealogical Society conference starting April 28 in Salt Lake City? Stop by the Generation Maps exhibit hall booth Wednesday, April 28, from 2 to 5 p.m., for a Family ChArtist debut party. They’ll have refreshments, discounts, drawings, and demos of this online service for creating family trees.

• Archives.com (formerly GenealogyArchives) released a free internet search feature that scours several online genealogy resources, such as FamilySearch. To use this search, go to Archives.com and run a search on the homepage (if you’re a member of the site, you must be logged out). Web results will be listed below a summary of Archives.com results.

• You can get a seven-day free trial membership to search Archives.com’s own collection of 1.2 billion records and create a family tree on the site. Regular subscriptions cost $39.95 per year.

• British subscription and pay-per-view genealogy site Familyrelatives.com released a new batch of school and clergy records. School records might range from student registers to mini-biographies. Clergy lists name 200,000 members of Anglican and Catholic clergy for England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland.
  

• The Library of Congress will preserving every public tweet since Twitter’s inception in March 2006—that’s billions and billions of Tweets. See the library’s announcement for more details and some interesting discussion.

Friday, April 16, 2010 1:05:26 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• The second week of NBC’s “Who Do You Think You Are?” increased its viewership by 13 percent in adults age 18 to 49, and 4 percent in total viewers. The show finished in the ratings within a tenth of a point of first place for the 8/7 central time slot in adults age 18 to 49, and is tied for No. 1 among the major networks in adults age 18 to 34.

Tune in to tonight’s episode as Lisa Kudrow searches for her roots in Belarus.

• The UK’s General Register Office (GRO) has announced a restructuring of its charges for ordering birth, marriage and death records. Starting April 6, you’ll select from two instead of eight options, so it’s simpler, but the fees for standard service are going up from  £7.00 to £9.25 (about $10.60 to $14). See the GRO website for more information. 

• Luckie Daniels at the blog Our Georgia Roots is hosting the first edition of the Carnival of African-American Genealogy, themed “Restore My Name: Slave Records & Genealogy Research.” Click here to read Daniels’ entry and follow her links to participating bloggers' carnival posts.
  

• Ancestry.com is offering a free webinar about using Family Tree Maker 2010. It’s May 19, 8 pm EDT (thanks to the person who commented below to let me know about the new date!). Watch as the experts demonstrate advanced features available in Family Tree Maker 2010. Read more and register on Ancestry.com’s website.
  

Friday, March 19, 2010 11:27:44 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [1]

• Ancestry.com is holding an Ultimate Family History Journey Sweepstakes to help launch “Who Do You Think You Are?” The grand prize is $20,000 in travel money (!), expert help with your genealogy research, and Ancestry.com subscriptions. Twenty first prize winenrs get a World Deluxe Subscription. Enter at Ancestry.com (scroll to the bottom of the home page and click on the sweepstakes promo) before April 30, 2010, at 11:59 pm ET.

• British subscription and pay-per-view site Findmypast has launched a London Collection with baptism, marriage and burial records dating as far back as 1538. It also has London and West Kent Probate Indexes from 1750 to 1858, and names of participants in the Matchworkers' Strike of 1888. (Many of these records are also in Ancestry.com’s London Parish Records collection, launched last year.)
  

• Stop by Roots Television to watch a neat video from the Jewish Genealogical Society of Colorado, showing stories from those who’ve researched their Jewish family trees.

Friday, February 26, 2010 3:10:04 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [2]

• I wanted to point you to Thomas MacEntee’s Geneabloggers post about the genealogy reality series The Generations Project, produced by BYU Television, documenting the ancestral stories of “regular” people. New episodes air every Monday on cable on BYU-TV (for help finding the channel, US residents click your state on this map; Canadians click here); you also can the latest episode online.
  

Want to be on The Generations Project? See the show’s website to apply.

• Speaking of television, if you missed the second episode of Faces of America on Wednesday, you can catch it online.

• According to the National Genealogical Society Blog, you can now get access to information from the UK’s 1939 National Registration—if the person you want to find out about is deceased. The service, provided by England’s Information Centre for Health and Social Care (NHS IC), costs a nonrefundable 42 pounds (about $66) whether or not the search is successful. See the NHS IC site for instructions on making a request.
  

• The last Canadian veteran of WWI, John Babcock, has died at age 109 in Spokane, Wash. He enlisted at age 15, having lied about his age, but the war ended before he saw action.
  

You can learn about Library and Archives Canada’s WWI resources in the online Canadian Genealogy Center.

Friday, February 19, 2010 3:29:09 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• Neat website alert: The Ministry of Food goes with an Imperial War Museum London exhibit about the British public’s adaption to food shortages during World War II. You can see photos from the exhibit, check out Ministry of Food publications on gardening and cooking, and watch video clips.

And here’s a blog by a woman who’s living for a month on a 1940s British ration diet. 

• And another one: Go to What Happened in My Birth Year for a fun way to see top movies, books and events from the year you were born. Thanks to ResearchBuzz for the heads-up on this site.
  

• Ancestry.com has improved Collection Filters in the New Search. When you’re in the Advanced Search, a pull-down menu lets you give priority to matches associated with various countries or ethnic backgrounds. See how it works on the Ancestry.com blog.

• FamilySearch added records from five new states to the 1910 and 1920 US censuses on the free Record Search Pilot Site. FamilySearch Indexing has started new projects to index records from Germany, Spain, Jamaica, Norway, Alaska, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana and Iowa. Interested in volunteering to be an indexer? Click here.
  

Friday, February 12, 2010 12:07:06 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• I hope you didn't travel to Washington, DC, for genealogy research this weekend. Because of a snowstorm predicted to deliver up to 24 inches of snow to the area, the National Archives research rooms in DC and College Park, MD, closed at noon today, Friday, Feb. 5, and remain closed on tomorrow. The Library of Congress closed at 1 pm today and will stay closed Saturday.
  

• British subscription and pay-per-view genealogy site FamilyRelatives added 5 million new parish records with information on baptisms, marriages and burials in counties in England and Wales, dating from the early 1500s to almost 1900.

• FamilySearch is producing a short film based on a Hawaiian woman’s search for her grandmother, a resident of the Molokai Leper Colony, to show at this year’s National Genealogical Society conference. The conference takes place April 28 to May 1 in Salt Lake City and features FamilySearch-sponsored special events (you can read about them on the conference blog).

• Registration is open for the 30th IAJGS International Conference on Jewish Genealogy in Los Angeles July 11 to 16. Registration costs $265 (pay another $150 for a spouse/partner) until May 1. Student discounts are available, and you can purchase single-day registration. Click here to see pricing.
  
  
• Israel-based family networking site MyHeritage has acquired OSN, a network of 10 family sites (including Verwandt.de in Germany, Moikrewni.pl in Poland, and the Dynstree.com in the United States). According to the announcement, the acquisition makes MyHeritage the world's largest international netwrok dedicated to families. Read more about what this means for the geenalogy industry on Craig Manson's Geneablogie. 
  

Friday, February 05, 2010 2:05:53 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [1]

• Look for our article on midwifery and how our ancestors were born in the March 2010 Family Tree Magazine (on newsstands Jan. 5).
  
  
• Examining clues in old hospital records (free article)
  
  
• Medical Attention: How to find ancestors’ medical records and put their illnesses into historical context (Family Tree Magazine Plus article)

Monday, November 30, 2009 10:01:21 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• The Peninsular Medal Roll (1808-1814), naming some who fought in the Peninsular Wars against Napoleon from 1808 to 1813.

• De Ruvigny's Roll of Honour (1914-1918), a two-volume set with biographies of 25,000 men. The site currently has 12,500 of the biographies—those of men who lost their lives in the Great War.

• Harts Army Lists for several years. The lists were published regularly between 1839 and 1915, and give details of war service.

Thursday, November 05, 2009 8:36:29 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• Familybuilder DNA has added Groups, a feature that let customers collaborate on genetic genealogy research. They’ll be able to create and join groups focusing on commonalities such as haplogroup, national origin, surname, birthplace, etc. read more on Familybuilder.com.

• Historical newspaper and records site GenealogyBank has added content from more than 36 newspapers in 21 states. Here’s the full list of new expanded titles.

• Dick Eastman blogged about a National Library of Wales project to put 190,000 Welsh wills online. You can search the documents, which date from the 14th century to 1858, free on the National Library of Wales' website. You’ll find more details about the wills in Dick’s post.

Friday, October 30, 2009 2:48:23 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• Subscription site Ancestry.co.uk (sister site to the US-focused Ancestry.com) has added London parish records, which among other events cover deaths from the bubonic plague and the 1666 Great Fire of London. They’re part of a collection of London records from 1538 to 1980.

• Google Books, where you can search millions of out-of-print books, is partnering with On-Demand Books to let you use any Espresso Book Machine to print books in the public domain that Google has digitized from. (There aren’t a lot of places to find these book machines—click here for locations.) Learn more on the Google Books blog.

• Visit the Family History Expos blog for a list of 10 great tips for using social networking sites to do genealogy research and connect with your family.

• FamilySearch Indexing has launched new indexing projects from Indiana, Idaho, Canada, Spain, Guatemala, and Peru. The 1920 census index for Ohio is undergoing preparation for publication on the free FamilySearch site. Hooray! (We’re from the Buckeye State.) The 1920 census for Texas; Carroll County, Ind., marriages; and several international collections also are being readied for release.

• World Vital Records lowered the price of its World Collection subscription to $99.95 (from $119.95). This collection gives you access to all the site’s US records, plus those from Canada, the UK, Ireland and other countries. See the November 2009 Family Tree Magazine for our guide to using World Vital Records.

• Don’t forget to visit the Michigan Genealogical Council Web site for information on an online petition in support of the Library of Michigan, as well as links to news of budget-related library cuts across the country.

Friday, September 18, 2009 10:29:24 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• The National Genealogical Society (NGS) has launched a blog called UpFront With NGS, which will complement the society’s monthly e-mail newsletter of the same name. News will be posted regularly on the blog, so you don’t have to wait for the e-mail, and you can leave comments on the blog posts.
  

• Ancestry.com is hosting a free webinar to demo its recently released Family Tree Maker 2010 genealogy software. The webinar is Sept. 30 at 8pm EDT. Learn more about the webinar and link to the registration on Ancestry.com’s blog.
  
  
• The McMullen Museum of Art at Boston College has a Web site companion to its special exhibit of the Becker Collection: Drawings of the Civil War Era. The drawings by Joseph Becker and others from Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Weekly depict the Civil War, construction of railroads, Chinese in the West, Indian wars, the Chicago fire and more. You can browse drawings by date, place, subject, artist or reference number.
  
  
• Irish-ancestored people, take note: As posted by Dick Eastman, all counties have been added to the National Archives of Ireland's 1911 census Web site. Later this year, you’ll start seeing 1901 census records. The 1901 and 1911 censuses are the only surviving full Irish censuses open for research. Read what’s special about Irish censuses on Dick’s blog.
  
  
• Last, I wanted to point out this fun post by Randy Seaver (a re-post of his earlier post, which I missed the first time around) with links to lists of funny/strange place names.
  

Friday, September 11, 2009 11:16:06 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• Summit Memory, an online scrapbook from the Akron-Summit County Public Library in Ohio, now has several digitized historical atlases and maps from the 1800s and early 1900s. Access them in the site’s online map room. Check out the photos and other resources while you're there.
  
  
• British subscription and pay-per-view site FindMyPast.com has completed a new transcription and added higher-quality images for its 1901 census for England and Wales. Images for the 1881 census are next on the site's to-do list.
  
  
• A New York Times article on the transfer of early- to mid-century Alien Case Files to the National Archives quoted Schelly Tallalay Dardahsti, Tracing the Tribe blogger and author of our September 2009 Jewish research guide, about the importance of using original documents. Read the article here.
  
  
• Subscription family tree site OneGreatFamily.com is publishing its free newsletter as a weekly genealogy blog you can subscribe to vis RSS. It’ll include research tips, helpful Web sites and suggestions for using OneGreatFamily.com.
  
  
• The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) has launched a blog called NARAtions, which focuses on the future of online public access to records at NARA.

Friday, August 14, 2009 11:40:00 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• First, a reminder that if you plan to subscribe to Footnote or renew your subscription, stop procrastinating. The $59.95 annual subscription sale ends at midnight tonight (July 31). Also tomorrow, the membership rate goes from $69.95 to $79.95 per year.

• Another reminder for those who’ve been meaning to search the Caribbean slave records on Ancestry.com—the free period ends tonight. More on this collection here.
  

• Speaking of Ancestry.com, the new Member Connect features—which let you comment on and correct records, as well as get in touch with other members—went live this week. Click here for more on Member Connect.

• The FGS 09 conference is just a month away, Sept. 2-5 in Little Rock, Ark. Get news updates and registration information from the conference blog, and when you’re there, stop by to see us at the Family Tree Magazine booth (#407).
  

• This from Dick Eastman’s blog: The British national archives and UK-based family history site Findmypast.com are giving seven repositories in England and Wales free online access to the recently completed 1911 census records. See Dick's post for the list of archives.

Friday, July 31, 2009 2:19:19 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• Criminals sentenced to transportation to America, about 1705 to 1775
• Criminals executed at York, about 1710 to 1899
• Debtors who pleaded insolvency, about 1709 to 1813

Wednesday, July 22, 2009 8:35:56 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• The Connecticut State Library, which is facing a staff reduction due to the state's Retirement Incentive Plan, will be closed on Mondays for the summer. Starting July 1, the library’s new hours will be Tuesday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Saturday from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.

• After record additions throughout the first half of the year, the 1911census.co.uk site (developed by subscription and pay-per-view site FindMyPast.com with the British national archives) now has the complete 1911 census for England, Wales, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man. It also includes full details of British Army personnel and their families stationed overseas.

Read more about 1911census.co.uk in our post from last week.

• The free FamilySearch Record Search pilot added 6 million new records this week, including Louisiana and Idaho death records; the 1920 census for Delaware, the District of Columbia, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire and New Mexico; and digital images of church records were also added for Mexico (the states of Baja California and Baja California Sur).
  

• We hear that MyGenShare.com is almost ready for beta testing. Founder Barry Ewell said the launch was delayed until late summer to expand the site’s educational resources and take advantage of better technology to improve user experience.

Friday, June 19, 2009 2:11:26 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]

• The National Archives of Ireland free 1911 census site added records for Cork, Donegal, Galway, King's County and Wexford to those already online (from Antrim, Down, Dublin and Kerry).

Get more details on the site in this Genealogy Insider blog post.

• Millions of the US Citizenship and Immigration Services' alien case files (also called A-files) dating from 1944 and later were signed over to the National Archives (records will be relocated to the National Archives’ San Francisco and Kansas City facilities later this year).

Henceforth, USCIS can forward files 100 years after the birth date of the person whose file it is. The USCIS press office tells me you’ll still be able to order the 1944-to-1951 A-files through the USCIS Genealogy Program (through which you also can order naturalizations and alien registrations).

• Subscription newspaper and records service GenealogyBank added or expanded newspaper collections from 22 states. The new content is listed by state here, or go here to view the complete list of newspapers.
  

• Subscription site Ancestry.com is letting you preview upcoming changes to the family tree pages—to see them, click Family Trees on Ancestry.com's home page, then click the light blue bar at the top that says “Check out the new look.” (You must have a tree on Ancestry.com to see the preview.)
  

The new look will make pages load faster, be easier to navigate and display more information, says Kenny Freestone on the Ancestry.com blog. Randy Seaver at Genea-Musings describes the changes in detail.

Friday, June 05, 2009 1:46:42 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [1]

• Subscription genealogy site Ancestry.com launched a collection of German phone directories dating from 1915 to 1981. The books, which are, of course, in German, list names and addresses of more than 35 million people who lived in Germany’s major cities, as well as many businesses. 
  

• British subscription and pay-per-view site FindMyPast.com added merchant seaman crew indexes with 270,000 names of seafarers between 1860 and 1913. British ships created these lists every six months, including everyone from captains to able seamen, from engine room staff to stewardesses.

• The 1916 census of Canada is now available free at Family History Centers through their on-site Ancestry.com service. (Meaning this census isn’t on the FamilySearch pilot site—you must go to a Family History Center to search it.)
  

• The National Archives granted its first Excellence in Genealogy Awards to Myron McGhee of Decatur, GA, who took first place, and Stephanie D. Smith of Richtor Park, IL, who took second. Read about their entries on the archives’ Web site.
  

• The heritage travel Web site Go With a Purpose launched a new section called Go Connect, where users can upload photos with their reviews of historic destinations. Learn more on the site’s blog.

• A late addition: The New England Historic Genealogical Society is adding digitized back issues of the journal The American Genealogist, to its subscription databases at NewEnglandAncestors.org. Vols. 1 through 8 (published as Families of Ancient New Haven) and Volumes 9–13 (dated from 1933 through 1937), are available now in separate databases. Additional volumes will be added. NEHGS memberships start at $75.

Friday, May 08, 2009 2:02:07 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)    Comments [0]