• Ancestry.co.uk (the British records sister site of Ancestry.com) is making its 1911 and 1901 British census records free this weekend. To view these records you will need to register for a free Ancestry.co.uk account.

• The Dublin (Ireland) City Library and Archive has posted a free database of more than 46,000 Dublin voters in 1908 (men 21 and older and women 30 and older). Learn more about these records at DublinHeritage.ie.

• Do you love finding out about people's heirlooms? Were you one of the thousands of people to attend the "Antiques Roadshow" taping in Cincinnati last summer? I was! The three episodes filmed here will be broadcast Mondays April 1, April 8 and April 15, at 8/7 central on PBS. 

• More Cincinnati news: The Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County genealogy department has added two more volumes of its Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps to its free Virtual Library. Volumes 7 and 8, which cover Norwood and eastern neighborhoods in 1917, conclude the set that staff began digitizing four years ago. I've already made a note in my research log to dig further into this collection. View the maps here.

• Baseball fans, this one's for you: The National Archives has a free new ebook called Baseball: The National Pastime in the National Archives. It tells the story of baseball in America through documents, photos, audio, video and other records preserved at the archives. You'll find this and two more free e-books from the National Archives here.

Friday, March 29, 2013 10:02:47 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

That the city of Vicksburg, Miss., didn't celebrate Independence Day from 1863, when residents surrendered on July 4 after a 47-day Union siege, until 1945?

That during the Oklahoma Land Rush of April 22, 1889, two cities of 10,000 residents each (Oklahoma City and Guthrie) sprang up in less than a day?

The Genealogist's U.S. History Pocket Reference by Family Tree Magazine contributing editor Nancy Hendrickson delivers fascinating facts such as these, plus timelines, charts (one, for example, summarizes the dates, causes and outcomes of the major Indian wars), maps, important dates (including censuses), and lists of popular foods, books, music and trends. It encapsulates historical phenomena you might need a refresher on, such as the Triangle Trade and Bleeding Kansas. 

An awareness of the events your ancestors witnessed can unlock records in your family history research and provide context for the records you've already discovered.

This conveniently sized book is chronologically organized into historical eras for easy browsing of the time periods important to your genealogy research—and to your understanding of your ancestors' lives.

Learn more about The Genealogist's U.S. History Pocket Reference in ShopFamilyTree.com.

Thursday, March 28, 2013 8:26:00 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• Diaries and letters: This is Eleazer Blake, an apprentice in a wheelwright shop in Rindge, NH, who kept a diary.
  
  

In his diary, he mentions the Battle of Lexington and Concord as well as details of his everyday life. These statements let you relive parts of his life. Though your Revolutionary War-era ancestor may not have been a diarist, the writings of his contemporaries will help you understand the tense times he lived in.

• Pension applications: While some men exaggerated their wartime exploits in their Revolutionary War pension applications, other documents make for painful reading. James Allen Jr. of Maine applied for a pension several times, but lacked proof of his service. Allen’s brother submitted a deposition with a plea on his brother’s behalf: “I have no doubt my brother served in the Army of the Revolution as he has always stated to me, and I know that he has for the last 20 years or more been trying to obtain a pension.” (The November 2008 Family Tree Magazine has online resources for pension and other military records, as does our Family Tree University course US Military Records: Trace Your Ancestor's Service.)

• Memoirs: Seneca chief Chainbreaker, also known as Gov. Blacksnake or Tash-won-ne-ah, dictated his life story to a neighbor, relating how he served for the British in the bloody Battle of Oriskany in New York. George Avery wrote in his memoir that being taken prisoner at Royalton, Vt., in 1780 was a turning point. “I felt the evil of my life and the Divine Justice of Providence.” Use WorldCat, which includes the National Union Catalog of Manuscript Collections (1986 and later), to help you find published and unpublished memoirs in library collections.

Monday, March 25, 2013 8:23:48 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [1]

• Sharing and preserving stories and "opening the tent" to more people, particularly youth, are big themes at this year's conference. Many attendees found inspiration in FamilySearch president Dennis Brimhall's keynote talk about documenting people's lives, asking “What would our great-great-grandchildren wish we would have done?” You can read about the opening keynote talks by Brimhall, storyteller Syd Lieberman and findmypast genealogist D. Joshua Taylor on the RootsTech blog. Watch these talks on the RootsTech website—scroll down on the home page to the Daily Recaps section.

• In his keynote talk this morning, Ancestry.com president Tim Sullivan made several announcements:

Over the next five years, Ancestry.com will commit at least $100 million to digitize and index new content.
 
Over the next three years, Ancestry.com and FamilySearch will collaborate to digitize and index 140 million+ pages of US probate records spanning 1800 to 1930. He called this the organizations' "most ambitious collaboration" yet, and added the caveat that permission to put records online must be negotiated with repositories holding these records.

Ancestry.com is about to release new version of its iPhone iPad app with enhanced social media sharing, the ability to compare trees and other features. A third of new Ancestry.com registrants are through the site's mobile apps (there's also one for Android), and half of users over last 2 months come to Ancestry.com through a mobile device.

The Ancestry DNA database contains 120,000 DNA samples and has delivered more than 2 million fourth cousin relationships. To increase the size of the database, the price of the test will be lowered to $99, whether or not you're a subscriber.

(Update: Sullivan didn't include this in his keynote, but Ancestry.com has announced that test-takers can now download their raw DNA data.)

• In addition to a new logo unveiled to RootsTech official bloggers, FamilySearch will redesign its website with an emphasis on photos, as a way to engage more people. It'll also add a fan chart view to its online Family Tree program. Blogger Renee Zamora has lots of details on the information presented during the dinner.
  

• According to the Ancestry Insider, who attended Wednesday's dinner for the bloggers, FamilySearch is experimenting with broadcasting sessions to 16 satellite locations in seven countries (with translation where necessary). If successful, next year the number will be expanded to 600 locations. That increases to potential reach of the conference to 120,000 people.

• FamilySearch should reach its 1 billionth indexed record very soon, and is planning on awarding prizes to the indexer and arbitrator of that record. 

Friday, March 22, 2013 1:43:20 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• More than 6,700 people were pre-registered for RootsTech, which is huge for a US genealogy conference. The number is helped by the conference's location in Salt Lake City, home to the Family History Library and to many members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, for whom researching genealogy is a religious calling.
  
  
• About 2,000 teenagers signed up for a youth program on Saturday.
  

• FamilySearch will soon be available in nine languages for access by more people around the world. This is consistent with the organization's increasing focus on historical records from places besides the United States.
  

• FamilySearch unveiled a new logo at a meeting for genealogy bloggers. You can see it on Genealogy Gems blogger Lisa Louise Cooke's Facebook page.

• 3.2 billion names are now online in the databases at FamilySearch.org.

More RootsTech news to come!

Thursday, March 21, 2013 12:42:34 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• You can watch several presentations online each day of the conference. Check out the Rootstech livestreaming schedule here, and remember to translate the times from Mountain time into your time zone. Here's a Time Zone Converter.

• The RootsTech expo hall, which is free to the public, is 40 percent bigger this year. It includes opportunities to get research help in a FamilySearch mini-lab, have a photo or album digitized, get a large family tree printout, and receive a free copy of Family Tree Magazine (when you stop by our booth, tell Tyler, our online community editor, that I said hi).

• Story@Home, a conference about gathering and sharing family stories, has become part of RootsTech this year with a track of classes and a storytelling event on Friday evening.

• RootsTech attendees can register for just the Getting Started track of classes for $19 for one day or $39 for three days.

• A Developer Day on Friday will consolidate the presentations geared toward creators of genealogy technology tools.

• Special events include a Thursday night social at the Leonardo (a contemporary science and art museum), sponsored by findmypast.com; a special Mormon Tabernacle Choir performance also on Thursday; and extended hours at the Family History Library on Friday.

• Genealogy blogger DearMyrtle will be interviewing vendors and attendees in the exhibit hall, and broadcasting the segments online as DearMYRTLE LIVE! @RootsTech. Learn more and find out how to watch on Myrt's blog.

• We know of two scavenger hunts occurring in conjunction with the conference—RootsMagic's scavenger hunt includes an at-home component for those not at RootsTech, and the Heirloom Registry will hold a conference hall version of its online scavenger hunt from a few weeks ago.

Wednesday, March 20, 2013 11:31:05 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• Discover Your Roots Kit (great for beginners, and it's 30% off)
• 10 Years of Family Tree Magazine (2000-2009) DVD (40% off)
• 2008 and 2009 Family Tree Magazine annual CDs (60% off)
• State Research Guides hard-bound book (60% off)

Monday, March 18, 2013 3:08:25 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• RootsTech, the FamilySearch genealogy conference taking place in Salt Lake City March 21-23, has announced its lineup of 13 sessions you can watch free online. They include the opening day keynote by FamilySearch CEO Dennis Brimhall and storyteller Sid Lieberman; Researching Ancestors Online with Laura Prescott; and From Paper Piles to Digital Files by Valerie Elkins.

Click here to see the list of sessions that will livestream and the times you can watch (note that you'll need to translate the times from Mountain Daylight Time to your own time zone).

• The Irish Genealogical Research Society has launched a new website, IrishAncestors.ie,  that broadens access to resources from the group's library. The public area of the website offers resources including a fragment of the 1871 census for the parish of Drumcondra, County Meath, a database of Irish marriage records and more.

• FamilySearch has added 1.7 million indexed records and record images to collections from Australia, Austria, China, Dominican Republic, England, Italy, Mexico, Nicaragua, New Zealand, Paraguay, Peru and the United States. US records come from Arizona, Delaware, Maine, Massachusetts, Montana, North Carolina and Tennessee.

You see the list of updated collections here and click to search or browse them for free on FamilySearch.org.

Friday, March 15, 2013 3:28:54 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• UK and Irish genealogy website Origins.net is offering access to its collection of Irish directories from March 16 until March 18 at midnight GMT (that's about 8 p.m. ET in the United States). Recently added is Thom's Irish Almanac and Official Directory for 1845 to 1900. You could learn the person's exact occupation, as well as address and parish of residence. Note that the most "disadvantaged" classes—small tenant farmers, landless labourers and servants—are usually absent from these directories. Learn more about Origins.net's Irish Directories collection and start searching here.

• Ancestry.com is opening up its US passenger lists and border-crossing records through March 17—search here whether your ancestors came from Ireland or elsewhere. The search here initially netted zero results for my name search on Edward Norris born in 1827, but after I clicked Edit Search to bring up the advanced search window, and then clicked Search again, it worked.

Friday, March 15, 2013 9:28:52 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• Cemetery records: Check the woman’s tombstone and note surrounding ones, which may belong to her family.

• Church records: Witnesses on a woman’s or her children’s religious records may be her relatives.

• Court records: Women typically didn’t leave wills (in many times and places, married women legally couldn't), though a widowed or unmarried woman may have. Your female ancestor or her relatives may be named in her father’s or husband’s will. Also check divorce records, which may have been filed even if a divorce wasn’t granted.

• Home sources: Examine letters, needlework and quilts, recipe books, address books, baby books, wedding albums, Bibles and calenders for names of—and details about—female ancestors. 

• Land records: Women rarely owned land but may be named in deeds. A married woman may have signed a release of dower when her husband sold land. Those selling land to a couple, especially for a small sum, may be the woman’s relatives. Also consider that the neighbors may be her family.

• Marriage records: These might include a license, certificate, return, church register, banns, bond or newspaper announcement.

• Military pensions: A woman could file for a military pension when her husband or unmarried son died of war-related injuries. Widows had to send marriage records to prove the marital relationship. 

• Naturalizations: Until 1922, wives automatically became naturalized when their husbands did. Unmarried women rarely sought naturalization. Post-1922, look for separate records for married women.

• Newspapers: Pay special attention to society columns, announcements of births, engagements or anniversaries, and obituaries.

• Vital records: A woman’s death record may name her father (later records are more detailed). Birth records often give the mother’s maiden name.

• Finding Female Ancestors Family Tree University Independent Study Course from Family Tree University
• Secrets to Tracing Female Ancestors video class
• Research Strategies: Female Ancestors 7-page digital download
• Female Ancestors Cheat Sheet
• The Hidden Half of Family: A Sourcebook for Women's Genealogy by Christina K. Schaefer (Genealogical Publishing Co.)

Thursday, March 14, 2013 6:10:17 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• Almost 3.5 million Irishmen entered the United States between 1820 and 1880. Most stayed in large East Coast cities, partly because they couldn't afford to continue west and partly because they could create close-knit communities with others from their place of origin.

• In 1847, the first major year of famine emigration, 37,000 Irish Catholics arrived in Boston, according to the History Place, where they packed into slums. A sobering statistic from the site: "Sixty percent of Irish children born in Boston during this period didn't live to see their sixth birthday. Adult Irish lived on average just six years after stepping off the boat."

• The same year, about 52,000 Irish arrived in New York City. About 650,000 Irish arrived there during the entire Famine period.
  

• About 11.9 percent of the US population reported Irish ancestry as part of the Census Bureau's American Community Survey in 2008, making this the country's second-largest heritage group.

• Griffith's Valuation: Ask About Ireland has a free search of Griffith's Primary Valuation, a valuation of property in Ireland between 1847 and 1864. It's an important resource for 19th-century Irish research, especially given the destruction of census records from that era. The March/April 2013 Family Tree Magazine has a tutorial for this site.

• Census of Ireland, 1901 and 1911: The National Archives of Ireland offers these censuses for free, along with a trove of historical information. Our video class will show you how to mine the clues in these censuses, even if your ancestors left Ireland before 1901. 
  

• findmypast.ie: This new subscription site (with a pay-as-you-go option) has records of births, marriages and deaths (aka BMDs); courts and prisons; military; immigration; land and estates; as well as newspapers, directories and Griffith's Valuation.
  

• Information Wanted: Also free is this database of "missing friends" from the Boston Pilot newspaper, which published notices from those looking for lost friends from Ireland. The column ran from 1831 to 1921; this site has 1831 to 1893 plus 1901 and 1913.

• Irish Genealogy: This site from the Irish Minister of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht is dedicated to Irish genealogy and genealogical tourism. You can search nearly 3 million pre-1900 church records free, and view the actual record if it's been digitized.
  

• Ancestry.com: Subscription site Ancestry.com has Irish records including Griffith's Valuation, tithe applotment books (a tax paid to the Church of Ireland from 1823 to 1837), Ordnance Survey maps, BMDs and more.
  
  
• FamilySearch: Free Irish record collections here include civil registration indexes, prison registers, tithe applotment books and more.
  

• NARA: Passenger Lists: The National Archives' Access to Archival Databases has passenger indexes including Records for Passengers Who Arrived at the Port of New York During the Irish Famine. It covers 1846 to 1851 and lists people of all nationalities, not just Irish.

Tuesday, March 12, 2013 8:21:54 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• WikiTree, a free worldwide family tree website, has launched a new feature called Surname Following that lets you get updates when other WikiTree users post content related to names you're interested in. Log in to WikiTree and follow surnames to receive an email alert when related content is added to the WikiTree database or a related question, answer or comment is added to the WikiTree G2G (“Genealogist to Genealogist”) Q&A forum.

• Heads up: The early registration deadline is approaching for this year's National Genealogical Society annual conference, taking place May 8-11 in Las Vegas. You'll save $35 on your conference registration if you sign up before March 19. Click here to register.
  
  
• Speaking of conferences, registration is now open for the Federation of Genealogical Societies conference, Aug. 21-24 in Fort Wayne, Indiana (home of the well-known Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center). I'm hoping to be able to carve out some research time while there.
  

• FamilySearch has added 10.5 million indexed records and images to its free historical records search over the last two weeks, including 8,613,673 document images added to the New York Probate Records collection (1629 to 1971). Other notable collection updates are Brazil, Rio de Janeiro, Immigration Cards, 1900-1965, and Peru, Lima, Civil Registration, 1874-1996, collection.

Collections for Indonesia, Italy, New Zealand, and the US states of Minnesota and Ohio also have been updated. See more details and click through to the updated collections here.

• I got an email about a new iPhone/iPad app that helps you inventory family heirlooms. The $2.99 app, called Heirlooms, lets you store a photo of and information about an heirloom, and share it via an emailed attachment. A free version lets others read the attachment without having to buy the app.

• If you're up against a brick wall with some part of your genealogy research and you'll be in the Washington DC area on Saturday, March 16, the National Archives is holding a “Help! I'm Stuck” Genealogy Clinic. You can visit the Research Center main desk that day to sign up for a free, 20 minute consultation with an archivist between noon and 4 p.m. For details on this and other programs at teh archives, see the Archives.gov calendar.

Friday, March 08, 2013 12:13:51 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• six pre-recorded video classes, with demos of recommended websites and strategies
• excerpts from our popular Organize Your Genealogy Family Tree University course
• daily message-board discussions with workshop participants and instructors
• A day when Denise May Levenick, organization expert and author of How To Archive Your Family Keepsakes, will be on hand to provide consultation and answer your questions

Thursday, March 07, 2013 10:33:46 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• Everyone agreed that organization, staying on-task and information overload are time drains when it comes to genealogy research. Social media also distracts us, and catching up after being away from research steals time, too.
  
  
• Organization was a theme. Be organized from the start—using a research log to keep track of your to-do list for each family line and place you're searching really helps. At least one participant uses Evernote to keep her research log. Trello also was recommended (especially for those who think visually).
  
  
• Keep track of negative search results, too (i.e., you didn't find the record you were looking for) so you don't repeat the same search. Track your online searches of growing databases, so you can go back to look for new results.
  
  
• Schedule your genealogical research time on your calendar, just like any other appointment you have.
  
  
• When visiting a repository, plan ahead, use online tools (such as a library catalog and visitor information) to prepare, and call to verify hours, what you can bring in, etc. This gives you more research time.
  
  
• To-do list apps chatters use include Remember the Milk, Any.do and Wunderlist.
  
  
• Sometimes getting away from home to research is better, because you face fewer distractions.
  
  
• Set a research goal for the week (or a period of time that works for you).

We'll host another Virtual Genealogy Conference this Fall, so stay tuned! In the mean time, check out our Organize Your Genealogy One-Week Workshop, taking place March 15-22.

Wednesday, March 06, 2013 3:55:51 PM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• If you’d like to start the scavenger hunt now, go to The Houstory Hearth blog’s special Scavenger Hunt Page. There you’ll find information about the hunt, the prizes, and the list of the other three blogs you’ll need to visit today.

• If you already know what you’re doing, here’s the Heirloom Registry ID Code you need to obtain my secret word: CEFD-304-562-5138-2011

• If this is your final stop for Hunt No. 1, be sure to submit your entry form with your secret words before Tuesday, March 5, 2013 at midnight PST. Instructions for Hunt No. 2, which starts on March 6, will be posted at the Houstory Hearth blog at 12 a.m. EST on March 6. Good luck—and happy hunting!

Monday, March 04, 2013 11:15:32 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]

• The University of Edinburgh's Italo-Scottish Research Cluster online archive gathers material from the 1880s, the era of the first Italian mass migration to Scotland, to the present. Right now, you can see old photos of Italo-Scots, but check back for more additions. There's also a page where you can get links to learn more about this little-studied migration.    

• The new Legacies of British Slave Ownership database holds the names of 46,000 slave owners in British colonies who received compensation for the loss of "property" when Britain abolished slavery in 1833 (it outlawed the trade in 1807). The database doesn't name slaves, but it could aid those who are tracing African ancestors by researching the slave-owning families. Search the database here. 

• The Civil War Trust's annual Park Day takes place Saturday, April 16 at more than 100 participating battlefields in 24 states. Volunteers help clean and maintain these important Civil War sites by raking leaves, picking up trash, painting signs, clearing trails and more. To learn how you can help, visit the trust's Park Day page and click on the name of the participating Civil War site you're interested in (note that some sites are holding their volunteer events on alternate dates).

Friday, March 01, 2013 11:05:04 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)    Comments [0]