In last month’s episode we talked about how to construct a great family history story for video. Video is the perfect medium for sharing your family’s history. It captures the interest of the eyes and the ears.
In this episode I’ve got the ideal tool for you to use to make your video: Adobe Spark Video. Adobe Spark Video is a free app and website tool that makes it easier than ever to create shareable videos.
Click below to listen:
Genealogy Gems Podcast Episode 246 with Lisa Louise Cooke October 2020
Watch the Companion Video & Get the Full Show Notes
This episode features the audio from Elevenses with Lisa Episode 16 – How to Make a Video with Adobe Spark. Watch the video and read the full show notes here.
After listening to this episode, watch Elevenses with Lisaepisode 16How to Make a Video with Adobe Spark to learn how to make videos quickly and easily for free.
Genealogy Gems Premium Members can download the handy PDF show notes for each of these Elevenses with Lisa episodes. Simply log into your membership, and then in the menu under “Video” click “Elevenses with Lisa.” Click the episode and scroll down to the Resources section of the show notes.
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“I use MyHeritage to research my family tree.” Lisa Louise Cooke
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Read all about a new free Ukraine genealogy website, Yorkshire parish records, English workhouse records, German vital records and digitized newspaper coverage of England, Ireland and Scotland.
A New Ukraine Genealogy Website! Vital records and family trees
A new, free Ukraine genealogy website has launched with free family-tree building capability and an enormous database of nearly 300 years of genealogical records from present-day Ukraine. “The database includes 2.56 million people and is expected to reach 4 to 5 million in 2019,” reports EuroMaidan Press. “The access to its contents is and will remain free of charge. The sources of data are manifold: birth registers, fiscal and parish censuses, lists of nobility, voters, the military, and victims of repressions, address directories, and other documents produced under the Tsardom of Muscovy, Russian and Habsburg Empires, Poland and the Soviet Union. A Roman-letter version of the data index is reportedly to be enabled in the coming months.”
To translate the site, bring it up in Google Chrome and right-click.
The family tree-building feature has already proven incredibly popular, reports the same article: “nearly 18 thousand trees have been created in the first couple of days following the official inauguration of the site.” Automated tree-matching hinting will apparently be added in July 2017.
If you have Ukrainian roots, you may also want to read this article about how to request KGB files on relatives.
British Newspaper Archive: New content and free webinar!
The following historical newspaper coverage has been added to the British Newspaper Archive. They add about 100,000 pages every week–learn more about what they do in the free webinar, below.
Scotland: Rothesay Chronicle, covering the Isle of Bute, Isle of Arran, and the mainland. Added coverage for 1884-1892.
More Irish newspapers: Findmypast has added 20th-century coverage of Dublin in the form of about 155,000 news articles from The Catholic Standard. (Limit your search to this paper by using the filters along the left side of the webpage.) The coverage includes weekly news reports dating from 1933-1949 and 1951-1957.
England
1861 workhouse inmates. Ancestry.com subscribers can now search indexed images of a new collection, England and Wales, Long-Term Workhouse Inmates, 1861. “This collection comprises records and images from a volume listing every adult ‘pauper’ in each Workhouse in England and Wales, who had been resident there for five or more years in 1861,” states the collection description. The report was in response to a government mandate to record long-term residents of workhouses. “The report was printed on 30 July 1861 and listed 14,216 adults,” continues the collection description. “When compared with the total workhouse population of approximately 67,800 adult workhouse inmates (excluding vagrants) the percentage of long term inmates was just over 21%.”
Yorkshire parish records. Findmypast has published these new church record collections for Yorkshire:
Yorkshire baptisms. Over 600,000 records have been added for Sheffield and the East Riding to this database, which now has more than 5 million entries.
Yorkshire banns. Over 30,000 entries have been added for Sheffield and the East Riding.
Yorkshire marriages. Over 400,000 entries have been added for Sheffield and the East Riding. The database now has nearly 3 million records.
Yorkshire burials. Over half a million new burials have been added for Sheffield and the East Riding; this database now tops 4.7 million.
Germany: Church and civil records
Ancestry.com has a new browse-only collection of church records from 42 communities in Erfurt, the capital of Thuringia. According to a collection description, “The vast majority of the church records are from Protestant communities, but some Catholic and Jewish communities are also included. In one case, records from the ‘Kaufmannsgemeinde’ or merchants’ community are included.”
Also at Ancestry.com is a new collection of browse-only civil marriage records. Bischofswerda, Germany, Marriages, 1876-1922 includes government records of marriages from Bischofswerda and 11 other communities from the district of Bautzen; date ranges of records from each may vary.
Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links and Genealogy Gems will be compensated if you make a purchase after clicking on these links. Thank you for supporting Genealogy Gems!
Read this genealogy mystery from a Canadian family with French and Irish roots. You’ll see the value of considering varied surname spellings, watching for other relatives in census records, using church records, and compiling clues from several sources to get a...
A free FamilySearch account gives you access to more historical records and customized site features than you’ll see if you don’t log in at this free genealogy website. Here’s why you should get a free FamilySearch account and log in EVERY time you visit the site.
This post is part of our ongoing commitment to help you get the most out of the “Genealogy Giants:”
In this post, I comment on a recent announcement from the free giant everyone should be using: FamilySearch.org.
Why you should have (and use!) a free FamilySearch account
FamilySearch.org has always allowed free public use of its site. But beginning on December 13, 2017, the site will now actively prompt visitors to register for a free FamilySearch account or to log in with their existing accounts. Anyone can continue to search the catalog and user-submitted genealogies, explore over 350,000 digitized books, learn from the Wiki and the learning center, and even view user-contributed photos and stories. But by requesting you to log in, FamilySearch wants to remind you that this is your path to even more free records and services on the site.
Here are my top three reasons to have and use a free FamilySearch account:
1. Access more free historical records on FamilySearch.
One woman had an “ah-ha” moment of realization after reading FamilySearch’s announcement. She posted in the comments, “Though I have had a free account for some time, I did not realize that FamilySearch was not giving me full access to information in record searches just because I had not logged in. Maybe I need to redo my past searches as a logged-in account holder.”
2. Participate in the global Family Tree.
As I more fully describe in my quick reference guide, Genealogy Giants: Comparing the 4 Major Websites, FamilySearch’s online family tree is different than the tree systems used at the other major family history websites. Instead of creating your own personal tree, you participate in a collaborative, unified family tree of the world. As a logged-in visitor, you can enter your information, then that of your parents and their parents, etc. until you connect to deceased individuals who are already on the tree. (Information about living individuals is always privacy-protected.) Then you may, with other descendants, contribute what you to know to an ancestor’s profile.
Anyone may make changes to these public profiles, which may at times be frustrating. But it also allows for more focused collaboration. This is a great place to see a virtual compilation of others’ research on particular ancestors without having to search others’ personal trees individually, as you do on other sites (remember to look for their source citations and verify what others say). The Family Tree on FamilySearch is also a great place to digitally archive family documents and photos where other researchers may see and appreciate them for free. As you can see in the screenshot below, logging in also helps you see how others have identified the folks you see in your search results:
3. Get customized help.
Those who log in with a free FamilySearch account have access to one-on-one assistance through the website. If you have a question about using the site, accessing records, finding additional records about your ancestors, or even how to understand the records you’re looking at, you can email or call a live support person for help. Your login also sets you up to receive customized alerts and seasonal messages (like “Did you know your ancestor fought in the War of 1812?”) and a dashboard experience with at-a-glance reminders of record hints awaiting your review, where you left off in your last online session, tips about what to do next, and more. Here’s what the dashboard looks like:
How to get (or recover) a free FamilySearch account
See Registering to use FamilySearch.org for information about creating a free account. FamilySearch accounts have always been free and, the site assures us, will continue to be free. You will need to provide your first and last name, a username, a password, and an email or mobile phone number.
According to FamilySearch, your login and other personal information:
enables collaboration in the Family Tree and Memories areas of the site (you control how much information is shared)
“allows you to send in-system messages to other users without revealing your personal identity or email address”
“allows FamilySearch to send you emails and newsletters (you can specify how many emails, if any, you receive)”
enables communication when you contact their online support team for help
will not be shared “with any third party without your consent”
If you’ve already got a FamilySearch account but have forgotten your username, click here. If you’ve forgotten your password, click here.
Genealogy Gems Brings You Genealogy Giants
Each of the “Genealogy Giants” has so much to offer family historians around the world! But it’s hard to keep them straight, compare their top features, and get the most out of them without some inside help. That’s why we published the must-have quick reference guide, Genealogy Giants: Comparing the 4 Major Websites, your personal comparative tour of Ancestry.com, FamilySearch, Findmypast, and MyHeritage.
This inexpensive guide can save you hours of wasted time hunting down the records you need. It can save you hundreds of dollars by helping you invest in the genealogy websites you most need to use right now–because your research needs change right along with your growing family tree! The guide is available for your immediate reference as a digital download or get a handy, high-quality printed copy you can keep with your genealogy research files.
Find your Abuela (the Spanish word for Grandma) in a wide variety of Catholic Church records for Mexican genealogy at FamilySearch. Also in new and updated genealogical records, collections from Norfolk, England; Victoria, Australia; and Quebec, Canada.
Mexico – Church Records
Abuela Francisca Ramos. Photo used with permission from the family.
FamilySearch has updated and added thousands of new Catholic church records in their Mexican genealogy databases. These church records cover many areas of Mexico, but in particular, the Hidalgo, Puebla, Jalisco, and Guanajuato databases have all reached over 1 million records. The years covered will vary, but the earliest records are from the 1500s and as recent as the 1970s.
These Catholic church records include baptismal records, marriage records, deaths, and other miscellaneous records that may contain valuable genealogical data for your ancestors. Check out the following databases for Mexican genealogy below:
Several collections for Norfolk, England have been updated at Findmypast this week. Among them are first, Norfolk Bishop’s Transcripts Baptisms 1685-1941. Norfolk Bishop’s transcripts for baptisms contain over 647,000 records. Each entry includes an image of the original document and a transcript of the vital details. The amount of information found in the transcript will depend on the age and condition of the original document. Most will include a name, baptism year, baptism place, and the names of parent’s. Images may reveal additional information such as your ancestor’s birth date, father’s occupation, and the name of the officiating minister.
The second database is titled, Norfolk Bishop’s Transcripts Marriages 1685-1941 and contains over 157,000 records. Each record includes a transcript and may include the birth year, date of marriage, place of marriage, and the name of their spouse as well as an image of the original document.
Thirdly, the Norfolk Bishop’s Transcripts Burials 1685-1941 collection will allow you to search over 434,000 Bishop’s transcripts of Norfolk burials to discover your ancestor’s final resting place. Transcripts will also reveal when they died and their age at death. Images of original documents may reveal additional information such as the name of the minister who performed the ceremony, your ancestor’s date of death and, occasionally, their cause of death.
Finally, the Norfolk Electoral Registers 1832-1915 containing over 4.5 million records may be just want you are looking for. Electoral registers were first created in 1832. Every year, a new electoral register was created to list the name of every individual eligible to vote. Voting was closely linked to the possession of property; therefore, the registers described the type of property owned or rented by the individual.
Electoral registers are an invaluable resource to trace your ancestors between the census years. Each entry in the Norfolk Electoral Registers 1832-1915 will include an image of the original register and a transcript of the facts listed. Transcripts will list your ancestor’s name, the place they registered, the district and the year they were registered. Images will provide additional information such as you’re their address and the type of property they owned or rented.
Australia – Victoria – Birth Records
Also at Findmypast, over 104,000 records have been added to the Victoria Births collection. These civil registration records may reveal your ancestors birth place, birth year, parent’s names and registration number. The entire collection now contains over 1.9 million records spanning the years 1837 t0 1917.
England & Scotland – Newspapers
Over 1.6 million articles and 13 brand new titles have been added to Findmypast’s collection of historic British Newspapers. The new additions cover the North West and South East of England, a number of Scottish counties, Nottinghamshire, and Bournemouth. The new Scottish titles include the Haddingtonshire Courier, Linlithgowshire Gazette, Ross-shire Journal, Rothesay Chronicle, Kinross-shire Advertiser, Peeblesshire Advertiser, and the Scottish Referee.
Canada – Quebec – Various Record Collections
The Drouin Institute has been in the genealogy business for over a hundred years. The Drouin Collection, which is available on Ancestry as well as on GenealogyQuebec.com, was microfilmed in the 1940s and digitized in the 2000s by the Institute. The Drouin Collection contains the civil copy of allparish registers (baptism, marriage, and burial records) from Quebec from 1621 to the 1940s. It is just one of many of the collections you will find from the Drouin Institute.
In total, GenealogyQuebec.com offers many databases to research and reaches near 43 million images and files.
To access the Drouin Institute record collections, you will need to visit GenealogyQuebec.com. It is subscription based website. Subscription information can be viewed here.
LAFRANCE
The LAFRANCE is the most popular and comprehensive tool available at GenealogyQuebec.com. It is a very detailed, high quality index of the Drouin Collection, and also provides the original document. Here is an example of what the LAFRANCE looks like from our users’ perspective:
Currently, the LAFRANCE covers the entirety of the 1621 – 1849 period for Catholic baptisms and burials, as well as, the 1621-1916 period for Catholic marriages. In addition, the LAFRANCE covers the 1760 – 1849 period for Protestant marriages.
The LAFRANCE’s index is particularly valuable and appreciated by English speakers, as it negates the need to read and understand French in order to obtain all the relevant information from a record.
WWI Holdings
The Library of Congress has launched a comprehensive portal to its extensive WWI holdings. This one-stop portal is designed to help you search WWI subject material with ease. Search things like propaganda posters, letters, diaries, newspapers, and more. It is a wonderful site for not only the genealogist, but the avid historian as well.
More on Mexican Genealogy
The Mexican Genealogy Guide by David A. Fryxell from Family Tree Magazine will help you discover the bounty of records in Mexico. This digital download will help you understand naming practices, pinpoint ancestral whereabouts, and how to best navigate church records there.
Disclosure: This article contains affiliate links and Genealogy Gems will be compensated if you make a purchase after clicking on these links (at no additional cost to you). Thank you for supporting Genealogy Gems!
The Mexican Genealogy Guide by David A. Fryxell from Family Tree Magazine will help you discover the bounty of records in Mexico. This digital download will help you understand naming practices, pinpoint ancestral whereabouts, and how to best navigate church records there.