Family History & Genealogy Bits and Pieces...

At first I thought that I could maintain my personal blog, be a full time student, work part time and maintain my two family history blogs, however I was over confident. As my genealogy passion is about South African history, and I have had wonderful reactions and feedback for that blog I have decided to discontinue this site.

However feel free to come over and check out http://southafricanfamilyhistory.wordpress.com. Most of the posts will pertain to South African research, however from time to time there will be general posts about family history and genealogy. I will leave this blog up, as there are some good links, but I will eventually have all the stuff on the site on the South African genealogy site.

Thank you for your support.

I am feel like a giddy teenager, granted I am in my twenties, but I havent felt this excited about something in a long time! I have been using PAF (Persoanl Ancestral File) for a while now, and while it is GREAT - especially since it is free and fairly easy to use, there are limitations to it that I at times get frustrated with.

At the BYU Family History Conference yesterday I saw a few different genealogy programs/data managers for sale and I was at a loss as to which I should purchase! Most of the companies had their products on sale, so the fact that they were the same price didn't help my indescision. I decided to attend the demo of RootsMagic and I was amazed! I asked many questions about applications and differencescompared to PAF and just listened in awe. My smile and joy increased with the minutes of the presentation!

So, today when I went to the second day of the conference I bought this great software.
I think it will be the first time that I actually read the manual for anything - I want to make sure I get the maximum benefits from it. For anyone who is interested in trying out this software you can actually download a free trial version (no credit card needed) and see for yourself how wonderful this program is.

Todays keynote speaker at the conference was Elder Marlin K. Jensen of the Seventy of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I really enjoyed his speech, and I was very happy to find the transcription today. Click to read >>> "Making a Case for Genealogy".

Today was amazing! I attended the BYU 2006 Family History Conference and WOW! Let me just say that if you ever get the chance to attend one of these conferences or any of the other conferences like FGS and NGS you should take this amazing oppertunity. I have learned so today! I intend on blogging about these here, but it may take me the rest of this week to just post about today, and this conference is 4 days long!!! So look out, some major posts are coming up!

Brigham Young University is the home of the Center of Family History and Genealogy . The Center has many genealogical projects such as the Basque, Irish and Welsh Projects. One of its biggest projects however is the Immigrant Ancestors Project , which is an "demographic historical indexing progect". Extraction of origional records occurs for the following projects: British (incl. Scottish, Irish & Welsh), German, French, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese (Dutch soon to be added). They have a free searchable database online.
Volunteers are alwasy needed to assist in the extraction process.

TANAP is an extraordinary project involving the countires that have archives of the Dutch East India Company (VOC -Verenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie). In this multi-national project it is also connected to many Universities around the world. Its objectives are not only about preservation and a world wide parnership but increasing knowledge and teaching and scholarship.

The Archives involved in the project:
Netherlands: Nationaal Archief
Indonesia: Arsip Nasional Republik Indonesia
South Africa: Cape Town Archives Repository
Sri Lanka: National Archives of Sri Lanka
India: Tamil Nadu Archives
England: British Library, Oriental and India Office Collections
Malaysia: Arkib Negara Malaysia

Brigham Young University offers its genealogical conferences annually to beginners and professional genealogists alike. August 1st, 2006 is the next conference it holds. I will actually be presenting along with other students and Dr C. Doxey on Tuesday morning. Our presentation is titled "British and Irish Emigration Records" . I will be posting most of what I say on my other blog South African Genealogy so keep checking there is you are interested in hearing about South African records or South African reseach in the British Isles.

I have just returned to the United States after doing genealogical research for 10 weeks overseas. I was in England, Scotland, France and the Netherlands.
I learned alot about how to do, and how not to do research in these countries. I hope that through this blog I can share the things I have learned. I will be adding posts about the respective archives I researched in, as well as general notes about doing family history. Please leave comments and ask questions.

The Utah Valley Regional Family History Center at Brigham Young University is a great for researchers. However you don't have to be there to benefit from many of their resources. Click here!

I stumbled upon this gem from the University of Idaho . It is a great search tool for all sorts of archives and repositories all over the world! You just click on a region and then a country and VOLILA! You can selet the type or name of the archive and with one more click you will be immediately connected to their website. It has saved me many hours of searching. This is a must have site! Beware though not every single archive or library will be found here, but it is a very good base!

NB: Make sure that you look at the "Additional links" section as it includes countries that are not under the continent search!

This is an awesome website to find records in archives around England, it will even give you archive & repository details. This is an invaluable site for British genealogists or those with British ancestors. http://www.a2a.org.uk/

NATIONAL ARCHIVES
ENGLAND -Kew: www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/
SCOTLAND - Edinburgh: www.nas.gov.uk/
NETHERLANDS -Hague: www.en.nationaalarchief.nl/default.asp
FRANCE- Paris: www.recherche.gouv.fr/archives/default.htm
SOUTH AFRICA -Cape Town: www.national.archives.gov.za/
AMERICA -New York: www.archives.gov/national-archives-experience/

SMALLER ARCHIVES
BRITISH LIBRARY: www.bl.uk/collections/orientalandindian.html
HAMPSHIRE: www.hants.gov.uk/record-office/
NOTTINGHAM: www.nottinghamshire.gov.uk/archives
GLASGOW: www.glasgow.gov.uk/en/Residents/Leisure_Culture/Libraries/LibraryCatalogue/
POITIERS: http://www.cg86.fr/cotes/archives.html?v=14