Anglo-Celtic Connections

Choose from selected free online events in the next five days. All times are ET except as noted. Assume registration in advance is required; check so you’re not disappointed. Find out about many more, mainly US events, at Conference Keeper.

Tuesday, 29 October

2 pm: Ottawa Virtual Genealogy Drop-In, for OGS Ottawa Branch.
https://ottawa.ogs.on.ca/events/virtual-genealogy-drop-in-2-2024-10-29/

2:30 pm: The Lincoln Family Album, by Abbie Meek for Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center.
https://acpl.libnet.info/event/11773882

Wednesday, 30 October

2 pm: 10 Essential Philadelphia Repositories for Genealogists, by Katy Bodenhorn Barnes for Legacy Family Tree Webinars.
https://familytreewebinars.com/webinar/10-essential-philadelphia-repositories-for-genealogists/

2 pm: Wednesdays With Witcher: Telling the Stories of Our Lives, by Curt Witcher for Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center.
https://acpl.libnet.info/event/11775223

Thursday, 31 October

6:30 pm: Who Walked These Streets? How to Build an Online Platform for Historic Neighborhood Research, by Elizabeth Hodges for Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center.
https://acpl.libnet.info/event/11775273

7 pm: Update on Canada, by Dave Obee for BYU Family History Library.
https://familyhistory.lib.byu.edu/learning/webinars

Friday, 1 November

8 am: First presentation of the Wikitree Symposium.
https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Help:WikiTree_Week_Symposium

2 pm: Researching Your Buckinghamshire Ancestors, by Richard Holt for Legacy Family Tree Webinars.
https://familytreewebinars.com/webinar/researching-your-buckinghamshire-ancestors/

Saturday 2 November
10 am: “Bringing the First World War Home: The
Generations of 1914 and 2024 Come Together”, by Jonathan Vance for OGS London and Middlesex Branch.
https://londonmiddlesex.ogs.on.ca/events/

From 29 October to 1 November 2024, MyHeritage offers free access to its vast collection of “dispatches” (death, burial, cemetery, and obituary records.) That’s nearly 1.2 billion records in 435 collections.

Just a reminder that Ottawa Public Library cardholders and Ontario Genealogical Society members have free at-home access year-round to the MyHeritage Library Edition.

“We are pleased to announce the addition of more than 600 new papers from 20 states and six countries, including Australia, Canada, England, Wales, Papua New Guinea, and the Philippines. Have a paper you’d like to see added to our archives? Please let us know here. Explore these new newspapers today on Newspapers.com.”

That’s from the Newspapers/com Fishwrap blog post.

Let’s dig deeper:

New Brunswick:
Telegraph-Journal: The most extensive collection from New Brunswick, with 943,895 pages spanning 1874-2024, providing a rich archive for Saint John and provincial history.

Saint John Times Globe and The Moncton Transcript:  Substantial additions with 609,730 and 438,884 pages, respectively, covering over a century.

The Kings County Record and The Northern Light: These more recent additions offer insights into Sussex and Bathurst from 2010 to 2024.

Ontario
Etobicoke Guardian and The Scarborough Mirror: These suburban papers are notable, with over 100,000 pages each, covering mid-20th-century to early 21st-century local news.
The Willowdale Mirror: 37,496 pages capture Toronto area developments from 1960–1984.

Quebec:
Le Nationaliste: With 5,824 pages (1904-1922), this Montreal newspaper offers early 20th-century French-language news.

England
Gazette and Herald editions in Yorkshire and Wiltshire: Largest collection in England with over 22,000 pages, providing local historical coverage for 2014-2019.
The Press (York ed.): A significant addition with 87,086 pages from York (2014-2019).
Other notable entries include The Cumberland News and various local Darlington and Stockton Times editions for northern England.

Wales
Powys County Times and Gazette and Powys County Times and Express: Covering Radnorshire and Montgomeryshire with over 10,000 pages each and focusing on recent years (2017-2019).
Tivy-Side Advertiser: With 10,678 pages from 2014-2019, it covers the Cardigan area in Dyfed, providing a snapshot of Welsh local news.

This is an update to the post Financial Health of Canadian Genealogical Societies 2023 to incorporate the three societies whose financial results were unavailable then. The amounts are for the reporting and two preceding years.

Alberta Genealogical Society

For the reporting period ending 2023-12-31, total assets of $284,133 ($1,041,398, $590,395) and liabilities of $14,952 ($212,232, $175,854.) The total revenue was $103,689 ($614,488, $188,456.) Expenditures totalled $57,130 ($199,863, $183,798). The individual annual membership fee remains $50 for digital journal subscription. 

Genealogical Association of Nova Scotia

For the reporting period ending 2023-12-31, total assets were $273,107 ($280,554, 277,896) and liabilities $76,541 ($75,206, $48,520.) The total revenue was $57,910  ($75,204, $66,629.) Expenditures totalled $72,603 ($66,232, $65,885.) The individual annual new membership fee is $59.

For the reporting period ending 2023-12-31, total assets were $151,851 ($220,754, $232,273), liabilities (33,104, $116,355, $117,868), total revenues $240,136, ($222,338, $240,443), and total expenditures $225,788, ($232,345, $227,656). Individual basic annual membership remains $70.

Of the 13 societies surveyed, eight were in a surplus position for the year, and five were in deficit.

 

There’s another possible opportunity to attend this online presentation by Ken McKinlay on Monday at 7 p.m. It’s the same topic Ken presented for the OGS Ottawa branch just over a week ago. This time for the Oakville Public Library.

Ottawa Branch was only able to handle 100 registrants. The session was oversubscribed, which left some people interested but disappointed.

Information for the Oakville Public Library session is at https://attend.opl.on.ca/event/11152523/. They also have a limit of 100 registrants.

Usually, this is the time of the month that FreeBMD updates on additions to its indexed records. Not now. This pop-up appears on the FreeBMD website.

Due to a technical issue, post-1900 records cannot be searched. We are working on a solution, but this may take some time so please bear with us. We apologise for any inconvenience.

Miscellaneous items I found of interest during the week.

The Making of the Irish Border, 1912-1925, a Short History

The Counterculture and Donald Trump

‘Childless cat ladies’ have long contributed to the welfare of American children − and the nation

FOR HALLOWEEN

Many important 20th-century philosophers investigated ghosts – here’s how they explained them

Why ghosts wear clothes or white sheets instead of appearing in the nude

Thanks to this week’s contributors: Ann Burns, Anonymous, Kenneth R Marks, Teresa, Unknown.

 

 

You’d think Findmypast meant they had Manitoba newspapers to search. It’s misleading, if not downright deceptive.

Clicking on “See Manitoba, Canada newspapers” takes you to the start of a listing of 203 matching newspaper and publication articles from the British Newspaper Archive that mention Manitoba.

Those results may be of interest, but they’re not Manitoba newspapers. The BNA has no Manitoba newspapers! There are some Canadian papers in the collection — from Ontario.

So yes, newspapers from Manitoba, Canada, could reveal your family’s forgotten history. They did for me, thanks to the Newspapers.com collection, not Findmypast/BNA.

 

The branch meeting will be held at Lansing United Church and online only on Monday, 28 October, at 7:30 pm.

When it comes time to write the stories of your ancestors’ lives, you will want more than names, places and dates, whether you want to write a blog post or a book. These lists of facts make for dull reading. Janice Nickerson will share her secret (no longer) method of uncovering hidden episodes of our ancestors’ lives that bring their stories to life.

Opening Act: Patricia Blackstock will present In Search of Irish Ancestors.

For more information and to attend online follow the link from https://torontofamilyhistory.org/toronto-branch/meetings/

 

 

TheGenealogist has added a comprehensive collection of parish records for North West Kent with over 2.5 million individuals. The detailed transcripts include direct links to original images. Coverage is:

● Baptisms: 1538-1916
● Marriages: 1538-1939
● Burials: 1538-2000,

In case you’re wondering, Ancestry has a transcription collection in Kent, England, Church of England Baptisms, Marriages, and Burials, 1538-1914, with 1,318,564 entries.

Findmypast has three Kent parish collections covering the whole county, including transcripts and some linked images.
Kent Baptisms with 3,609,621 records
Kent Marriages and Banns with 3,196,177 records
Kent Burials with 3,076,315 records.

Before getting to the newly available records this week, the entire newspaper archives is free until 28 October, https://www.findmypast.co.uk/search-newspapers

British Army, Northumberland Fusiliers —12,444 new transcriptions. While the detail given varies, most include:

Name
Residence
Enlistment date
Enlistment place
Service number
Rank
Battalion
Transfer to/from
Discharge date
Cause of discharge
Wounded/sick
Notes – details about service, age, medals received and more
Source

Scotland, Fife Mounted Volunteers Index 1860-1892, is transcriptions from Colonel Anstruther Thomson’s book A History of the Fife Light Horse, published in 1892.

1 pm, Saturday, October 26, 2024
Ottawa Public Library, Main Branch Auditorium

Gateville & Beyond, by Stephen McKenna

A village on the edge of city & countryside

Join Stephen McKenna as we trace the history of a working class Gloucester village-like neighbourhood – carved out of the former Billings Estate – and its transition from the era of ice houses, sawmills, brickyards, swimming creeks, and horse-drawn wagons into the modern age of shopping malls and the practicalities of present day suburbia.

Admission is free. All are welcome to attend.