Tuesday, January 31, 2012

Join Us Online At RootsTech 2012

The following is from FamilySearch & RootsTech.


RootsTech 2012


We'd Love To See You At RootsTech, However...

We'd love to see you at RootsTech 2012! There's still time to register for the free Consultant Training and Saturday Devotional by clicking here. Or, if you'd like the full conference experience (100+ sessions, special evening events, and more) you can register for just $89 using code RT89 at www.rootstech.org and save $100!

However, if you can't make it we understand! You can still participate free of charge via live streaming of the event over the Internet.

Just login into the RootsTech home page atwww.rootstech.org during the event; the homepage will transform into RootsTech Live, letting you see what's going on at the conference--right on our homepage.

To see a schedule of what we'll be streaming (all times Mountain Standard Time), visit www.rootstech.org.

One last thing--the Consultant classes won't be streamed live, but they'll be recorded and made available on the consultant site after the conference. Watch for more details about this after RootsTech.

The RootsTech Team

Fold3 Opens Nearly 3 Million African American Records For Free During Black History Month

The following is from Fold3. 




Fold3 is proud to announce Free access to our Black History Collection in honor of Black History Month. This collection includes many enlightening historical records documenting African American achievements since the earliest days of our nation, and will be available the entire month of February.
As soon as black soldiers were recruited to serve the Union in 1863, records were generated to document their service including Compiled Service Records for the U.S. Colored Troops and, ultimately, pension files. The pension file index cards, like this one for Joel Bedenbaugh, include a soldier's rank, company, and regiment within the U.S.C. Infantry, his pension numbers, and sometimes a death date, 24 August 1913, in this case. Private Bedenbaugh's 16-page service record also includes his enlistment record from when he joined up in Dayton, Ohio, in 1864.
Southern Claims Commission files are petitions by southerners who lost property to Union troops during the Civil War, including many blacks, like William and Louisa Ferguson. Though freeborn, Louisa was not only the wife of a slave, but also the daughter of George Washington's carpenter, also a slave. Their claim for compensation of $150 for the loss of a horse was denied, but Louisa's tales of Union and Confederate troops in the vicinity includes her encounters with the rebels and her service to the Union hospital nearby. A transcription of her file is here.
Explore these and thousands of other records documenting the history of African Americans in the U.S., from before the Civil War to the War in Vietnam. Join us as we recognize Black History Month and provide free* access to the Black History Collection on Fold3.

Registration for 2012 LDSTech Conference Now Open

The following is from the LDSTech website.

LDSTech Conference 2012

The 2012 LDSTech Conference will be held March 29-30 in Riverton, UT. The LDSTech Conference consists of two days of information-packed sessions about Church technology, community sessions for testing and developing Church software, and opportunities to interact with other community volunteers.
Registration for the conference is now open.  You can register for the conference by going to https://tech.lds.org/conf/.
Breakfast and lunch are provided each day of the conference. Be sure to bring your laptop, tablet, and mobile devices for development and testing. During the conference, you can expect to do the following:
  • Learn about new Church technologies, sites, and applications. Browse information booths, attend technology sessions, and participate in tutorials and workshops.
  • Help beta test and improve new, unreleased software. Identify bugs and other issues to help development teams refine and improve applications.
  • Lead community projects. Get involved in project leadership by managing and prioritizing tasks, integrating community volunteers, and coordinating development.
For more information about the conference, see the LDSTech Conference wiki page.

Why RootsMagic Works for Me!

Genealogist can be really passionate about their genealogy software programs. I have to include myself among that bunch. In July 2007, I was heralding the praises of Legacy Family Tree from within the walls of this blog.  I was happy I was content, life was good.  Then the challenge was offered to take a peek at RootsMagic.

I was lucky the RootsMagician himself (Bruce Buzbee) demonstrated the inner workings of RootsMagic to me. The feel and flow of the program just spoke to me and my heart sang "This is the one! It conforms to my sense of order in my little genealogy world."

At that moment I knew an eternal genealogy truth. There is no "right" program out there, it's all a personal choice. All of us have different tastes, styles, ways of thinking, preference methods, and our own sense of order. Combine all this with the power of peer pressure and the individual needs for hand holding tech support, is it any wonder that there are so many different genealogy software programs out there?

It's been almost 3 years since I posted "Why I Left Legacy for RootsMagic". At the time I was comparing Legacy 7 with RootsMagic 3. An imminent launch of RootsMagic 4 was on the horizon.  Today I am using RootsMagic 5 and still loving it. In fact I even work for the company now, which is the best job ever!

In this article I want to share with you some of my favorite features and why RootsMagic works for me!

Edit Person Screen  



Upon analyzing RootsMagic for the first time, the major thing I noticed, was how much the Edit Person screen resembled a spreadsheet.  I am a spreadsheet sorta gal. Neat little rows and columns let me see at a glance the events I have recorded on a person's life. Corresponding check marks notify me if there are notes, sources and media for that event. There is so much information at my figure tips, yet it doesn't feel cluttered. You just don't have to dig deep to find the information. Just look at that window. Isn't it beautiful!

Timeline View


The Timeline View is a new feature in RootsMagic 5.  Now I can see not only the events in a person's life but when major events happened in family members lives. This really helps me visualize new places to look for information on people.  Ok, maybe not this relative, but you get the idea.

Descendant View

You may not think this view is anything special, but I want to share a tip with you. In the RootsMagic Forum one user described how they primarily work from the Descendant View, especially when adding new people to the database. I was like "What?"  I had never done that and thought it weird, but, I was willing to give it a go.  You know what, I wouldn't have it any other way. I love, love, love to add people to RootsMagic from the descendant view.  I can see all the family relationships at a glance.  It helps me keep track of who belongs to whom. When you combine this with using short-cut keys you get blazing fast at data-entry. This is my favorite view to work from.

To Do List


There are some really great changes in RootsMagic 5 on the To-Do List. I haven't taken advantage of them yet in my primary database, which is what you are looking at.  I had my own little coding system going on in the Task Title to help me locate priority items. Now with the ability to sort on priority, status, completed and open items things will get much easier as I convert over.

To-Do Lists are a must for genealogist and I really put mine to good use in RootsMagic. I am forever late night searching out new leads, but to tired to enter them into my database.  You can see in this example I saved the obit and then reminded myself to go back and data entry it.  There is never a boring moment in my genealogy - always work to be done.

Research Manager -  Research Logs


Another new feature in RootsMagic 5 is the Research Manager.  I am so excited about it's arrival because now we finally have Research Logs. You can create Research Logs for a Person, Family, Event, Place or General items.  The intention is to move To-Do items into a Research Log as you complete each task.  This will build a log of all your completed research activities.

You are probably noticing by now that I only have one Research Log and a single entry in it.  As I've played with the Research Log in my test database I could see that it had even greater potential than what it was designed for. If you save the research log report as an RTF file you can edit the column headers in Word to anything you want. This leaves the field wide open for all sorts of spreadsheet type lists.

I've had a goal for several years to create a Genealogy Inventory Database or even just a Personal Library of books I own. The Research Log is fully searchable and sortable. It's possible for me to record all the genealogy materials I have and track my work status with them.  Are they digitized? Where do I store them? Has all the information I need been data entry into my database, etc, etc?

I am way excited about these Research Logs, yes for their intended purpose, but also for my personal desires.  I really do like having all my research right at my finger tips. This brings me to the finale favorite thing about RootsMagic I am going to share with you today.

RootsMagic To-Go


RootsMagic To-Go was introduced in RootsMagic 4. It is a small utility program that comes with the program.  It allows you to install the RootsMagic program onto your flash drive and transfer your database files to keep them in sync.  RootsMagic To-Go helps me keep at a minimum what I need to take on research trips.  I have not needed to use my laptop in a long time.  As long as I am at a research facility with a computer I can pop in my flash drive with RootsMagic To-Go on it and have the full database right in front of me.  No need to install the software to anyone's computer and no traces are left behind. A flash-drive with RootsMagic To-Go on it is part of my emergency kit.  I never leave home without it.

Here's another great tip for using RootsMagic To-Go.  I've used it at home right along side my desktop version of RootsMagic.  I will open the desktop version of the program and RootsMagic To-Go at the same time and tile them side by side.  This helps me compare information by having multiple windows, such as two edit person screens, open next to each other. You can not drag n' drop between the programs, like you could if you had two databases open in one program at a time.  This just allows you to enhance the comparisons.

As I start to wrap this article up I realize I didn't talk about the new Multimedia features, Sources, CountyCheck, working with New FamilySearch, or a number of other great things - all important to my genealogy life!  Yes, there are many, many reason why RootsMagic works for me. I suggest you stop by the RootsMagic Booth at RootsTech this week and check out the program.  If you're at home check out the free webinars online at: http://www.rootsmagic.com/Webinars/

And last but not least, if you are participating in the RootsMagic 2012 RootsTech Treasure Hunt, with an opportunity to win an iPad, my clue is below. (Don't forget to click on the image)


I appreciate you stopping by Renee's Genealogy Blog.  If you enjoyed this article please feel free to sign up for my RSS feed or request email delivery by FeedBlitz.  Links are available on the top right column of the website at: http://rzamor1.blogspot.com

See ya tomorrow, for tomorrow is always another genealogy day!

Monday, January 30, 2012

Win an iPad in the RootsMagic 2012 RootsTech Treasure Hunt!

The following is from RootsMagic.




It’s been a tremendous last few months here at RootsMagic. We’ve been busy with the new releases of Personal Historian 2 and RootsMagic 5. We’re also excited to participate in one of the largest genealogy events in North America-RootsTech!
We want to celebrate these momentous events with you, our loyal users! And what better way to celebrate than with a treasure hunt where you could win one of many prizes including an iPad 2!

Online Treasure Hunt

We’ve partnered with 15 of the best and brightest genealogy bloggers who will be reporting at the RootsTech conference. Each blogger will place one of 15 clue words on their website. The clue word will look something like this:
From Thursday, February 2 through Wednesday, February 8, 2012, visit http://www.rootsmagic.com/treasure for a complete list of the blogs where the 15 clue words can be found. Visit each blog, collect all 15 clue words, and you could win software, prizes, or an iPad 2!

Enter at RootsTech or at Home

Once you’ve collected the clues there are two ways to enter.  The first is at the RootsTech conference itself.  Pick up an entry card at the RootsMagic booth(#224) in the Exhibit Hall.  Write the clue words on the back of the card and return it to the RootsMagic booth in the Exhibit Hall by Saturday, February 4 at 1:20 pm.  At that time, we will hold the prize drawings.  You must be present to win.
We didn’t want those who aren’t able to attend RootsTech in person to feel left out so we’re holding a second drawing and giving away more prizes including a second iPad 2.  To enter this drawing, visit http://www.rootsmagic.com/treasure anytime between Thursday, February 2 and midnight MST on Wednesday, February 8, 2012.  Fill out the online form to be entered into the second drawing.  You may enter both drawings but one entry per person, per drawing.  Winners will be picked at random and notified via e-mail by Friday, February 10, 2012.
Remember, the treasure hunt doesn’t begin until this Thursday. Good luck!

RootsTech 2012 Starts This Week!

The following is from FamilySearch and RootsTech.



RootsTech 2012 Is Here!


RootsTech Kicks Off This Week

If you haven't yet signed up for RootsTech 2012 to take advantage of the FREE offers--the Consultant Training Track, the Devotional on Saturday, and access to the many amazing companies who will be in the exhibit hall, maybe this additional offer will get you to register!

Attendees can print FREE poster-sized versions of their family history (like a 9-generation fan chart) in the GenealogyWallCharts company booth (#620). There is no charge for B&W prints, and you can upgrade to a color print for as little as $5.95.

You can submit your PDF ahead of time by visiting www.genealogywallcharts.com, or bring your PDF to the event on a USB drive or CD to take advantage of this great opportunity.

Dress

As a reminder, dress for RootsTech is business casual...even for the Saturday Devotional.

If you've already registered, we'll see you this week! If not, you must register to attend by clicking here.

The RootsTech Team

Ancestry.com, Behindthename.com, and Werelate.org Announce an Improved Approach For Finding Variant Names

The following is from Ancestry.com.


Ancestry.com, BehindTheName.com, and WeRelate.org announce an improved approach to finding variant names in genealogy searches.  Up to now, most genealogy websites have had to rely upon Soundex to return variant names in response to searches. These approaches often miss variants that should be returned, or include variants that aren't very similar.

Ancestry.com, BehindTheName.com, and WeRelate.org have created an open-source database of name variants that is free for any website or genealogy software developer to use. Tested against pairs of names provided by Ancestry.com, it reduces the number of missed name variants by over 25% in comparison with Soundex.

How you can help: A large portion of genealogical expertise involves learning variant spellings for the surnames in your tree. Why not share your knowledge with others? By adding your variant spellings to the database, searches on any website that uses it will include your variant spellings automatically. You can review and add variant spellings here: http://www.werelate.org/wiki/Special:Names

In addition, we need people to review the changes that others have made to the database, to make sure that we have multiple pairs of eyes reviewing the names that are being added and removed. You can review changes that others have made here: http://www.werelate.org/wiki/Special:NamesLog

If you are a website or software developer: The database and source code are available at: https://github.com/DallanQ/Names

In addition to the database of name variants, the source code also includes a function to return the similarity score between any two names. This function has been found useful in duplicate detection.

More information about the project can be found at: http://www.werelate.org/wiki/WeRelate:Variant_names_project

brightsolid hires top genealogist D. Joshua Taylor to support move into US market

The following is from brightSolid.


brightsolid hires top genealogist D. Joshua Taylor to support move into US market

• He’s helped stars find their roots on TV’s “Who Do You Think You Are?”
Now, he’s helping brightsolid’s US launch as business development manager
and media spokesperson

• Taylor is one of several new appointments to the new US operation
of UK’s major online genealogy business

January 30, 2012. SANTA MONICA, CA: brightsolid online publishing, a leading online provider of historical and genealogical content, today announces that top genealogist D. Joshua Taylor has joined its new US operation with immediate effect, as business development manager and media spokesperson.

D. Joshua Taylor, MA, MLS is one of America’s most prominent genealogists – a prolific genealogical researcher, speaker and author, who has also received numerous awards for his work. Adept at media interviews, he has twice been featured on the NBC series ‘Who Do You Think You Are?’, helping both Sarah Jessica Parker and Ashley Judd trace their family trees.

“We’re thrilled to have recruited such a dynamic and talented genealogist to represent us both to the media and the wider genealogical community”, says Neil Curtis, brightsolid’s new Senior Vice-President (SVP) of North America.

Speaking about his appointment, Taylor says: “Having seen what brightsolid has achieved on the UK genealogy scene, I’m excited about helping them fulfill their huge potential in the US.”

British-owned brightsolid has itself been at the forefront of technological innovations in family history for over three decades. It hosts over a billion genealogical records across its family of brands and was this month voted Best Genealogy Organization in the online Gene Awards. 

As part of its move into North America, brightsolid is sponsoring RootsTech 2012, the major family history and technology conference, taking place in Salt Lake City from February 2-4 2012, where Taylor himself will be giving three talks. They will cover, respectively, the need for a universal standard in online digital archiving; best practices for using Cloud computing in family history research; and a forecast for future genealogy software developments.
Other new appointments to brightsolid’s new US operation:

D. Joshua Taylor is just one of several new appointments for brightsolid, following the opening this month of its new US operation, based in Santa Monica, California. 

• Neil Curtis moves from his role as brightsolid Corporate Development Manager to focus on the US market as Senior Vice President (SVP) of North America.

• Rachel Denning joins as the General Manager of North America, after 14 years experience in the IT and web industries.

• Brian Speckart joins as Marketing Manager of North America, after a varied 15-year career in marketing and public relations, including teaching New Media Marketing at UCLA Extension.

• Katy Curtis will focus on North America as Finance Manager, after previously working as a director at KPMG.  




• More About D. Joshua Taylor

D. Joshua Taylor, MA, MLS has been passionate about genealogical and historical research since his youth. He has continued to show this passion during his 15-year year career in the genealogy industry.

He has received numerous awards for his work, including RootsTech’s Distinguished Presenter Award, the Federation of Genealogical Societies Award of Merit and the Rubincam Youth Award from the National Genealogical Society. 

He is the current Vice-President of Administration for the Federation of Genealogical Societies (FGS), where he also serves as chairman of the Conference Planning Committee. He previously held the role of Director of Education and Programs at the New England Historic Genealogical Society, the nation’s oldest genealogical organization (founded in 1845).

He was a regular columnist for ‘Digital Genealogist’ and has published prolifically in ‘America Ancestors’ and ‘Association of Professional Genealogist Quarterly’, amongst other titles. He is also a frequent speaker at genealogical societies and events, including GENTECH, the National Genealogical Society Annual Conference and RootsTech, where he’ll be speaking again this year.

He holds an MLS (Archival Management) and an MA (History) from Simmons. In the medium-term Taylor will be based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
He will be giving three talks at RootsTech 2012, February 2-4:
•             A User's Perspective: Developing a Universal Metadata Structure for Genealogical Content Providers
•             Do I Trust the Cloud? - Cloud Computing and Family History
•             Software Forecast 2.0 - What Genealogists Need for the Future


• About brightsolid

Since 1994, brightsolid group has been delivering online innovation and pioneering the expansion of the genealogy market with leading family history websites including the global network of findmypast sites, plus ScotlandsPeople, GenesReunited, and britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk, together servicing over 18 million registered customers worldwide.

The sites connect people via their innovative family tree software and deliver access to over a billion records dating as far back as 1200. Family historians can search for their ancestors among global collections, relating primarily to people with UK and Irish ancestry, of military records, census, migration, occupation directories, newspapers, as well as birth, marriage and death records.

brightsolid is proud to be part of the 1940 US Census Community Project, a joint initiative with Archives.com, FamilySearch and other leading genealogy organizations, which aims to make the 1940 census searchable as quickly as possible after its release in April 2012. The completion of the project will allow anyone to search for their ancestors in the 1940 census for free online. Learn about this exciting new project atwww.the1940census.com and volunteer to help today!

Friday, January 27, 2012

Season 3 Premiere of "Who Do You Think You Are?"

The following is from Ancestry.com


 

 
 
From the Irish Civil War to the American Revolution, and from the African nation of Cameroon to the Republic of Bulgaria, Season 3 of Who Do You Think You Are?will take you all over the world and inside the fascinating family histories of 12 celebrities.
 
Learn more on NBC.com
 
whose stories will you discover this season?
 
episode 1: Martin Sheen learns how family members in Ireland and Spain stood up for their beliefs during times of war.
February 3rd, 8/7c
episode 2: Marisa Tomei travels to Italy to discover the truth behind the rumor about her great-grandfather’s murder.
February 10th, 8/7c
Tune in throughout the rest of the season to watch Blair Underwood, Reba McEntire, Rob Lowe, Helen Hunt, Rita Wilson, Edie Falco, Rashida Jones, Jerome Bettis, Jason Sudeikis and Paula Deen.

RootsTech Conference Will Broadcast Select Sessions Free Online

The following is from RootsTech.

RootsTech 2012


RootsTech Conference Will Broadcast Select Sessions Free Online
SALT LAKE CITY—RootsTech, a leading family history and technology conference held in Salt Lake City, Utah, February 2-4, 2012, announced today that fourteen of its popular sessions will be broadcasted live and complimentary over the Internet. The live broadcasts will give those unable to attend worldwide a sample of this year’s conference content. Interested viewers can watch the live presentations at RootsTech.org. The second-year conference has attracted over 3,000 registered attendees.
 
The free online sessions include the keynote speakers and a sampling of technology and family history presentations. Following are the fourteen broadcasted sessions and speakers. All times are in Mountain Standard Time (MST):
 
Thursday, February 2
8:30-10:00 am, Inventing the Future, as a Community (Keynote Address) by Jay L. Verkler
11:00 am-12:00 pm, Do I Trust the Cloud? by D. Joshua Taylor  
1:45-2:45 pm, Effective Database Search Tactics by Kory Meyerink     
3:00-4:00 pm, Twitter – It’s Not Just “What I Had for Breakfast” Anymore by Thomas MacEntee  
4:15-5:15 pm, Eleven Layers of Online Searches by Barbara Renick     
 
Friday, February 3
8:30-9:30 am, Exabyte Social Clouds and Other Monstrosities (Keynote Address) by Josh Coates
9:45-10:45 am, Publish Your Genealogy Online by Laura G. Prescott     
11:00 am-12:00 pm, Optimize Your Site for Search Engines by Robert Gardner    
1:45-2:45 pm, Genealogists “Go Mobile” by Sandra Crowly  
3:00-4:00 pm, Google’s Toolbar and Genealogy by Dave Barney      
 
Saturday, February 4
8:30-9:30 am, Making the Most of Technology to Further the Family History Industry (Keynote Address) by Tim Sullivan and Ancestry.com Panel
9:45-10:45 am Genealogy Podcasts and Blogs 101 by Lisa Louise Cooke    
11:00 am-12:00 pm, Future of FamilySearch Family Tree by Ron Tanner
1:45-2:45 pm, Privacy in a Collaborative Environment by Noah Tatuk    

About RootsTech

RootsTech is a new conference designed to bring technologists together with genealogists to learn from each other and find solutions to the challenges faced in family history research today. The conference’s activities and offerings are focused on content that will help genealogists and family historians discover exciting new research tools while enabling technology creators to learn the latest development techniques from industry leaders and pioneers.

Fold3 5th Anniversary Special Ends Soon

The following is from Fold3.



Save $30.00 on an annual All-Access Fold3 Membership.
Last Chance to Get $30 off a Fold3 Annual Membership
Annual Membership Offer. Only $49.95! Start Today
We want to remind you that our 5th Anniversary offer is expiring. Get an Annual Membership now for only $49.95 (regular price is $79.95).

In 5 years, Fold3 has:

  • Added over 85 million documents and over 100 million memorial pages
  • Established unique partnerships with the National Archives and other institutions
  • Built a unique set of content that perfectly complements other websites like Ancestry.com
  • Grown to over 1.5 million registered Fold3 Members
Click Here to see what we've added recently.
Act Now! This offer ends January 31st at 11:59pm

Canterbury Cathedral records to go online at findmypast.co.uk

The following is from FindMyPast.

FINDMYPAST.CO.UK TO PUBLISH CANTERBURY CATHEDRAL RECORDS ON THE WEB
  • Project announced to increase access to over a million baptism, marriage and burial records dating back to 1538
  • First time that images of the original parish records from East Kent churches will appear online
Today leading UK family history website findmypast.co.uk has announced that it has been awarded a contract by Canterbury Cathedral Archives to publish online for the very first time historic records from the archive. The first phase of the Canterbury Collection project will see a browsable version of the parish registers of the historic Archdeaconry of Canterbury go online in the coming weeks at findmypast.co.uk.

An estimated 270,000 images containing over a million entries will be published on the website, covering parish churches from a wide expanse of East Kent, including:
  • the city of Canterbury
  • the towns of Faversham, Wye and Elham
  • Thanet
  • towns along the east Kent coast stretching from Whitstable in the north round to Hythe in the south
The launch has been timed to coincide with the temporary closure of Canterbury Cathedral Archives for refurbishment, so that family historians and local historians can continue to enjoy access to these fascinating records until the Archives reopens in autumn 2012.

From the initial online launch in February, visitors to the findmypast.co.uk website will be able to browse through the scanned pages of the parish records to search for their ancestors. At the same time, findmypast.co.uk will start to transcribe the records, with a view to creating an index and making them fully searchable on the website later this year.

Paul Nixon, Content Licensing Manager for findmypast.co.uk, said: "We're really looking forward to seeing these invaluable records from Canterbury Cathedral Archives go live on findmypast.co.uk, strengthening the site's position as the natural home for UK parish records."

Canterbury Cathedral Archivist Cressida Williams, added:  "Working with findmypast has provided us with a wonderful opportunity to expand access to these records to a worldwide audience. This resource will be a great asset for anyone with an interest in the history of this part of Kent."

The Canterbury Collection will join an impressive array of UK parish records at findmypast.co.uk, including records from Manchester Archives, Cheshire Archives, Plymouth & West Devon Record Office and Welsh Archives, in addition to over 40 million parish records from family history societies throughout the UK in partnership with the Federation of Family History Societies.

Anyone wishing to be notified when the Canterbury Collection becomes available can register online at findmypast.co.uk to receive a newsletter.


About findmypast.co.uk
Leading UK family history website findmypast.co.uk (formerly 1837online.com) was the first company to make the complete birth, marriage and death indexes for England & Wales available online in April 2003.

Following the transcription, scanning and indexing of over two million images, the company launched the first website to allow the public easy and fast access to the complete indexes, which until then had only been available on microfiche film in specialist archives and libraries. The launch was instrumental in creating the widespread and growing interest in genealogy seen in the UK today.

Findmypast.co.uk has subsequently digitised many more family history records and now offers access to over 750 million records dating as far back as 1538. This allows family historians and novice genealogists to search for their ancestors among comprehensive collections of military records, census, migration, occupation directories, and current electoral roll data, as well as the original comprehensive birth, marriage and death records.

In November 2006 findmypast.co.uk launched the ancestorsonboard.com microsite in association with The National Archives to publish outbound passenger lists for long-distance voyages departing all British ports between 1890 and 1960.

As well as providing access to historical records, findmypast.co.uk is also developing a range of online tools to help people discover and share their family history more easily, beginning with the launch of Family Tree Explorer in July 2007.

In April 2007, findmypast.co.uk's then parent company Title Research Group received the prestigious Queen's Award for Enterprise: Innovation 2007 in recognition of their achievement.

Findmypast.co.uk was acquired in December 2007 by brightsolid, the company who were awarded The National Archives' contract to publish online the 1911 census, which it launched in January 2009.


About Canterbury Cathedral Archives
Canterbury Cathedral Archives collects, cares for, and provides access to, records relating to Canterbury Cathedral, the City of Canterbury, parishes in the historic Archdeaconry of Canterbury, and other local institutions and families. The Archives closes on 31st January for refurbishment work, due to reopen in Autumn 2012.Findmypast.co.uk is working with the Cathedral Archives on 'the Canterbury Collection', made up of registers of parishes in the historic Archdeaconry of Canterbury.

http://www.canterbury-cathedral.org/history/archives.aspx