Are you looking for photos of Mennonite life in Canada?

 

If you are looking for photos of Mennonites in Canada, there is a new online photo archive that is making thousands of images of Mennonite life from across Canada and around the world easily available to the public. It is located in the Mennonite Archival Image Database (MAID) at Mennonite Archives of Ontario at Conrad Grebel University College in Waterloo, Ontario. 

 

The images, some over 100 years old, chronicle everything from weddings to barn-raisings, and is the product of the work of seven Mennonite archives across the country - one each in Alberta, British Columbia, Saskatchewan, and Ontario and three in Manitoba. 

 

There are 80,000 photos with descriptions in the database, but at this point only 10,000 of the photos are scanned and are currently available from the archives. 

 

As an added bonus, people who browse the archives and spot family members or other photos that interest them, they can easily buy and download digital copies of the photos online. 

 

The website of the Mennonite Archives of Ontario at Conrad Grebel University College in Waterloo is at https://uwaterloo.ca/mennonite-archives-ontario/photograph-and-slide-collections 

 

Check the Canadian Week in Review every Monday morning for the latest in Genealogy, Heritage, and History news in Canada.

If you missed last week’s edition, it is at http://genealogycanada.blogspot.com/2015/03/canadian-week-in-review-16-march-2015.html

It’s the ONLY news blog of its kind in Canada! 

 

It has been a regular post every Monday morning since April 23, 2012.

The book catalogue of the OGS is on VITA

The Book Catalogue and the Cemetery Locator of the OGS has been moved to VITA, a division of OurOntario (a site which tells the story of Ontario) at http://vitacollections.ca/ogscollections/search

Some feature are –

Family Histories

You can now search our Family History Collection at VITA

Periodicals

The entire Periodical Collection is easier to search. They have now been able to provide more info for their Branch Newsletters, i.e., location information for branch libraries and contact information.

Mystery Photos

They have had the Mystery Photos site on their OGS Old Photos flickr site for a while, and now they have moved them over to the new VITA site and have them all accessible in one place.

WWI Memorial Wall

I know that the OGS has wanted to do something like this for a number of years. If you have a WWI vet in your family and you would like to share their photo and a bit about their life, the OGS would be honoured to include your WWI vet on our Memorial Wall.

Where are your Ontario Roots?

This is brand new for OGS, an interactive feature where you can share a bit of history about your family and your Ontario roots! You will find this located on the top right hand corner of the page.

Contact librarian@ogs.on.ca if you have any questions.

Editor’s Note: Your editor has used this new service and has found it to be very good. I had a series of surnames, and place names that I wanted to check, and the search feature worked very fast and was complete. Have you tried it yet? How did you find it? Was it a good finding research tool, or could it be improved?

What will happen to Barnardo’s Home photos?

Barnardo’s Homes is going to start digitizing their photos (of children), and then has plans to destroy the originals.  Some 30,000 of these photos are Home Children that came to Canada.

There's more at http://britishphotohistory.ning.com/profiles/blogs/barnardo-s-archive-up-for-grabs

You can help find a home for the collection by signing an e-petition; it's quick, simple and free. Here is the link

www.change.org/en-GB/petitions/save-barnardo-s-photographic-archive-find-a-new-home-for-the-original-photographs?share_id=cwjMybIulb&utm_campaign=signature_receipt&utm_medium=email&utm_source=share_petition

Collected Photos Goes Digital

CTV Saskatoon is reporting that Adrian Paton has assembled over 8,000 photos showcasing the early years of the province’s history. And they are being scanned and are going online at Saskatchewan History and Folklore Society.

He says it started out as a genealogical project, but it didn’t take long for him to branch out to local history, and then instead of searching for photos, people started bringing them directly to him.

To read more about the story, go to http://saskatoon.ctvnews.ca/collection-of-8-000-photos-of-early-sask-goes-digital-1.1119222#ixzz2Ijtc1kep

The website of the Saskatchewan History & Folklore Society is http://shfs.ca

© Elizabeth Lapointe All Rights Reserved

Toys and Games in Canada

The Library and Archives Canada (LAC) sent out this notice yesterday about the history of toys in Canada, and pictures on their Flickr album -

"The joyful holiday season is the perfect time to introduce you to the Library and Archives Canada collection of photographs related to games and toys.

Although toys and games have existed since the dawn of time, it was only in the 19th century that the ‟toy” really came into its own in Canada. It was also during the Victorian era that toys and diversion were deemed beneficial to children, thereby kick-starting the mass production of playthings. At first, toys mainly came from England, Germany and the United States, but between 1860 and 1915, some 20 Canadian companies began to manufacture them as well. They were made of wood and generally mimicked miniature furniture, cars or horses.

The First World War slowed toy production in Europe, giving the Canadian toy industry the opportunity to flourish. New toys were produced, particularly battleships and construction sets. This is also when manufacturers started using a wider variety of materials, which resulted in copper, tin, iron, lead, and rubber toys. Plush dolls and animals, small lead soldiers, bugles and trumpets, rubber balls, hockey pucks and even humming tops could also be found.

In the 1940s, plastic was introduced in toy manufacturing; it was used to make rattles, beach toys, tractors, trucks and construction sets, as well as an array of tools. In subsequent years, large multinational companies emerged and completely diversified the toy-making industry".

Various outdoor games, such as croquet and lawn bowling have become popular. Children also enjoy games of strength, string, and chance, which are featured in our new Flickr album at www.flickr.com/photos/lac-bac/sets/72157631912501393

LAC is on Facebook

The Library and Archives Canada is on Facebook, and I read quite a few postings this morning, so that I could get a feeling of what the LAC has done with it.

They have a lot of pictures taken from their holding on the pages, and there were photos I have never seen before eg photos of Home Children, Danish Immigration, and you can read Sir Winston Churchill first speech to the House of Commons as prime minister on 13 May 1940.

They have 262 “likes” right now, and comments on the page, some of which are about the closing of interlibrary loan on December 11 – next Tuesday!

The Facebook page is on www.facebook.com/LibraryArchives