Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Launch of "Census of Canada, 1871"

The LAC has just released a press release this afternoon -

"Ottawa, August 30, 2011— The 1871 census marked the first regularly scheduled collection of national statistics, and Library and Archives Canada is now pleased to make its results available online. Researchers can access digitized images of original census returns featuring the name, age, country or province of birth, nationality, religion, and occupation of Canada's residents at the time.

The information covers the four provinces that were part of the Dominion of Canada in 1871: New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Ontario and Quebec.

Access to the digitized images of the 1871 census is available online in two different ways:

Through a database that is searchable by nominal information such as Name, Given Name (s) and Age, and/or geographical information such as Province, District Name, District Number, and Sub-district Number.

The database is available at: http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/databases/census-1871/index-e.html

Through the "microform digitization” research tool, you can browse the microfilm reels page by page.

The tool is available at: http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/microform-digitization/006003-110.02-e.php?&q2=26&interval=30&sk=0&&PHPSESSID=f0v3thhcgqvau3vslaruumn2a7
For more information, please contact webservices@lac-bac.gc.ca.

Free Access – Immigration to the US

Yesterday, I had the post about "Free Access - Immigration from the UK", today there is more news, and it is free access (August 29th to September 5th)to "Immigration to the US". One of the areas to check is the “Border Crossings: From Canada to U.S., 1895-1956”.

I spent the morning working on my grandfather Lester John BLADES from Barrington Passage, Nova Scotia. There were at least 17 trips he made to New York from 1925 to 1935. While in New York, he worked on yachts that travelled around the world, and while in Boston, he worked in factories.

Do you have Canadian ancestors who went to the States looking for work, or ancestors going on vacation to visit their relatives?

If you do, using Ancestry.com until Sept 5 is an excellent way to discover the trips they made from 1895 to 1956.

The website is at
http://www.ancestry.com/immigration?cj=1&o_xid=0004887102&o_lid=0004887102

Call for Papers

The Toronto Branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society have issued a call for speakers to take part in a one-day Branch workshop on Finding Your Great War Ancestors, to be held in Toronto on 31 March 2012. It will be co-hosted by the Canadiana Department of North York Central Library.

To read about the Call for Papers, please go to http://www.torontofamilyhistory.org/GreatWarCall_2012.html

The deadline for proposals is 18 September 2011

To submit your proposal, please contact the workshop coordinator, Paul Jones, at announcements@torontofamilyhistory.org

Monday, August 29, 2011

Free Access – Immigration Records

A reader of the blog wrote to me yesterday to tell me that the British arm of Ancestry.com is offering free access to immigration records from today up until the 5th September.

You can search and view all of the immigration records for free.

I will be checking my Barclay, and Hitchens names to see if there is anything new.

Thank you Craig for passing along the word.

If you want to check them out, they are at http://www.ancestry.co.uk/immigration?o_iid=48750&o_lid=48750&o_sch=Inbound&AID=10402952&PID=1793701

New Blog – AFGS Acadian Heritage News

The tag line is “Focus of this blog is to provide news and information regarding Acadian Heritage”.

It is a Heritage Blog by the American-French Genealogical Society, and although it is not strictly a Canadian blog, it is about the Acadians – and there are genealogical societies on both sides of the border, so the blog caught my eye over the weekend as something I would like to read..

One of the blogs is “As tough as her ancestors” which the blogger tells about the being interviewed by his niece about what it is like being Acadian, and shows pictures of her exhibit and video of the process – very interesting! The exhibit “Nova Scotia - Acadian”

Another blog was the 34th Annual Acadian Festival which was held at
Madawaska, Maine on August 11th, and a visit to the The Acadian Historic Village – Caraquet, NB.

The blog is at http://afgs-acadian-heritage-news.blogspot.com/

Saturday, August 27, 2011

London Leaf Newsletter

The August London-Middlesex Newletter August 2011 edition is out, and this edition is all about lists of names.

It contains articles such as “Women Who Were Entitled To Vote In London For The First Time” contains over 400 names of local women in 1885; a list of 80 Glencoe And Wardsville High School Entrans 1900, and a list of the people who offered their help to the inhabitants who were living in Michigan and were affected by the fire of 1881 under the title of Strathroy Request for Help – 1881.

The London-Middlesex County Branch will meet on September 6th at 7:30 pm at the Westmounth Branch of the London Public Library, 3200 Wonderland Road, in which Dennis Mulligan will talk about “Don't Believe Everything You Read: Research Using Internet and Other Sources”.

Their website is http://www.londonmiddlesex.ogs.on.ca

Oxford County Library Databases & Indexes

I came across a webpage in the Oxford County Library, Ontario the other day, and there is a huge amount of genealogy for those who have ancestor's in the county.

For example, they have -

Newspaper Indexes of the Ingersoll Chronicle (birth, death and marriage index), and also of the Ingersoll Tribune.

Oxford County Genealogy Records (1793 - 1858)

Cemetery Records of the Index of Ingersoll and Area Cemeteries, and some headstone photos

Land Records of Oxford County Land Patents (1798-1852)

Local History Books & Indexes including -

Index to History of North Oxford Township 1867-1967
Index to Ingersoll: Our Heritage by Henry W. Whitwell
Index to The Axe and the Wheel: a history of West Oxford Township, 1790-1974
Index to With Mortar and Pine: a collection of the architectural heritage in the Township of Norwich
Autobiography of Thomas Brush Brown, 1804-1893 : a pioneer of East Nissouri Township
From the Roaring 20s to Y2K by Elsie McSpadden
Zorra Boys at Home and Abroad or How to Succeed by William Alexander McKay
Pioneer Life in Zorra by William Alexander McKay
Musings on the Banks of Canadian Thames by James McIntyre
Zorra by William M. Campbell
Souvenir Manual of the Embro Congregational Church

Directories, Gazetteers & Voters' Lists -

1852 Oxford Gazetteer by Thomas S. Shenston
1857-58 Directory of Oxford
1871 Gazetteer of Oxford County : Ingersoll (11 MB)
1877 Town of Ingersoll Voters' List NEW
1883 Town of Ingersoll Voters' List NEW
1894-95 Town of Ingersoll Directory
1908 Union Publishing Company's Directory of the Town of Ingersoll(12 MB)
1911 Town of Ingersoll Directory NEW
1927 Town of Ingersoll Telephone Directory NEW

History of the Town of Ingersoll including -

Town of Ingersoll Historical Photo Gallery
Industrial Ingersoll Illustrated, February 1907
Industries of Canada : Ingersoll, 1887
Ingersoll in the Eighteen Seventies : excerpts from the Ingersoll Tribune
Index to Ingersoll: Our Heritage by Henry W. Whitwell
The Ingersolls of Hampshire in the line of John Ingersoll of Westfield, Massachusetts by Charles Stedman Ripley
History of the Town of Ingersoll by James Sinclair, 1924
1947 Ingersoll Fall Fair Souvenir Program

The amount of information here is astounding!

If you wish to read some of these histories, directories, newspapers go to http://www.ocl.net/genealogy/.