GeneaNet

I just came across this amazing website:

Created by the Institute of Historical Research and the History of Parliament Trust, British History Online is a digital library containing some of the core printed primary and secondary sources for the medieval and modern history of the British Isles.

A lot of free resources and a full-text search of all the sources in the website!

ProQuest will provide free, open access during National Library Week to three of its most popular student resources—CultureGrams®, eLibrary®, and SIRS Discoverer®. These online resources connect learners of all ages to media-rich content that helps with homework, course study, and research.

From Monday, April 13 through Friday April 17 CultureGrams®, eLibrary®, and SIRS Discoverer® will be freely available at www.proquestk12.com/go/celebrate. CultureGrams®offers concise, reliable, and up-to-date country reports on the cultures of the world—from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe. eLibrary® delivers high-quality, high-interest, and highly usable full-text and multimedia content—all via an engaging, contemporary interface. SIRS Discoverer® connects users to a wide range of topics, articles, graphics, and websites editorially selected from more than 1,900 sources worldwide.

Source & Information

Seventy years after the outbreak of World War II, Poland will launch a database of some 2 million victims of the fighting, the daily Polska reported on Thursday.

The database will be available in the next several days on straty.pl, and will include the location and circumstances of the victims' death. Families or loved ones will have the option to add to the list of victims.

Officials hope that the database will grow to 4 million names within a year or two.

'Launching such a database is a big event,' historian Wojciech Roszkowski told the daily. 'Up until now, researchers trying to determine the number of victims always hit a wall. They weren't able to determine in various places how many were really died.'

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OldAerialPhotos.com is an unsurpassed collection of information about old aerial photographs of the UK, from the 40's to the 90's. Our aim is to offer you the ability to search through hundreds of thousands of aerial photos, both vertical and oblique, at the click of a button, and to then select and purchase photos of your choice. You can select either a print or a digital scan.

Our team of experts has collated the photography held on the site from many independent and historic archives, and for the first time you are able to view the exact positions of these photos and see what area they cover on a map. Please note that currently only vertical aerial photographs are offered on the website. Oblique photographs are coming soon.

List of the 25 Most Popular Genealogy Blogs as of April 3, 2009, determined by Technorati.

1. About.com Genealogy (Kimberly Powell) 
2. Eastman Online Newsletter* (Dick Eastman)
3. Genea-Musings (Randy Seaver) 
4. Creative Gene (Jasia) 
5. Dear Myrtle (Pat Richely) 
6. AnceStories (Miriam Midkiff) 
7. Genealogue (Chris Dunham)
8. footnoteMaven (Anonymous) 
9. Genetic Genealogist (Blaine Bettinger) 
10. Tracing The Tribe: Jewish Genealogy Blog (Schelly Talalay Dardashti) 
11. GenaBlogie (Craig Manson) 
12. Olive Tree Genealogy Blog (Lorine McGinnis Schulze) 
13. Steve’s Genealogy Blog (Stephen J. Danko) 
14. 24-7 Family History Circle (Juliana Smith)
15. TransylvanianDutch (John Newmark) 
16. GenDisasters (Stu Beitler) 
17. Genealogy Insider @ FamilyTree (Diane Hadd) 
18. Think Genealogy (Mark Tucker) 
19. California Genealogical Society and Library Blog (California Genealogical Society) 
20. The Genealogy Guys (George G. Morgan and Drew Smith) 
21. CanadaGenealogy, or, 'Jane's Your Aunt' (Diane Rogers) 
22. Ancestry Insider (Anonymous) 
23. GenealogyBlog (Leland Meitzler) 
24. Ancestor Search Blog (Kathi) 
25. Tie Hugh Watkins Genealogue (Hugh Watkins) - It's a tie
26.  Legacy News (Legacy Tree Software) - It's a tie

Geneally.com is a new dedicated genealogy and family search engine, built from the ground up to create a useful resource for anyone researching their ancestry.

Hundreds of new links are added each day. If you run a genealogy-related website, do contact us and we'll do our best to add the details of your site to our database.

In November 2008 Geneally acquired the former genealogy news site www.rssgenealogy.com, making Geneally.com the best starting point for all matters of interest to family historians.

Glasnevin Cemetery group hold records for five Dublin cemeteries, some open to the public and others now closed. Select records on interments are now available to certified genealogists and will be available to the general public for online search starting on April 8, 2009. Included will be records for Goldenbridge Cemetery on Dublin 8, Dublin’s first Catholic cemetery. The initial records becoming available will date back until 1890; however, the project will be ongoing until all records are added. Glasnevin Cemetery opened in 1832, and Goldenbridge opened in 1829. The other three cemeteries managed by this group are: Dordistown, Newlands Cross and Palmerstown.

For details please visit: http://www.funeralbooking.com/genealogy/

Thanks to Deborah Nilles - dnilles@key2chicago.com

While still considered a strange destination on holiday, a growing number of people are seeking out cemeteries to visit. There is an inherent fascination in cemeteries that should be embraced. Whether you are interested in the architecture or artwork of the tombs, the history of the area, or simply seeking out the final resting place of a favorite personality, cemeteries are a worthwhile destination.

The List Universe list a by-no-means definitive list of some of the most famous cemeteries in the world.

The Internet Archive organization plans next week to announce the opening of a new data center to house two petabytes of information for its Wayback Machine, the digital time capsule that stores archived versions of Web pages dating back to 1996.

The Wayback Machine houses 85 billion Web pages archived for more than a dozen years, which amounts to three petabytes of data, or about 150 times the content of the Library of Congress. Only five years ago, the Wayback Machine contained about 30 billion Web pages. It is expected to continue to grow by 100TB of data per month now that it's live.

The Internet Archive's massive database is mirrored to the Bibliotheca Alexandrina, the new Library of Alexandria in Egypt, for disaster recovery purposes.

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A new web site, IrishCentral.com, has arrived offering Irish-American news and entertainment.

Niall O'Dowd, the New York-based Irish publisher is behind the site, which includes genealogy information, top tourist spots in Ireland as well as breaking news and features. Its target audience is the Irish diaspora, which numbers 36.5 million in the United States, more than eight times the population of Ireland.

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Usenet Newsgroups Provider NewsDemon.com now provides access to an extensive collection of newsgroups related to the topic of genealogy, making genealogy research with Usenet easier. This allows researchers to take advantage of extensive research conducted by the newsgroup community going back to 1995.

In order to access these newsgroups, it's required to have access to Usenet. NewsDemon provides a free public server for this purpose. Just use the nntp address, login, and password found here.

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Cedar City is creating an interactive cemetery online thanks to an Eagle Scout project by Cedar City resident Curtis Weber, 18.

Cedar City Engineer Troy Maxwell has been assisting Weber with the project.

"He was trying to put together a database where people could look it up," Maxwell said. "I said I could incorporate it to where they have a picture of where the plots are located."

Maxwell said that although the interactive cemetery is being worked on, people can still look online at what has been done so far online.

For more information, go to www.cedarcity.org/index.asp?nid=116 and click on the "cemetery interactive map" link.

Source & Full Story

FamilyHistoryOnline will close on Monday 2nd March 2009 and the data will be transfered to FindMyPast.com.

The Federation of Family History Societies and its services company will not be able to invest sufficient time and money in the considerable resources that would be necessary to enable FamilyHistoryOnline to continue as a viable alternative to other commercial sites.

The hosting of FamilyHistoryOnline by findmypast.com is providing greater access to this valuable information and bringing the data to a wider audience worldwide. It will also produce greater returns to the family history societies who own this data, and they will be able to use this income to support their educational, project and other work.

An online partnership between the Federation of Family History Societies and findmypast.com was announced in a press release on 1st September 2007.

Read more at http://www.familyhistoryonline.net/general/fmpfaq.shtml.

The National Archives of Scotland (NAS) launched The Scottish Register of Tartans to promote and preserve information about registered tartans. The Register, which will be maintained by the NAS, will provide a focal point for tartan, its design and production and for genealogical research.

Tartan, known throughout the world as a national symbol of Scotland, has now been officially recognised by the Parliament in Edinburgh. It has taken six years to complete the legislation establishing the Register with The Scottish Register of Tartan Act receiving Royal Assent in November 2008.

The Register will provide users with the opportunity to search its database for tartans already recorded and will also provide a registration service for recording new tartans. The Scottish Register of Tartans Act specifies the criteria which new tartans will be required to meet, and these official vetting procedures will promote and protect the status of registered tartans.

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