Workshop November 12

Maureen provided a basic introduction to Fold3, a subscription-based military website which is now owned by Ancestry. You can visit the site to learn which records are free (Maureen provided a list on her handout), or register for a free seven-day trial, or use it via Ancestry's Library edition at Vista Grande Library or gain access at the local Family History Center. Fold3 is also included in Ancestry's All Access subscription.

Service records, pension records, draft registrations and military cemeteries are some of the records included on the site. There are some non-military records, but most of them are accessible on other websites.

You can search the site by country, military conflict, branch of service, time period and/or name. You can also browse "publications," Fold3's term for their record collections. Searching is not necessarily intuitive, but be persistent.

Thanks, Maureen!

Fold3

Our topic for this week's workshop is the subscription site Fold3. Many pay sites offer free access at different times of the year, and Fold3 is opening its World War I and World War II records to the public until midnight, November 11 supporting Veteran's Day.

Take advantage while you can, and learn more about it from Maureen Tuesday night.

November 5 Welcome Back!

We began the 2024-2025 season with a look at several of the search options on FamilySearch. We viewed records, images, catalog and research wiki under the search tab. Following the presentation, Annie demonstrated tips for using each of those selections on the website.

Records can be found by Searching Historical Records, Finding Collections and Searching by Place. Use surname searches and filter by types of records beginning with census and moving on to vital records. In Collections and Place areas it's a good idea to begin with a location and then narrow your choices.

Images are digitized but unindexed records. It's helpful to begin with a location here. Using England and then Devon brought up 7,000 results, but we could then narrow to a specific village in Devon before searching the microfilm pages.

Catalog items should also be searched by location. Under Lowestoft, Suffolk, England we found records for individual churches and searched the actual microfilm. Many of the catalog items have an index.

The research wiki is a vital part of the FamilySearch website. You can find information about most locations even at the county or village level. Each page will have a tab to access online genealogy records for that place.

November News

We will begin workshops on Tuesday, November 5 with a review session on FamilySearch. Other topics for the month include Fold3, Tombstone Care and a special genealogy roundtable. There will be time each week for assistance with genealogy research. Be sure to bring your computers or other devices.

Vista Grande Library has changed the date of their genealogy classes to the first Monday of each month. Annie will present "County Histories" on November 4 at 10 AM. Join us if you haven't heard this topic--or if you'd like to listen again.

Heads up! Next February we will have a class called "Taking Care of Family Heirlooms." A roundtable is scheduled for the week following where members can share or describe one of their family treasures. Bring something with you this year!

Vista Grande October Class

If you've returned to Casa Grande, you might want to take advantage of the first class of the season at Vista Grande Library. "Diseases Our Ancestors Faced" is the title of the presentation which begins at 10 AM, Monday, October 7.

Family History Month

October is Family History Month.

It's time to organize your family history materials for the coming season. We are looking forward to some interesting topics. We are waiting for notification from Activities regarding our room assignment and will begin scheduling speakers soon.

Library Genealogy Classes

Vista Grande Library has announced the topics for genealogy classes scheduled for the coming season. Sessions will be held at 10 AM the first Monday of each month from October through April. Mark your calendars! 

2024

October 7 - Diseases Our Ancestors Faced

November 4 - County Histories

December 2 - Reminiscing, Reunions and Recipes

2025

January 6 -Writing Your Ancestor's History

February 3 - FamilySearch Search Tab

March 3 - FamilySearch Wiki

April 7 - Newspaper Research

Canadian Newspapers

The Internet Archive and Library and Archives Canada have announced a partnership to bring online 100,000+ out-of-copyright publications. Below is part of the announcement from Internet Archive Canada. Note there is no date for completion.

As part of this project, six digitization workstations, known as Scribes, have been installed at LAC’s Collections Storage facility in Gatineau. This digitization centre (staffed by six operators) will play a pivotal role in digitizing a vast collection of up to 100,000 out-of-copyright publications from the 1200s to 1920. The materials will be made freely accessible online to researchers, historians, scholars, individuals with print disabilities, and the general public, in line with IAC’s and LAC’s commitment to expanding digital collections of Canadian content.