The road rises up

As National Family History Month in Australia comes to an end for 2015, here's a wrap up of events held at Noosaville Library.

The program kicked off with a session to guide participants through the process of researching a WWI soldier or nurse, including finding military records, cemetery and battle information.

Particular reference was made to the local Adopt a Digger program which focuses on researching WW1 Diggers and Nurses from the local Sunshine Coast region of Queensland. Attendees benefited from the in depth knowledge of Jane the local heritage librarian and Bob, family history volunteer guru.

The second session was designed to introduce the audience to a wide range family history sites available on the Internet with emphasis on free sites, the major pay sites, portal and gateway sites, archives, libraries, newspapers and so much more. During this 3 hour session various search strategies were demonstrated. Needless to say such depth of material can only be a taster of available online records but for many participants this was their first exposure to a wide range of search techniques and resources previously unknown.

Week 3 brought out the genealogy equivalent of brick walls, not always solid and can often be knocked down with the right tools and approach. Bob detailed the "nitty gritty" of

• gathering information
• understanding the data
• using the laws of probability and averages
• examining the people found
• searching many sources with a range of strategies. 

He then illustrated in three case studies how he systematically searched for clues, families, connections, and approached problems from diverse directions to obtain results.

Today's session on Irish Family History is embedded below with links to a range of sites that Bob and I have both found to be useful. Seven of my great grandparents came to Australia from Ireland, possibly even the eighth, as yet unconfirmed. Many of my husband's ancestors are also Irish.

So at the end of NFHM2015:

May the road rise up to meet you,
May the records suddenly appear,
May the lost ancestor find you,
and appreciate your care. - Carmel Galvin, 2015

 This post first appeared on http://librarycurrants.blogspot.com 26th August 2015

Power searching videos

Learn from an expert

The ability to search the internet effectively is a skill everyone needs. There are many online courses and sites to help but why not learn from the experts at Google? If you missed the Power Searching courses presented by Dan Russell, he has now posted all the videos used in the lessons online. Each video is only a few minutes long but by viewing them sequentially one can gain a better understanding of how search works and how to become a more effective searcher.
Learning how to search Google effectively eliminates many frustrations for those not finding their desired results.

Dan has listed all the videos here: 
http://searchresearch1.blogspot.com.au/2015/08/video-content-from-powersearchingwithgo.html
Alternatively you can search for PSWG3 which will find the YouTube channel but I do recommend that you watch them in lesson number sequence to get the best result for your efforts.

Here's the first video to get you started.

One of my favourite search techniques is to use the site operator to search within a site. Dan teaches this technique in Lesson 3 1. Happy viewing and learning!

This post first appeared on http://librarycurrants.blogspot.com/2015/08/power-searching-videos.html

A June jaunt

A rainy winter morning was not enough to prevent an early start to Brisbane to attend Ireland to Australia: Searching for Ancestors seminar hosted by the Queensland Family History Society. After a trouble free drive of one and a half hours we arrived at Gaythorne in time to collect handouts and enjoy a morning concentrating on our Irish forebears.

First up was Mary King, the convenor of the QFHS Irish interest group. Her presentation Learning to think Irish in a new way focussed on a wide range of available resources. Her formidable knowledge of extant resources was accompanied by a handout of the slides, nine to a page which I shall peruse with magnifying glass in hand. She certainly managed to convince me to keep looking for a variety of alternatives.

A timely morning tea gave us a chance to enjoy a quick cuppa before Dr. Richard Reid's talks. 

His first presentation The great tide of emigration: 19th century Irish emigration to Australia focussed on the journey with illustrations of the parting of the ways and reflections on the journey actually undertaken by ancestors. His book Farewell my children provides more details on this story. The complete statistics used in his research are available online in the manuscript through ANU digital publications.

The second talk There is no person starving here: Australia and the Great Famine in Ireland, 1845-1850 focussed on the conditions during the famine.

Richard's excellent presentations used a variety of illustrations from the National Library of Ireland Lawrence collection which can be filtered by county, town, subject and photographer. Another excellent source for information and images mentioned is the Illustrated London News which is available free through eresources with a National Library of Australia reader's card. It is easy to forget about the rich variety of resources freely available via the NLA and our State Libraries.

Reference to the poorhouses, the tumbling of cottier's accommodation and the conditions of the time were well documented and illustrated with references from the "Freeman's Journal" which is also available through the British Newspaper collection of the NLA's eresources.

The value of attending seminars and other educational opportunities can never be underestimated. Thanks to both speakers I have some new leads to follow and at Richard's exhortation will read another account of Irish history. The recommended title was The sharing of the green: a modern Irish history for Australians by Oliver MacDonagh.

To wrap up our June jaunt, my friend and I had lunch at the lovely Eden Gardens at Carseldine before the afternoon drive home.

This post first appeared on http://librarycurrants.blogspot.com/2015/06/a-june-jaunt.html