Blog
How to Make the Trip to Your Ancestor’s Homeland in Genealogy Gems Episode 115 8/8/11
When my husband Bill and I travelled to England earlier this year, I was as excited about visiting the old stomping grounds of his ancestors as I was about speaking at the Who Do You You think You Are? LIVE event.You can listen right from here, or download the podcast for free in iTunes. (Need more info on how to use the free iTunes media player. I’ve got answers for you here)
Real Life Horror Connection to Family History 7/23/11
Old newspapers are a treasure trove of genealogy gems for the family historian. The Chronicling America free online newspaper collection is one I turn to regularly. Today I unearthed a 100 year old article that provided insight into one of my ancestors person passions.
My family history research has revealed that my Grandma Burkett adored the “picture shows.” She meticulously documented all the moving pictures she went to see starting back in the Silent Film era. Those pages outlining her visits to the now historic California Theater led me to give silent films a whirl and now I’m hooked!
100 years ago today on July 23, 1911 the New York Tribune ran a full page feature declaring “Sometimes It’s a Real Horror That the Film Presents for Your Gaze.” After reading this article I’ll be taking a much closer look at the expressions that cross the faces of the silent stars as they race across the screen.
New Mexico, Tennessee, and Vermont are now included with 22 other states and the District of Columbia in Chronicling America’s almost 4 million pages of historic newspaper pages, published between 1836 and 1922.Update: 1940 Census Enumeration District Maps Now Available 7/21/11
Hot off the press and on the heels of my post yesterday, Steve Morse and Joel Weintraub announce an update on the 1940 census:
PRESS RELEASE
The National Archives (NARA) has recently uploaded the 1940 Enumeration District (ED) maps to their website. These ED maps will be very useful for searching rural and small urban areas.
The maps can be located using NARA’s Archival Research Catalog (ARC) at http://arcweb.archives.gov/arc/action/BasicSearchForm . The ARC search form isn’t the easiest to use, so Steve Morse has produced a simpler search form for rapidly getting to these maps. The new utility entitled: “Viewing 1940 ED Maps in One Step” is at http://www.stevemorse.org/census/arc1940edmaps.html
We have revised our tutorial/quiz at http://stevemorse.org/census/quiz.php to reflect this new locational resource for the upcoming 1940 census.
