~ October 2009 ~  

MEETING DATES 2009

Meeting held 2nd Wednesday of the month at 10am in the Tebbutt Room, Windsor Library

INFORMATION

FIND MY PAST

Hawkesbury Library now has a subscription for members to Findmypast.com which is a family history and genealogy website, with an ever-growing collection of over 650 million family history records. This new technology will bring your family’s past to life and make the process of tracing your family history easier. To make a booking phone the library on 4560-4460. Findmypast.com offers:

• Records from each of the Victorian (1841-1901) censuses
• The Parish Records Collection, which features over 22 million parish baptisms, marriages and burials
• An extensive military records collection, which includes records from the First and Second World Wars, military births, marriages and deaths, army roll-calls, Waterloo records, and more
• Ancestoronboard.com  -  an exclusive collection of full-colour Passenger Lists for all long-haul voyages leaving the UK between 1890 - 1960
• Overseas births, marriages and deaths indexes
• An electoral roll search

SEARCH FACILITY

There is now a search facility on the Hawkesbury Family History Group newsletters page at http://www.hawkesbury.net.au/community/hfhg/newsletters.html  This means all the archived newsletters cane be searched. If you are looking for web address or information about a book or reunion, you can find it from this page.

NEW BOOK AVAILABLE

Rod and Wendy Gow have released their newest newspaper index book called "Hawkesbury Herald newspaper index 1902 - 1904"The index contains over 8,700 entries, and is available in either, A4 book format, or, on CD-ROM, at $35 each (postage free within Australia). You can check for further details are on their web site www.gownewspaperindexes.com.au  The Gow’s also supply print outs from any of the newspapeooks for $5 per article plus a Stamped Self Addressed Envelope. Rod & Wendy Gow, Gow Newspaper Indexes, 50 Ferry Lane, Cundletown 2430 NSW

WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE? AUSTRALIAN SERIES

Who Do You Think You Are? Australian Series 2 is currently showing on SBS on Sunday at 7.30pm. You can watch the previous episodes online if you have missed them by checking out the website at  www.sbs.com.au/shows/whodoyouthinkyouare/watchonline/page/i/1/show/whodoyouthinkyouare You can also read about the stories.  Who Do You Think You Are? Australian Series 1 is available on DVD to purchase, copies are also available to borrow from Hawkesbury Library for members.

NSW BDM TRANSCRIPTIONS

Pre-Christmas Sale now on for all orders with Marilyn Rowan & Transcriptions.com.au Orders received from now until the 10 December 2009 will receive 10% off!! Contact details PO Box 38 Menai Central 2234  T: (02) 9543 8156  E: marilynr@marbract.com.au  W: http://www.transcriptions.com.au/

PRONI

Public Record Office Northern Ireland (PRONI) will be moving and scheduled to open to the public in May/June 2011. In preparation twelve months notice is being given for a temporary change to service delivery between September 2010 and May 2011. To help alleviate the inconvenience to customers during a period of on-site closure the amount and range of material available on-line will be extended. This will include the Belfast Street Directories (pre-1901) going on-line in September 2009 which will make the contents of 27 street directories for Belfast and provincial towns available to a worldwide audience.  Additional databases scheduled for completion in 2009/10 financial year include 1766 Religious Census Returns, 1775 Dissenters Petitions and the pre-1910 Coroners’ Inquests. More information can be found on the PRONI website at www.proni.gov.uk

PORT MACQUARIE CEMETERIES

The Port Macquarie & Districts Family History Society Inc. have recently released a new cemetery CD. The group will also conduct a free Cemetery Surname Search Service. The new cemetery CD, contains over 24,480 cemetery records for all district cemeteries covering the period of 1821 to 2001 and beyond. To access the service, send an email listing just the surnames of interest to tdhanly@bigpond.com 

NEW LOCAL STUDIES ITEMS

New Local Studies items now available to consult in the Local Studies Collection at Hawkesbury Central Library. To check the Library catalogue online go to http://catalogue.hawkesbury.nsw.gov.au/amlibweb/

• William Baker, gentleman / Thomas Le Sueur & Lorrae Johnson shelved at RL994.20994 BAK
• Who do you think you are? : encyclopedia of genealogy : the definitive reference guide to tracing your family history / Nick Barratt / RL929.1072041 BAR
• Divorce in 19th century New South Wales / Hilary Golder shelved at RL306.8909944 GOL
• Mountain memories : Tales from Bowen Mountain / J. Neil Hartley shelved at RL919.442 HAR
• Getting the most out of RootsMagic / Bruce Buzbee shelved at RL929.10285 BUZ
• Getting the most from Family Historian / shelved at RL929.10285 GET

Surfing the internet……. Sites for family historians

Members with internet access should check out the following interesting sites. The Library has free access to the internet, contact 4560 4460 for bookings at Windsor & 4578 2002 for Richmond bookings.

Sydney Benevolent Asylum ~ http://www.sydneybenevolentasylum.com/

Government schools of NSW from 1848 (Database , photos and historical information about education) ~ http://www.governmentschools.det.nsw.edu.au/cli/govt_schools/index.shtm

Britain unlimited ~ biographies on famous people i.e. William Wilberforce, Captain Cook & William Pitt. ~ http://www.britainunlimited.com/index.htm

National Library of Scotland ~ http://www.nls.uk/

Scotland written history and Timelines ~ http://www.nls.uk/scotlandspages/index.html 
 
Surname profiler ~ http://www.nationaltrustnames.org.uk/default.aspx

Cheshirebmd (Cheshire births, deaths & marriages) ~ http://www.cheshirebmd.org.uk/

~ Let us know of sites, that you have tried with (or without) success ~