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Saturday, February 28, 2009

Facebook Connect Site Directory

Facebook Connect Site Directory

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There are two family history applications in the Top 5 Facebook Connect Sites sorted by Monthly Active Users. This stat demonstrates how many people have an interest in their origins and relations.

Old Bailey Wiki

From the Old Bailey Online

"An Old Bailey user wiki has been launched, allowing users to contribute information on people mentioned in the Proceedings, historical background, related source materials, and corrections. The wiki also includes the bibliography and schools pages."

Now I have another task - I will add information about my ancestors who were tried and sentenced at The Old Bailey to the wiki.

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

I haven't read as many titles as Carole

BBC Book List - how many have you read?

Noticed this on Carole's Canvas and, as a reader, just had to take part.
Apparently the BBC reckons most people will have only read 6 of the 100 books here.
How many did you read, and which ones?
Instructions:
  • Look at the list and put an ‘x’ after those you have read.
  • Add a ‘+’ to the ones you LOVE.
  • Star (*) those you plan on reading.
  • Put ? on the ones you’ve never heard of.
  • Tally your total at the bottom.
  1. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen X
  2. The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
  3. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte X
  4. Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
  5. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee X
  6. The Bible
  7. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte X
  8. Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell X
  9. His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
  10. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens X
  11. Little Women - Louisa M Alcott X
  12. Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
  13. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
  14. Complete Works of Shakespeare
  15. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier X
  16. The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien X
  17. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks X
  18. Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
  19. The Time Traveller’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger ?
  20. Middlemarch - George Eliot
  21. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
  22. The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald X
  23. Bleak House - Charles Dickens
  24. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
  25. The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy X
  26. Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh X
  27. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
  28. Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
  29. Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll X
  30. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame X
  31. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
  32. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens X
  33. Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis X
  34. Emma - Jane Austen X
  35. Persuasion - Jane Austen
  36. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis X
  37. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini X+++
  38. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
  39. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden X+
  40. Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne X
  41. Animal Farm - George Orwell X
  42. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown X
  43. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
  44. A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
  45. The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
  46. Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery X
  47. Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
  48. The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
  49. Lord of the Flies - William Golding
  50. Atonement - Ian McEwan
  51. Life of Pi - Yann Martel
  52. Dune - Frank Herbert
  53. Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
  54. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen X
  55. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
  56. The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon ?
  57. A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens X
  58. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
  59. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon X+++
  60. Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
  61. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
  62. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
  63. The Secret History - Donna Tartt X
  64. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
  65. Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
  66. On The Road - Jack Kerouac
  67. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
  68. Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding X
  69. Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
  70. Moby Dick - Herman Melville
  71. Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens X
  72. Dracula - Bram Stoker
  73. The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett X
  74. Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson X+
  75. Ulysses - James Joyce
  76. The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
  77. Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome X
  78. Germinal - Emile Zola ?
  79. Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
  80. Possession - AS Byatt
  81. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens X+
  82. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell ?
  83. The Color Purple - Alice Walker X +
  84. The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
  85. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
  86. A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry ?
  87. Charlotte’s Web - EB White X
  88. The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Alborn X+
  89. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle X
  90. The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton X
  91. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
  92. The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery X
  93. The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks ?
  94. Watership Down - Richard Adams X
  95. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole ?
  96. A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute X
  97. The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
  98. Hamlet - William Shakespeare X
  99. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl X
  100. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo
Geniaus’ total read = 44

Friday, February 20, 2009

Internet access for travelling genealogists


When you're out in the field and need to connect to the internet there are not many spots in Australia where one can get free WiFi internet access.

I have just noticed that Maccas (aka McDonalds) are rolling out free WiFi at a rate of 8 stores a day. So far 568 McDonald’s restaurants offer free wi-fi with estimated completion date of mid March. The final number of stores will be 710, making McDonald’s the largest provider of Free WiFi Internet Access in Australia.

To locate a store go to their McDonald's Australia Restaurant WiFi Locator.

I note that my local McDonalds at Dural is already connected so I can pack my netbook and do some surfing when I take the grandkids there for a treat.

10 Privacy Settings Every Facebook User Should Know

10 Privacy Settings Every Facebook User Should Know

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In the light of recent activities with Facebook's Terms of Service this post is pertinent reading for Facebook members.

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Bega Genealogists - Share your Memories


On its website, Bega Council has a wonderful page called My Place where members of the community are invited to share their memories. "We would love to include your memories of a house, street, farm, locality, village, town, park, beach or monument within the Bega Valley Shire on my place...

Your memories may be from long ago or from a few months ago. There is no time limit."


Amongst the stories published are a number from notable Australian Children's Author "Di Bates".

Genealogists with links to the Bega area, here is a place where you can record stories of your families.

Friday, February 13, 2009

Queensland Resource

From Queensland Archives

"The Index to Register of Immigrants 1864-1878 is now available on the Queensland State Archives website. This index was compiled from Series ID 7454 , a register of immigrants created by the Assistant Immigration Agent, Toowoomba. This register contains details of applications for passage certificates for immigration, registered in Toowoomba. The date, name and age of immigrant, trade, where living (country of origin), amount paid, name of depositor and relevant remarks as to where living in the district are included in the details."

Genealogy Online Course

Genealogy Online

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The next Australian and New Zealand Genealogy course commences in March. For registration in this online course go here.

Thursday, February 12, 2009

Rootsweb TV - Australian Interview

Thank you Dick Eastman for highlighting this video which is an interview with Brad Argent from http://ancestry.com.au.

I have had a subscription with http://ancestry.co.uk for a number of years and am interested in comparing the resources available in these products and seeing what is available in the Australian edition.

Wednesday, February 11, 2009

Bushfire Emergency - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Bushfire Emergency - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

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Our national broadcaster, the ABC, has a wealth of current and archived news on the devastating fires that have ravaged Victoria over the past few days. The sobering news on this site lacks the sensationalist bias of some other media organistions.

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Costume - Smile for the Camera


My grandfather, Frank Duncan, fought with the allied forces in World War 1. He was a long way from his home in Cobar when he had this photograph taken in his distinctive Australian slouch hat at The American Galleries in Lime Street, Liverpool, England.

Frank's war record can be found here at The National Archives of Australia.

This post has been prepared for The 10th Edition Smile For The Camera - A Carnival Of Images

Tips for Online Safety

Tips for Online Safety

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Today is Safer Internet Day. Google, as a partner in this event, has published this page of tips for users.

Genealogists- show your love for libraries

Let the staff of the libraries you visit know of your affection for their institutions on Library Lovers' Day - 14th February.

The campaign is a combined advocacy event organised by the Australian Library and Information Association (ALIA) and Public Libraries Australia (PLA).

I have noticed that Sutherland Shire Library, Mosman Library and The Blue Mountains Library are organising events to celebrate the occasion, if your library is not hosting an event you could still pop in and spread your love.

Monday, February 9, 2009

New Archives in Brief 116

Researching your house and property

Useful guide for those researching the history of a house or property in NSW.

National Archives of Australia - Memento

National Archives of Australia - Memento

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Wonderful free online journal from the National Archives of Australia

Friday, February 6, 2009

9th July 2004

This post is prepared for Genea Bloggers Weekly Genealogy Prompt Week #5: Talk about your genealogy adventures while on vacation. Doesn’t everyone plan a little genealogy visit during vacation? Take your readers along for the ride.

From my diary on 9th July 2004: "Big find of the afternoon was the death of Robert's 5xgrandmother Janet Sibbald."


We had paid a visit to East Lothian Local History Centre in the town of Haddington, Scotland "where the staff, who work in the most incredibly basic conditions, were hugely helpful." It was here that we found an obituary for the death of Janet Gowans nee Sibbald who died on 24 February 1814. We were thrilled to find that she was interred in a local church, St. Mary's, Haddington so we set off in search of the grave. The staff at the Local History Centre were very professional in their approach and tuned in to our needs; they went out of their way to make our visit the success that it was.


"We cannot find the Gowans grave, but meet a helpful old Scot, Ewan, who is indexing the historic cemetery. He gives us his 'phone number and promises to look in his records at home to see if he has any info for us." After returning from dinner to our hotel in Edinburgh that evening we gave Ewan a call. "We are given the news that we were very close to Janet's grave this afternoon and that there are five other persons in the grave including Robert's 5xgrandfather John Gowans." The next morning we returned to St. Mary's and took a number of photos of the grave and graveyard.


Ewan's act of kindness created one of the highlight's of our family history trip to Scotland. It is pleasing to see that the results of Ewan's work are published on the church website.


The information on the Gowans headstone gave us many leads for further research. We now need another trip to Scotland to follow them up!

Thursday, February 5, 2009

Announcing the Article Search API - Open Blog - NYTimes.com

Announcing the Article Search API - Open Blog - NYTimes.com

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Wow! There will be some gems for genealogists in this new article search of over 2.8 million New york Times articles from 1981–today

Read Alert » Blog Archive » Hail, fellow!

Read Alert » Blog Archive » Hail, fellow!

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Genealogists in Victoria could apply for the La Trobe Society Fellowship – One six-month Fellowship for a historian, with a grant of $25,000.

Wednesday, February 4, 2009

Skype 4.0 Promises Improved Call Quality; Will It Deliver?

Skype 4.0 Promises Improved Call Quality; Will It Deliver?

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As a skyping genealogist I look forward to this upgrade that promises to conserve some of my bandwidth.

Monday, February 2, 2009