Reminder: Genealogy à la carte blog has moved

This blog, Genealogy à la carte, moved to a new location July 1 where I continue to post genealogy news stories every day.

If you haven’t visited the new digs, you’ve missed the weekly Crème de la crème of genealogy blog posts and a survey about why people join genealogical societies. Other popular posts in July include the first families of New Brunswick, new French Canadian resources, a story about two societies who created a unique fundraiser, and the three-part series about summer reading for genealogists.

So, how about dropping by?

www.genealogyalacarte.ca

We’ve moved!

It’s July 1st and this blog has moved!

We are now at a new, simpler address: www.genealogyalacarte.ca

We have moved all the blog posts to the new digs, and the genealogy news format and look remains the same. Only the address has changed. So, click on the above website address and join me at the new location where I will explain why it was à propos to move today.

 

Got a couple of minutes to celebrate Canada Day?

Canada Day, or any day such as today, is a good time to watch two of Historica Canada’s Heritage Minutes about Sir John A. Macdonald at the Charlottetown Conference in 1864, which launched Confederation, and about Sir George-Étienne Cartier’s incredible contributions to bringing our country together.

Support wanted for Montreal Irish Memorial Park

A new group, the Montreal Irish Memorial Park Foundation, asks for support to create a new park at the Black Rock. The park would provide green space and honour the immigrants who died of typhus in 1847-48, and those who helped them.

Irish Commemorate Stone, the Black Rock. Montreal. Photographer: André Pichette. Montreal Gazette.

The Black Rock, also known as the Irish Commemorative Stone, is a monument in Montreal near the Victoria Bridge.

During the mid-19th century, workers building the Victoria Bridge across the St. Lawrence River discovered a mass grave in Windmill Point where victims of the typhus epidemic of 1847 had been quarantined in fever sheds. The workers, many of whom were of Irish descent, were unsettled by the discovery and wanted to create a memorial to ensure the grave, which held the coffins of 6,000 Irish immigrants, would not be forgotten.

Erected on December 1, 1859, the stone was the first Canadian monument to represent the famine. The inscription on the stone reads:

To Preserve from Desecration the Remains of 6000 Immigrants Who died of Ship Fever A.D. 1847-48

This Stone is erected by the Workmen of Messrs. Peto, Brassey and Betts Employed in the Construction of the Victoria Bridge A.D. 1859

The Black Rock is currently in a desolate area, almost impossible to reach because of busy traffic on either side. A few years ago, there was talk of creating a park around the monument so people could visit it and relax. That never happened.

Fergus Keyes, a director of the Montreal Irish Memorial Park Foundation, encourages Montrealers interested in a Montreal Irish Memorial Park to send an email to Mayor Denis Coderre, “asking him not to approve any plan for light industry around the north side of the Victoria Bridge until this green-space possibility is studied properly.”

More about the proposed project and the Foundation is available in an op-ed article in the Montreal Gazette, written  by Mr. Keyes.

You may contact Mayor Coderre through the City of Montreal’s website here.

This week’s crème de la crème — June 28, 2014

The bijoux I discovered this week.

Blogs

10 Ways to Find a Loyalist Ancestor by Lorine McGinnis Schulze on The Olive Tree Genealogy.

Book Review: Loyalist Refugees. Non-Military Refugees in Quebec 1776-1784 by Bobbi King on Eastman’s Online Genealogy Newsletter.

PRONI user forum meeting — latest developments by Chris Paton on The British GENES Blog.

Step back in time: Library and Archives Canada helps the National Gallery of Canada recreate a First World War exhibition experience on Library and Archives Canada Blog.

Genealogy Goals vs Strategies and Just Dig A Little Deeper by Valerie Hughes on Genealogy with Valerie.

Books We Own by Dianne Nolin on Genealogy: Beyond the BMD.

Reading Ancestors’ Old Records: Problems to Watch Out for by Diane Haddad on Genealogy Insider.

The Creative Process: Mind Maps by Diane Weintraub on Nuts From the Family Tree.

Vital records: How to request them and keep track of those requests by Diane Hall on Michigan Family Tree.

How Emotional Peril Keeps Readers Reading by Janice Hardy on Writers in the Storm.

Free Kindle App — Read Kindle Books on Any App by Thomas MacEntee on GeneaBloggers.

BBC TV WDYTYA next series by John D. Reid on Canada’s Anglo-Celtic Connections.

Articles

Many narrow streets of yesteryear still exist — in name only by Robert N. Wilkins, Montreal Gazette.

Time machine: What life in Canada was like before the First World War by Rick Cash and Jerry Johnson, Globe and Mail, Toronto.

Race Is On To Preserve Little-Known French Dialect in Missouri by Alan Scher Zagier, Associated Press, Edmonton Journal. (Appeared in several major Canadian newspapers.)

Franco-American history and culture at USM LAC in Lewiston by Juliana L’Heureux, Portland (Maine) Press Herald.

French Canadians Celebrate Their Heritage by Madeline Stoker, CT News Junkie, Connecticut.

Wounds that won’t heal, cars for the Kaiser and more reader stories from WW1, Globe and Mail, Toronto.

An Irish Woman’s Diary on those who came home from the first World War by Alison Healy, Irish Times.

The Fast-Paced World of the Past by D. Joshua Taylor, Huffington Post.

Cedar Rapids company under state review after complaints by Erin Jordan, The Gazette, Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

New WWI Canadian records added to Ancestry

I learned from John D. Reid’s blog, Canada’s Anglo-Celtic Connections, that Ancestry has added the following Canadian WWI records.

Canada, Ledgers of CEF Officers Transferring to Royal Flying Corps, 1915-1919, 1,210 records
This relatively small database is from the records of the Department of National Defence, RG 24. Library and Archives Canada. The records, typically two pages, include name, address, date of birth, next of kin, the officer’s movements from unit to unit, appointments and promotions, decorations and honours, medical information, and civilian employment.

Read John’s blog post here to find out what else Ancestry recently added to its military collection.

Celebrate Canada Day with free access to Canadian records

Ancestry.ca offers free access to all 235 million Canadian records on its website until Canada Day, July 1, 11:59 p.m. Eastern time.To view these records, you will need to register for free with Ancestry.ca with your name and email address. Once you have registered, they will send you a user name and password to access the records. If you do not register, you will be prompted to do so once you start trying to search and view the records. After July 1, 2014, you will only be able to view these records using an Ancestry.ca paid membership.

New books in LAC’s Genealogy Services Collection

Library and Archives Canada posted on its blog a list of new books available in its Genealogy Services Collection. Among the books listed, the following are about Quebec and Quebec families.

Family Histories

L’ancêtre des familles Kirouac en Amérique, son épouse et leurs fils : synthèse d’une recherche généalogique effectuée de 1978 à 2013, by François Kirouac.

Barthélemy Verreau, premier Verreau en Nouvelle-France, by Jean-Marie Verreault.

Les 100 ans de Taschereau, by the Comité du 100e anniversaire de Taschereau (Québec).

Dictionnaire généalogique des familles Audet et Lapointe, 1663-2013, by the Association des descendants de Nicolas Audet dit Lapointe.

Généalogie de la famille Bournival, by Gilbert Bournival for the Regroupement des Bournival d’Amérique.

Hanrick / Handrick / Hendrick Family of County Wicklow, Ireland and West Québec, Canada, by Della Hendrick Dupuis.

Labossière : descendant, 1878-2006, by the Labossière Family Association.

Les mariages Dumas du Québec et des régions avoisinantes, by Michèle Dumas.

Ethnic and Local Histories

Les filles du Roy (1663-1673) : Champlain, Batiscan, Sainte-Anne-de-la-Pérade, edited by Jean-Pierre Chartier.

Répertoire des mariages (1895-1986), baptêmes (1895-1986), sépultures (1895-2012), St-Jean-Baptiste de Cap-aux-Os : avec notes marginales, edited by Donat Fournier, Serge Ouellet, Élaine Réhel.

The entire list of books and details are available in the LAC blog post here.

Toronto Star donates more than one million photos

The Toronto Star has donated more than one million photographs, spanning the years 1900 to 1999, to the Toronto Public Library. This collection represents the Star‘s entire photo archive.

Toronto Star publisher John Cruickshank said: “These remarkable photos will now be easily available to students, researchers and all the people of Toronto. We believe this collection will help all Torontonians better understand our past and appreciate our future.”

By July 7, the majority of the images will be publicly available in the Marilyn & Charles Baillie Special Collections Centre at the Toronto Reference Library. Some of them will also be available on the library’s digital archive in the near future.

According to John Honderich, chair of Torstar Corp. and a former publisher of the Toronto Star, the collection includes “some of the most iconic photographs of the city” and captures “both the times of triumphs and the times of despair over a century in the life of Toronto.”

Toronto’s outgoing chief librarian Jane Pyper said: “This photo archive is believed to be the only complete archive of Canadian news photographs spanning the entire 20th century.”

The donation is one of the ways the Star is working with other institutions in the city to “create a lasting legacy for the people of Toronto.”

The Toronto Star Archives are available online on a subscription basis.

The article about the photo collection donation is available here.

40% off genealogy boot camps

Thomas MacEntee’s Hack Genealogy has announced 40% off all digital downloads from his genealogy boot camp series.

The available boot camps, with handouts, are:

• Self-Publishing Boot Camp

• Get Your Genealogy Groove Back Boot Camp

• Genealogy Writing Boot Camp

The sale price for personal use of each boot camp is $7.77 US. Do the math. That price is probably cheaper than a couple of coffees at Starbucks — and you will derive even more pleasure from a genealogy boot camp.

This offer includes the commercial version of the boot camps for $23.67 US, which is especially interesting for genealogy societies and organizations that want to broadcast a webinar at an upcoming meeting and distribute copies of the handouts.

The commercial version of the Genealogy Writing Boot Camp would be ideal for a family history writing special interest group. If your society is unable to purchase it, members may each be willing to chip in a toonie (couple of bucks) to order.

In January, I signed up for the personal Get Your Genealogy Groove Back Boot Camp and watched it live. It was well worth the price of admission, and I have digital access to this boot camp and the handouts for one year. I will most likely purchase the Genealogy Writing Boot Camp. After all, I can never pass up a good bargain.

Read about the Boot Camp offer here.