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Posts Tagged ‘Family History Library’

Horse of a different color

03 May
Johann Georg Deller and Apollonia Buchwieser marriage record, 1846

Collecting dust on a hard drive

A while back I decided to scan every image on a microfilm that included Deller over in the page margin. It was towards the end of a trip to the Family History Library, and I did it on a whim. The film was of church records, written by a German speaking priest … in Latin. I ended up with 66 full page scans, covering marriages and deaths. The plan was to then casually translate the images in my free time.

Fast forward 6 years, and I’ve started browsing through those images.  The diamond in the ruff (so far?) is this marriage record.  It shows my GG Grandfather and his first wife, Appolonia Buchwieser.  It also includes all 4 of their parents (including maiden names).  That is a whole new generation for me to pour over.

“On the twelfth day of May in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and forty six I, Bernard Ihle, parish priest in Iggelheim, after calling the banns three times, joined in marriage two young people, Johann Georg Deller, a catholic, in Iggelheim, the unmarried son of Johann Deller, deceased, a labourer in Iggelheim, and of his surviving wife, Catherina Mapp, and Apollonia Buchwieser, a catholic, in Iggelheim, the unmarried daughter of Johann Buchwieser, deceased, a labourer in Iggelheim, and of his surviving wife, Elisabeth Altvater. In the presence of the witnesses Johann Adam Hath and Daniel Buchwieser of Iggelheim.”

 
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Worst seat in the house

12 Mar

What are these for?

The Family History Library has 2.4 million rolls of microfilm, 3 quarters of a million microfiche, a couple hundred thousand books and a bunch of other cool stuff.  Then why is it that the majority of the people here are sitting in front of computers looking at Ancestry.com and other online databases?

I want to *scream* at these people.  What an absolute waste of time and resources.  Every decent public library in the country has Ancestry.com and HeritageQueset Online.  Don’t get me wrong, those are great tools, when you are NOT sitting next to 2 and a half MILLION rolls of 16mm and 35mm microfilms.

On the bright side, there is barely a wait for the microfilm scanners.  Most people are still doing photocopies and printouts.  Pfft.

 
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Getting ready for a Family History Library trip

02 Mar

I’ll be at the Family History Library in Salt Lake for 3 days next week.  The way I figure it, I’ll have about 36 hours in the library … give or take.  I want to maximize my time, so I’ve been prepping.  I’ll be bringing:

  • My trusty Macbook loaded with all of my historic documents (no clumsy binders)
  • A lock for the laptop so it doesn’t accidentally walk away
  • A thumb drive, to copy new scans of microfilmed documents (no printouts)
  • A laundry list of microfilms to look at (I’m up to 49 so far)
Start easy

Start easy

I’ve organized my microfilm reading list by location.  I don’t want to waste time, or energy, running up and down stairs from the British Isles to the United States.  I also try to have some easy wins early on.  It’s a morale booster to start out with a success.  A few years ago, I started out on the International Floor, reading German records from a Catholic Church.  They were all in Latin.  That was a discouraging way to start the week.

To get that list of microfilms together, the Library Catalog is my best friend.  The majority of the films are Vital Records, referred to as Civil Registration in some countries.  I do a Place Search for the ancestor I’m researching and see what’s available.  I start small with a City Search and then expand out if necessary (and it almost always is).  In some cases, like Ireland, Civil Registration is available for the whole country.

 
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There can be only one

05 Feb

In Salt Lake City, Utah, is the mother of all genealogy centers … The Family History Library.  But there can only be one.  The small research rooms at local churches are Family History Centers.  They aren’t libraries.

It’s some sort of branding effort I guess.  Maybe someone doesn’t want to dillute their name and become Xerox (is that still a company?), Tivo or Coke.  Man, I love to photocopy my butt.

 
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Posted in Genealogy