Australian Genealogy and History Snippets – March 2023...

From time to time I come across all sorts of interesting history and/or genealogy related tidbits that I want to share with you, so I’ve collected them together to make up a Snippets post. These aren’t meant to be comprehensive, but rather they are just bits that I’ve found and wanted to share. Mostly it is Australian news, but I have tacked on some overseas snippets on the end for you interest too. Discovering Anzacs website “Decommissioned”News on Twitter is that the National Archives of Australia have “decommissioned” (deleted) the Discovering Anzacs website. This is a perfect demonstration of why the community are hesitant to engage with and contribute to institutional projects. How many hours of work and contributions of material has been thrown away? –  via @michwatsonoz@ausglam.space on Twitter. More info on the NAA website. Are you interested in helping to research and preserve the history and heritage of the WEA (SA)?Are you interested in helping to research and preserve the history and heritage of the WEA? The WEA are in their 110th year, and they are launching an exciting volunteer-led project to ensure their  history is properly recorded and preserved for future generations. The project will include a research component as well as cataloguing, digitising, and storing our vast treasure trove of documents, photographs, and objects. Initially we are seeking 3 enthusiastic Volunteers to take on the role of WEA Volunteer History Project Team Leader for our three categories: Research; Cataloguing; and Digitisation. Once our Team Leaders have been appointed we will also be calling for general volunteers to assist with the project. If you’re interested, CLICK HERE for more information or to apply. Sydney Jewish Museum Major ExpansionNews from the Sydney Jewish Museum … “We’re thrilled...

Discovering Links: Another 25 FREE Links for English Genealogy and History...

It’s been too long since I did a “Discovering Links” post. These posts consist of a collection of links that I have discovered, or found useful, and want to share with others. But rather than simply giving you a whole batch of random links each time, I am grouping them by Australian state, country or topic. You can see my previous Discovering Links posts here. For this one I’ve decided to share my English links, afterall it’s been aaaaaages since I did one that covered England. You can find my earlier post with 25 links here. These aren’t intended to be an exhaustive collection of links (not by a long shot), but they are simply ones that many will find useful, and it may include some that you may not have known about. And while many people think that genealogy costs a lot of money, let me tell you that all of the links below are free. Personally I find that it’s often a matter of knowing where to look beyond the big-name websites, and hopefully this will help with that. === ENGLAND GENERAL === UK WILL TRANSCRIPTIONSAt present this site contains over 7100 transcripts, but anyone who has transcribed a pre-1900 UK will is invited to contribute to this site which is searchable by Testator, Executor or Administrator, or Witness. It is hoped that ultimately there will be a large number of transcripts which may assist family historians in their research and also those who are interested in local history and the families who lived in a particular locality. THE WORKHOUSECreated by Peter Higginbotham, an expert in the field of UK Workhouses, he says ‘this site is dedicated to the workhouse – its buildings, inmates, staff and administrators,...

Genealogy News – February/March 2023...

A new series that I’m starting here is the “Genealogy News” posts. Putting it simply, I’m collating the news from big-name genealogy societies, archives and other genie organisations from Australia and elsewhere, and have listed it here for you. As for how often I’ll do it, I’m thinking monthly at this stage, but it will depend on what news is available, so we’ll see. As RootsTech (the world’s biggest genie conference) was held recently, there were a lots of posts from numours people relating to the event. For this list I’ve chosen to not include them. They’re still listed on their blogs, so you can check them out if you wish. Anyway, now on with the news … 23andMeRaising Awareness of Rare DiseaseNew Algorithm Cleans Up 23andMe Family Tree AncestryAncestry Launches Storymaker StudioCelebrating 40 Years of Family History Discoveries Australian War MemorialMeet the women in construction at the Australian War MemorialAustralia’s first Academy Award 80 years onUntold stories of Australian sailors and airmen revealedAustralian War Memorial’s new galleries take flight FamilySearchNew Free Historical Records on FamilySearch 6 February 2023The Family History Library Is Now the FamilySearch LibraryNew Free Historical Records on FamilySearch 30 January 2023Updated and Redesigned FamilySearch Help FamilyTreeDNAFamilyTreeDNA Has Added 5,000 Ancient Connections to Our DatabaseBig Y-700 DNA Testing Breaks Down Brick Walls in Family with African AncestryIntroducing the New FTDNATiP™ Report for Y-STRsThe Group Time Tree: A New Big Y Tool for FamilyTreeDNA Group Projects FindmypastHonour your heritage with over 100,000 new records, including female shipbuilders and engineersDelve into the dark legacy of British slavery and the daily life of Nottingham’s churches this weekEnrich your tree with over 200,000 new records, from Lincolnshire to West YorkshireCelebrate the civil service and more with nearly a million new...

National Library of Australia’s 2023 Community Heritage Grants are Open...

The National Library of Australia (NLA) is calling for applications for their 2023 Community Heritage Grants. The grants of up to $20,000 are available to community groups such as libraries, archives, museums, genealogical and historical societies, multicultural and Indigenous groups around the country to help preserve locally owned, but nationally significant collections of materials that are publicly accessible including artifacts, letters, diaries, maps, photographs, and audio visual material. The types of projects supported include:– significance assessments of collections– preservation needs assessments of collections– conservation activities and collection management, and– training workshops. Run annually since 1994, the program has provided more than $8.4 million dollars in funding to over 1,600 projects across Australia. APPLICATIONSApplications MUST be made online, no mailed or emailed applications/documentation will be accepted. You can find all the details regarding application guidelines, and the application form on their website. THE DEADLINEApplications for new applicants will close on Monday, 8 May 2023Applications for those who have recently completed a Community Heritage Grant project and are applying for the next stage will close on Thursday, 1 June 2023Applications for training projects will close on Thursday, 1 June 2023 MORE INFORMATIONIf you would like to discuss your project or have any queries, please email the CHG Program Team at...

March is Women’s History Month...

Women’s History Month is a month that highlights the contributions of women to events in history and society. Celebrated around the world during March, it corresponds with International Women’s Day which is held on March 8th. “One this day [in the US] in 1987, Congress passed a resolution declaring March as Women’s History Month. This month, we celebrate the women who fought, took risks, and stood up for what was right. We celebrate their legacy, and continue to fight.” One thing does seem to be a recurring trait – and that is that women’s history doesn’t get written about nearly enough. They were often the backbone of not only a family, but society itself. They lived, they worked, they got into trouble, they struggled, they triumphed, they were inspirational. Every woman has a story. They helped make history! So let’s do what we can to recount some of their stories and make sure they are not forgotten. HOW WILL YOU REMEMBER YOUR FEMALE ANCESTORS?Need some ideas? how about sharing some old family photos of a female ancestor, and telling a story about themwhat about doing an oral histry recording of your memories of your mum, grandma, aunts etc. (or another female in the family) if you’re a blogger, tell a story about an amazing female in your family, or if you are more into local history, some females from the local communitydo you have an heirloom or two that are they connected to family members? Share that story, so family knows the significance of them itemspend the month doing research so you can give that “Mrs Smith” or “Mrs Tucker” from your family tree a nameif you’re into crafts you might want to sew, quilt, crossstitch, scrapbook or anything else similar, a project...

Australian Genealogy and History Snippets – January/February 2023...

From time to time I come across all sorts of interesting history and/or genealogy related tidbits that I want to share with you, so I’ve collected them together to make up a Snippets post. These aren’t meant to be comprehensive, but rather they are just bits that I’ve found and wanted to share. Call for expressions of interest for new editor/s of the Journal of the Royal Australian Historical SocietyThe Council of the RAHS is seeking expressions of interest for the position of editor of the Journal of the Royal Australian Historical Society (JRAHS). The current editor Adjunct Associate Professor Carol Liston AO and our proof reader Mrs Joy Hughes are stepping down after many years of distinguished services in their respective roles. [via their email newsletter] Billionaire fails in bid to partially demolish historic goods shed in VictoriaA $750 million twin office tower project has been turned down in a move by Heritage Victoria to preserve the state’s largest and most architecturally elaborate 19th century railway goods building. [via The Age] New Records at Queensland Registry of Births, Deaths and MarriagesNew records alert!  The Queensland Registry now has 107,603 new records available to search on their BDMs website. These include BDMs from the following years: 1923 Births, 1948 Marriages, 1993 Deaths. Start searching today! www.qld.gov.au/familyhistory [via Facebook post] Labour History Society South AustraliaDid you know that there is a society dedicated to the history of labouring in South Australia? No, nor did I until I found it mentioned on a website. So if you’re interested be sure to get in touch with them, or if you’re local, pop along to one of their meetings. [via Experience Adelaide site] 41,000 Burials for the ‘Adelaide Plains’Recently the Adelaide Northern Districts...

Please, Help Save Trove

For any Australian historian (family, local, or social historian) Trove is the ultimate GO-TO site. It is the National Library of Australia’s site, which is accessed by around 20 million people every year, and contains about six billion (that’s right BILLION) digital items, including news­papers, magazines, photographs, journals, parliamentary papers and more … and it’s all FREE!! However due to huge funding cuts over a number of years, and the fact that Federal funding for the National Library of Australia’s digital resource ends in June 2023, means that Trove could cease operations, or at least in its current form. What if there was no Trove? But to us researchers, a life without Trove is as unthinkable as life without Google. This is Australia’s primary institution, the one that provides access to not only what the National Library of Australia itself holds, but access to holdings from 900 or so other Australian institutions. This is portal for Australia’s heritage, and yet depite it being used on a globa scale, is being treated as unimportant. What can we do? We have been asked to use our voice (well technically fingers), to sign a petition, and spread the word far and wide. But there is a time limit … the petition date is 22 February 2023. So we don’t have much time. There was a Change.org petition for this topic, but it’s been said that the government only acts on “official” petitions. So another one was started by the same person, and this official petition will be presented to parliament. So if you care about access to Australia’s history, even if you don’t use Trove, please take a few moments to sign the petition. SIGN THE PETITION NOW And if you want...

The Road to Gumeracha

Anyone who is familiar with the Adelaide Hills knows what a beautiful drive up from the city and suburbs it is. For those who aren’t think rolling green hills everywhere, except in Summer when they’re brown, with plenty of big beautiful gum trees around. There are crops and vineyards, sheep, and cattle. It’s the country, and it’s what I grew up with! I found an article in South Australia’s Register newspaper, from 20 January 1920, where the writer takes a trip from Athelstone through the hills to Gumeracha, and describes the journey. So I wanted to share a portion of that with you. To read the full article, click here.   An Entrancing Corridor If an unlabelled moving picture of the Gorge road were thrown on the screen people would ask where it was. The route is an eye-opener in rugged beauty. For most of the 17 miles, from the time the gateway is entered at Athelstone, the track runs between massive, rock-ribbed, tree-spread cliffs which climb hundreds of feet, and seem to meet the blue sky. From the moment you get into contact with the great panorama, it is a wonderland of wild, decorative effects, carried out by Nature to big scale. The road has the appearance of a bold, tiny interloper, twisting in and out among the boulders with flimsy, and almost precarious, audacity. Looking up on one side you see the hills, mottled by shadows on a sunny afternoon, lean their grey bulk against a radiant back ground. On the other the jagged, broken rock offers, at times, a rather uncomfortable proximity, supplying a striking colour contrast with their red and dark blue and brown faces. Running along this 24-ft. thoroughfare, amid some of the most impressive open-air...

Australia Day Blog Challenge: Climbing Your Family’s Gum Tree...

I do love a good geneameme, so when Shauna Hicks posted her Australia Day post recently, which ended up being a revisit of an Australia Day Blog Challenge that was created by fellow Aussie geneablogger, Pauleen Cass a number of years ago, which apparently I missed … the challenge was on!! Pauleen says … “The geneameme is to test whether your family is ridgey-didge and to show us how Australia runs in your veins, without any flag-waving and tattoo-wearing. Shout it out, be proud and make everyone wish they lived in this wide brown land of ours.” 1. My first ancestor to arrive in Australia was … Ok, if we count “what’s yours is mine” when you get married – Mr Lonetester’s convict, John Warby, who was given a free ticket to Australia in 1792, is my earliest ancestor. You can read more about him here. However ‘my’ own first ancestor would be Isaac and Simeon Richardson. They are two brothers who were labourers from Kent, and were sentenced to death for their part in local riots, however thanks to the local townsfolk, their life was spared, and instead they were transported to Van Diemen’s Land (for more click here).  But my first non-convict ancestor was my Randell family from Devon to South Australia in 1837 (click for more details). Based on my Randell family, i’m 6th generation Australian. 2. I have Australian Royalty (tell us who, how many and which Fleet they arrived with) … OK, I don’t have any first, second or even third fleet convicts, but I do have Australian Royalty. Isaac RICHARDSON, transported 1831, Lord Lyndoch Simeon RICHARDSON, transported 1831, Lord Lyndoch William COSGROVE (still not 100% proven, but seems highly likely) So that was my direct...

They Closed the Borders ….. AGAIN!!...

“Victoria-NSW border to close for the first time in 100 years as Melbourne coronavirus cases hit record daily high” – this is the headline from the SBS News report, dated 7 July 2020, and it comes as Victoria is just beginning another six weeks of lockdown to try get COVID-19 under control. Anyway that headline intrigued me, as I was curious about the previous border closure … so I headed to Trove to see what I could find. And what an amazing article I found. Talk about history repeating itself … just have a read of this article from South Australian newspaper, The Register, dated 3 February 1919. You can see the original article here. Please note, the red highlight is my emphasis, not that of the original article.  —The Spanish Flu— No one desires to minimise the horrors or the epidemic which has swept over the world, nor the necessity for precautions, but it would seem that if ever fear was worse than the disease, the present is the occasion. The Federal Quarantining Department kept the disease out of the country for months. Australia has had ample warning, and advantage from the experience of other countries. The Commonwealth and State authorities met last November, and planned, a joint course of action. The Sydney doctors diagnosed their cases as the real thing; the Melbourne doctors were still using big words, and unable to make up their minds. Now both States have been declared infected, but New South Wales will not admit Victorian passengers, because Melbourne was responsible for the trouble, and Queensland, not to be out of the fuss, is asking the despised Commonwealth Government to lend it a body of Light Horse to patrol its border against New South Wales....