Malta Family History - Commonwealth Air Forces Memorial (Floriana)

I had a cousin, James Ford Billett,  that I knew died during WWII but I did not know where. I was researching some of his family members today and ran across this site which gives a list of all the names inscribed on the memorial. How did I know it was the right person? It also listed his parents and his uncle and where they were from.
James Ford Billett, 1051615, Sergeant, Royal Air Force (V.R.) 18 Squadron, died 26th December 1941, age 22 years. Son of Albert and Marion Billet, and nephew of Mr. D. McEwan of Drymen, Stirlingshire.
http://website.lineone.net/~remosliema/index.htm
2,301 names are on the memorial from RAF, RCAF, RAAF, RNZAF, SAAF and BOAC.

Just because I can - OWOH - another giveaway

A while back I participated in the One World One Heart giveaway. I decided to have another drawing. This time I will be offering 5 hours of assistance with your research. I have pulled a few names and will be contacting them sometime during the next 2 or 3 weeks :)

I've been busy recently teaching classes and helping others with their research. Lots of fun. I love helping others get started. Everyone always feels like they have been able to accomplish something positive. Recently I've been helping people who have been given lots of family history from other family members and each one has felt overwhelmed to say the least. What to do with it all, how to store it, how to organize all the family names etc. My first piece of advice is usually DON'T TACKLE IT ALL AT ONCE.

When organizing items use the "work for 15 minutes chunk" principle. Start 4 stacks - one for each grandparent name - pick up a piece of paper, find the appropriate name and put it in the stack. DO NOT read everything else, you will get side tracked. That part comes later :)

Following the paper trail - Accountants

Do you have an accountant in your Scottish family? I do.
Here's some resources that might be of use.
1."The Incorporated Accountants Year Book by Society of Incorporated Accountants and Auditors." available on Google Books. Go to the index to find the name you are interested in then jump to the page indicated for more information.
My g g uncle shows up in  the 1904-05 edition.  Gives the name of his company (in his case partnership), where it was located and when he was admitted as an associate. In the 1907/08 edition he shows up as a Fellow without a partner at a different address.
The Society (Scotland) was founded in 1885 and merged with the Institute of Chartered Accountants (England & Wales) in 1959.
2. "History of The Society of Incorporated Accountants 1885-1957" was written by A.A. Garrett  and published by Oxford University Press in 1961.
3. "The Society of Accountants in Edinburgh 1854-1914: A Study of Recruitment to a Profession" by Stephen P. Walker was published by Garland Publishing in 1988.
4. The main online site is http://www.icaew.com/ It has an INDEX section called Accountancy Ancestors covering 1874-1965. It was last updated in August 2009.
The searchable index is set up as follows:-
Obituaries by surname
Obituaries by Accountancy Firm
Portraits
Other Illustrations
First World War
It's a work in progress being done by volunteers and is in the form of an excel spreadsheet. It was all pulled from information held by the ICAEW Library & Information Service.

Australia revisited

Those of you who read my blog on a regular basis know that a number of my relatives relocated to Australia. Every so often I piddle around on the computer looking for more information. Such was the case yesterday. Up popped a site I had never seen before and low and behold some information about my cousins and the ship they sailed on was there.
http://www.museum.wa.gov.au/welcomewalls
Welcome Walls is an interesting project being constructed in Fremantle and Albany. If your relatives landed in either place they might show up.
The entry I was interested in showed where my cousins sailed from and when, the name of the ship, where they landed, who was in the group and the profession of the head of household. Interesting for me. That led me to doing some research on the ship which led to some fascinating dairy entries of other people traveling during the same time period. This also led to a death notice and a military record.

It's all about the box

My daughter headed out to school today with a large box filled with items for an art project. She had been gathering things for a couple of weeks based on her theme. Never ceases to amaze me what seemingly unrelated objects can be gathered then combined together to make a work of art.
Genealogy can be like that, especially when you are first starting out. You might have lots of "odds and ends" scattered round your house, many seemingly unrelated. Some items may be complete mysteries because they have never really been looked at. So get yourself a box, and start gathering items. Take your time, maybe a few weeks. GATHER DON"T SORT !!!!!
Some things to gather.
BMD certificates
obituaries
awards
photographs
family stories
personal items e.g. baby clothing, small toys
newspaper articles
favorite recipes
wills
magazine articles
letters
postcards

I have a cardboard slimpick wallet folder that is old, worn and very much used. It has travelled many places with me and been used for many different family history projects. I am currently using it to gather information for project but it started out as my basic genealogy info carrier in the early 80's and became my "lightweight briefcase" for such when I moved "across the puddle" in 1987. It sits in a plastic tub with some bulky items and comes in very useful if I need to grab something for classes.

Fab 40

Family Tree Magazine has released its current top 40 genealogy/family history sites. Very interesting.
http://www.familytreemagazine.com/article/fab-forty
Top Scottish genealogy blog belongs to Chris Paton's Scottish Genealogy News and Events. http://scottishancestry.blogspot.com/  Very well deserved. I've been reading his blog for quite a while now. Always very informative.

ScotlandsPlaces

It's kind of hard to do on-line genealogy and watch the Olympics ski jumping at the same time :) Swiss guy (Simon Ammann) just made jumping history for his country. Woohoo :) Such an elegant looking sport.
ScotlandsPlaces. Interesting site to go to when you are researching places (which I am). http://www.scotlandsplaces.gov.uk/  The blurb for the site reads "Bringing authentic information and images together to help you discover places in Scotland."
It's divided up into each shire (pre-1975) showing a map, description, with photographs and general information. I found an ariel photograph of my great-grandparents house :)
The shire I am researching also has information about Farm Horse Tax 1797-1798, Medical Officer of Health Reports 1891 and Land Ownership Commision 1872-3.
When you click on a photograph you will be taken to an individual page. The information there is variable. Some will be very basic, others will give you quite detailed information.
Photographs are copyrighted and cannot be used for anything other than personal or teaching tool use.

OWOH - Magic Carpet Ride - and the winner is ..........

Bev Coffaro #880 www.alteredpaperarts.blogspot.com/

Congratulations to Bev. She has been notified and responded. She is a novice at genealogy so is looking forward to getting started.
Since a goodly number of you participated I have some other surprises in store but y'all are going to have to wait till another time to find out what that is all about :)

A fascination for all things Scottish

I've lived on this side of "the puddle" since 1987 and have rarely met a native that is NOT interested in Scotland and it's history. Many are fascinated by the clearances, Scots-Irish connections and the history of early Scots migration.
Myra Vanderpool Gormley wrote a good overview "Migration Patterns of Our Scottish Ancestors" for American Genealogy Magazine that was re-printed in Genealogymagazine.com    http://www.genealogymagazine.com/scots.html  She writes of the whys, where from to where to, and the early Scots contribution to the fledgling nation. Interesting reading and a good jump off point for more in depth studies of various settlements.
Another interesting, and much longer article "Scotland's Mark on America" by George Fraser Black can be found at http://www.scotlands.com/usa/3.html You need to take your time reading this one. Lots of information to sift through.

Poorhouse/Workhouse

I have mixed feelings about Poorhouse records. It's great that the places existed to provide relief for those that needed them but when I run across death entries e.g. my g-g grandfather in Glasgow,  I have to wonder why he was there and not living with a family member. His wife had died a year or two before and at that point he was working. He had children and grandchildren living in the area so I have had to ask myself if there had been a family rift or people had just lost contact with each other.
On the other hand I had ancestors who ran the poorhouse in Dundee and are well documented. When they died they were missed greatly by the local community and family.

A good site to visit for histories of Poorhouses/Workhouses in Scotland is  www.workhouses.org.uk/index.html?Scotland/UnionsScotland.shtml

Just as an example - the East Poorhouse in Dundee, which was run by some of my ancestors gives maps, information about when it was built, photographs, 1881 census records.

The site also gives a good overview of the 1845 Scottish Poor Law Act and the differences between Scotland and England/Wales when administering relief. The drawing shows a Model Poorhouse Plan for Town Parishes, 1847.

OWOH - Magic Carpet Ride - update

This  event is proving interesting. Lots of people to meet and interesting things to learn about. Lots of countries visited on my little supersonic carpet. I've even met someone from Scotland with the same surname as my grandmother :)
Our lovely crystal cookie jar - picked out specially for the occasion -  is filling up at a respectable rate. I will be announcing the winner of the drawing on 15th February. 10 HOURS OF GENEALOGY/FAMILY HISTORY ASSISTANCE.
The rest of the items in the photograph are just to make things more interesting to look at. The bonnie wee baby looking adoringly at her mother is MOI, aged about 1 month :) (That was taken a looooong time ago.) The tartan book in the background is entitled "Scottish Songs" and was a gift to my grandmother from her sister-in-law in 1917. The double photo frame shows (we think) two different images of my great grandmother with her mother and grandmother.

Writing a short story and Who Do You Think You Are?

Okay so it's February and many people's thoughts turn to romance.
Do you know how your parents met? Has it been written down?
It's a great way to start of your family history and guess who might like to read this "tale of romance" ....... your kids (if you have any) :)
If you have children have you told them yet how you and your spouse met ?
When I asked my mother how my grandparents met I was somewhat shocked to discover that she had no idea. She had asked but they did not tell ...... just grinned at each other :)
My dad's parents met through her sister and his best friend dating each other.

If you like to scrap book you can "pretty up" the story with items that date from the time they met.

"Who Do You Think You Are?" which is mighty popular in the old homeland hits the tiny screens here in March. It'll be interesting to see if it an exact replica or if a US twist is done to it. If this gets to our local channels I am going to be one happy camper and we have TIVO if it is aired at a silly time :)