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Jaguars! posted:I recently had the chance to walk the area in Sydney that my ancestors lived in during the 1860s. Yep, that's a lovely brutalist police station sitting on top of most of the places they lived. Ah well, it was nice to wander the area anyway. Somehow missed this post. Yeah, it really is something to visit a place where your ancestors lived hundreds of years ago. Mostly it'll be some modern trash, but once in a rare while you'll see the exact same house standing idk 300 years later (afaik the oldest still standing house that I know my ancestors lived in was built in the early 1700s). I'm not some kind of trve kvlt back to the past weirdo, but I do wish we'd take more care of old buildings. Preserving continuity isn't just for conservatives! Oh also, did you bring your parents? I've found that even if they never lived there themselves, it somehow brings them to talk about things they forgot that has nothing to do with that specific place. Weird old family stories. Carthag Tuek fucked around with this message at 19:29 on Nov 4, 2022 |
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Nov 4, 2022 19:24
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https://twitter.com/geneanetdotorg/status/1587101914042433546
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Nov 4, 2022 19:31
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Ooh that's some excellent news. Maybe I can find some Irish cousins...
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Nov 4, 2022 19:37
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Also I just heard through the grapevine that a major hospital near me is going to trash like a century of their records, only keeping the ones that hit a specific day of the month. loving sad and idiotic.
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Nov 4, 2022 20:09
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Carthag Tuek posted:Also I just heard through the grapevine that a major hospital near me is going to trash like a century of their records, only keeping the ones that hit a specific day of the month. loving sad and idiotic. oh man. I mean I get the privacy aspect but that data would be very valuable to researchers of several stripes, like epidemiologists doing historical dives into health outcomes and such, much less genealogists.
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Nov 4, 2022 21:54
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Oracle posted:oh man. I mean I get the privacy aspect but that data would be very valuable to researchers of several stripes, like epidemiologists doing historical dives into health outcomes and such, much less genealogists. exactly!!! there are even current ongoing longitudinal epidemological studies!!!!!! its so fuckin frustrating !"#€!"#%T"€/#REF our pricvacy laws are solid so i assume its a problem of space but wtf, just put a few million dkk in the budget ffs, compared to everything else its so little note: there was a law passed last year that means that everyone has the right to free access to their own records (kind of a FOIA type deal, which we have had for years, but the new law removed some barriers when youre the person involved)*, so i guess if you are in denmark or have a direct ancestor in denmark, use that right before its too late. * none of this is the reason for this destruction, that was decided years ago Carthag Tuek fucked around with this message at 22:19 on Nov 4, 2022 |
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Nov 4, 2022 22:16
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im gonna see if i can push my genealogical society to make a civil petition (50k signatures mean they have to take it up in parliament)
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Nov 4, 2022 22:19
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Carthag Tuek posted:im gonna see if i can push my genealogical society to make a civil petition (50k signatures mean they have to take it up in parliament) THat's a good idea, actually. If the law was made back when disk space was expensive as hell it would make sense to revisit it in the age of 400gb flash drives and such.
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Nov 4, 2022 23:00
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Oracle posted:THat's a good idea, actually. If the law was made back when disk space was expensive as hell it would make sense to revisit it in the age of 400gb flash drives and such. i think these laws are originally 60s-70s, so physical space was probably still the major consideration. like, you have to keep all the data for X decades, but after that, only keep 1/30 to save space ive seen photos of some of these archives, and tbf they are massive. but yea filming the stuff that is deemed trash would make me feel a lot better about trashing the physical documents & as you say disk space is cheap af now Carthag Tuek fucked around with this message at 23:37 on Nov 4, 2022 |
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Nov 4, 2022 23:34
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Carthag Tuek posted:i think these laws are originally 60s-70s, so physical space was probably still the major consideration. like, you have to keep all the data for X decades, but after that, only keep 1/30 to save space 60-70s disk space by and large didn't really exist for anyone short of NASA, it'd have been all about the microfiche.
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Nov 5, 2022 00:05
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Oracle posted:60-70s disk space by and large didn't really exist for anyone short of NASA, it'd have been all about the microfiche. oh like this is paper archives, so its shelf miles and miles. i get it, its a nightmare. microfiche & -film is wonderfully easy. we should still film stuff before we trash it. anyway we had a doctor come by and showed us photos of a magnetic tape of some records he had as part of his presentation, like "this tape is impossible to decipher. you can never get the data from this again" and we all work in archives were like "uhhh did you try. you should do that. there are literal societies for data preservation that will help transfer for free. they have the old machines up and running. you should contact them before its too late." hes like "oh! interesting, i might check that out". such a domain expert mindset, to just assume its impossible because nobody in your immediate social circle knows it Carthag Tuek fucked around with this message at 08:25 on Nov 5, 2022 |
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Nov 5, 2022 08:21
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Carthag Tuek posted:oh like this is paper archives, so its shelf miles and miles. i get it, its a nightmare. microfiche & -film is wonderfully easy. we should still film stuff before we trash it. Doctors and engineers are especially bad about this, good for you all. I’d follow up with him because I’m betting he won’t because what do a bunch of librarians know anyway/I’m a busy man.
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Nov 5, 2022 14:57
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re my illegitimate ancestor of the previous page The trial records have a transcript of a letter that is like "Dear sweet sister[-in-law], please come visit us [ie my wife (who is her sister) and I] before we leave. It would be lovely to see you etc etc." which is pretty standard for the time but then it ends with this: "PS. Sweet little wren. Come to me before we leave, that I may bid you a regretful goodbye. Burn this letter on the fire when you have read it. Adieu!" and im like uhhh why would you put that in writing you horndog. ever heard of opsec?
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Nov 18, 2022 16:19
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Oracle posted:60-70s disk space by and large didn't really exist for anyone short of NASA, it'd have been all about the microfiche. And even NASA purged enormous amounts of data. The 1970s budgets were pretty bare bones for everything that wasn't Viking or the Space Shuttle. If it wasn't on paper before 1973, it was at risk. Landsat data depended heavily on reused tapes and pretty much anything missing is now a tape with Landsat data.
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Nov 18, 2022 17:08
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even tax-funded national broadcasters like the bbc or the danish dr routinely taped over their shows until the 1970s/80s there's a danish christmas mini series for children (we have a new one every year) that was first broadcast in 1980 but only half of the 24 episodes exist in their archives because it wasnt well received (tbf it was weird, it was about two dudes who fell in a hole and they just talk about stuff, then at the very end you see santa claus behind a tree & people were super mad about it) but thats like twice the reason to preserve it to study mores and poo poo, this is tax funded!! its just nuts to me that they would be like "ehh, lets juts use this tape" when recording something new, like a dad trying to decide whether to keep the godfather or goodfellas but one of the tapes is actually their kid taking their fist steps Carthag Tuek fucked around with this message at 17:32 on Nov 18, 2022 |
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Nov 18, 2022 17:27
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Carthag Tuek posted:even tax-funded national broadcasters like the bbc or the danish dr routinely taped over their shows until the 1970s/80s NASA actually recycling tape of the moon landings, yeah, stuff was valuable and reused. I think a bunch of Dr. Who episodes were lost the same way, and they found some in Africa where they'd been broadcasted and not erased and reused. quote:and im like uhhh why would you put that in writing you horndog. ever heard of opsec?
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Nov 18, 2022 18:52
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im not gonna bother with dna as this was 300 years ago and neither the guy or the sisters had any other kids that survived. there are some uncles & aunts, but by then its 12 generations down to me so ehh any shared dna with someone else will like 99.9% be through my illegitimate dude anyway
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Nov 18, 2022 19:05
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Ever wanted to be on Finding Your Roots and have them solve your brick walls? They've put out an open call! (Yes you have to be in America).
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Nov 23, 2022 03:05
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50% off gift memberships on ancestry ends the 28th. If you already have a membership just don’t set it to go live until your old one expires because it’s for new memberships only not renewals. This is good for any level of membership and you can choose 6 months or one year.
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Nov 27, 2022 18:46
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This is a bit of a weird question, but can you guys think of any gift ideas for someone who's into genealogy? My dad's gotten really into researching our family tree ever since I gave him a 23andMe test kit for his birthday two years ago, and I was wondering what else I could give him that's in the same vein. Preferably not too expensive.
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Dec 2, 2022 01:53
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Define ‘not too expensive.’ Ancestry DNA tests are 49 dollars right now. Since neither ancestry nor 23 and me allow uploads this will be the easiest way he could access their 12 million+ user base to look for DNA matches. Combine that with a six month subscription (you missed the Black Friday sale, though they’ll have another a few days after new years that’s usually pretty good) and he’ll be a happy genealogy nerd. If money is real tight get him Blaine Bettinger’s The Family Tree Guide to DNA Testing and Genetic Genealogy (2nd Ed) Only 27.99 and the genetic genealogist’s Bible. If he’s already beaten you to all this stuff you could try and get your oldest living relative on any of his lines to test (makes going back further easier because you’re cutting back a few generations). If you have to choose choose ancestry; bigger database, you know the population is more likely to be family tree oriented than 23&Me, and they have a nice set of records to search through. Super DUPER cheap: upload his 23&Me DNA file to FTDNA and take advantage of their 9 dollar offer to unlock family finder there. Lots of European matches there he might not find on the big two (ancestry and 23&Me). It will also allow you to build your family tree there as well. And if you come into more money later you can get him a YDNA test for 47 markers there. That’s just off the top of my head; if none of those work or he already has them come on back and I’ll throw more at you.
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Dec 2, 2022 04:32
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Thanks for the suggestions! We generally don't give each other physical copies of books anymore, but I'll probably make an exception for the one you mentioned there, especially if it has diagrams and such (which are always tricky to display in e-book format). It sounds like something that would be right up his alley.
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Dec 2, 2022 05:01
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Phlegmish posted:Thanks for the suggestions! We generally don't give each other physical copies of books anymore, but I'll probably make an exception for the one you mentioned there, especially if it has diagrams and such (which are always tricky to display in e-book format). It sounds like something that would be right up his alley. It comes in ebook and audiobook formats too.
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Dec 2, 2022 05:51
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hoo boy someone found the last will and testament of Benjamin Musaphia, father-in-law to the Gabriel Milan I talk about in one of my first posts itt. Most pertinent to my case is that it gives an alias for the latter: Isaac Semach Arias, a name that has not so far been associated with him in the literature. So here I am transcribing 17th century Portuguese lol
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Dec 6, 2022 19:45
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Carthag Tuek posted:hoo boy someone found the last will and testament of Benjamin Musaphia, father-in-law to the Gabriel Milan I talk about in one of my first posts itt. Most pertinent to my case is that it gives an alias for the latter: Isaac Semach Arias, a name that has not so far been associated with him in the literature. That sounds a bit Jewish. Wonder if he was a converso?
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Dec 6, 2022 20:23
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Oh yeah, they were part of the sephardic community in Amsterdam, hence also the will being written in Portuguese. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Musaphia Link to my original post: https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3777244&userid=85617#post462828655 Carthag Tuek fucked around with this message at 01:37 on Dec 7, 2022 |
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Dec 6, 2022 20:35
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Almost through the 19 pages, but geez it's a lot harder to transcribe stuff when you don't speak the language 
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Dec 8, 2022 20:30
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Alright, I've done about the best I can with this but it's not 100% correct. I know a guy who speaks Portuguese though, maybe he can give me some pointers on my most obvious mistakes. Also, for those with ancestors in Amsterdam, they've been scanning their notarial archives dating back to the late 1500s and put them through Transkribus. Obviously the recognition quality varies a lot, but you can do fuzzy searches here and I've found like 30 documents of interest to me: https://transkribus.eu/r/amsterdam-city-archives/#/search
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Dec 21, 2022 13:34
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Researchers were allowed to extract DNA from loose teeth in a medieval Ashkenazi cemetery, fascinating stuff: https://www.science.org/content/article/meeting-ancestors-history-ashkenazi-jews-revealed-medieval-dna https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(22)01378-2
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Dec 30, 2022 09:56
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They just extracted Mendels’ DNA too!
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Dec 31, 2022 06:37
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i like this quotequote:Fairbanks has thought about how Mendel would feel about being disturbed in his grave to satisfy the curiosity of today's scientists. cf also getting rabbis to weigh in on what part of the body must not be disturbed after death in the ashkenazi cemetery
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Dec 31, 2022 13:53
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couple weeks ago i got an email from a woman whos writing up a family tree for her boyfriend, and i share an ancestor with him 200 years ago. we've been writing a bit back and forth about various ancestors, but she keeps replying in a fresh new mail instead of just replying back in the same thread and it was pretty annoying. then she stopped replying so i thought ok she got what she needed just now i got one from her where she apologizes cause she was trying to send to gmail.dk instead of gmail.com. lmao shes like 90 years old and types my email address out by hand every time she writes me. and she has a boyfriend shes making a present for. thats adorable 
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Jan 13, 2023 20:16
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also speaking of Sephardim, apparently Dr Jeffrey S. Malka has traced his family back 800 years & is going to do a talk on this channel on sunday 11am pacific https://www.youtube.com/SephardicGenealogyAndHistory that sounds like a lot, what sources are even preserved about families and relations in the 1200s??? well i guess we will find out
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Jan 13, 2023 21:39
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Carthag Tuek posted:also speaking of Sephardim, apparently Dr Jeffrey S. Malka has traced his family back 800 years & is going to do a talk on this channel on sunday 11am pacific Doomsday Book goes back to 1086, I suppose it’s possible there’s some equivalent, possibly related to Jews that left Spain and changed their names. I hazily recall something like that put out by Spanish authorities in France (where a lot of them ran). Somewhere like this maybe quote:Since the end of the 13th century, an enclave belonging to the Papal States existed in the Avignon area (today in southern France), with important Jewish communities in Avignon itself and neighboring Carpentras. Until 1791 (when the area was integrated to France), local Jews were not concerned by the French legislation. Isolated from other Jews, these communities mainly remained endogamous. When in 1808 a law signed by Napoleon forced all French Jews to take hereditary surnames, local Jews retained the family names they used for many centuries such as Crémieu(x), Milhaud, Monteux, Naquet, and Cohen. Of the total of about 2,000 persons, a huge portion was covered by only a few dozens of surnames.
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Jan 14, 2023 03:34
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yea sure there are fantastic spot sources that will put you back then — if you can make a chain to another source royals and nobles can do it easy but i wanna know what types of sources there are for regular people... technically its impossible to be even bourgeois if you were born before say 1400
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Jan 14, 2023 06:51
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Carthag Tuek posted:yea sure there are fantastic spot sources that will put you back then — if you can make a chain to another source He probably tied in to some royal/noble honestly.
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Jan 14, 2023 08:53
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Oracle posted:He probably tied in to some royal/noble honestly. yeah probably
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Jan 14, 2023 10:25
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Whew, transcribing a police case from when an ancestor died after an altercation at an inn, 15000+ words so far and theres a lot more where they came from
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Feb 3, 2023 12:57
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Also I helped a guy find his ancestor in the Danish cavalry muster rolls from the Great Northern War (1700–21) last year & he was super chuffed and I was proud. So we talked a bit about my own luckless travails locating a cavalrist ancestor from the same area and period. Then he writes me this week like "you're not gonna believe it, I think I found your guy!" and I'm like, "awesome, show me the goods" while thinking "yea sure". So he sends me links and a very long writeup that he is 100% certain etc (honestly kinda hypomanic). I look at it and while you can absolutely read the name of the guy he found as my guy's name, I immediately thought "that's not his surname, that's his profession" and within a couple hours I had indeed confirmed that it was his profession, and the record misspelled it as a similar profession, eg he's a merchant not a "mason" (or whatever else starts with M). He buys and sells iron goods and owns a house in Copenhagen, why would he leave his wife, join the cavalry, and then settle as a copyholder in a 4 house fishing hamlet? I suppose he could go bankrupt but still. I gave it a day and wrote back my findings diplomatically & it's just absolute silence since then. I wonder if he's mad or ashamed or furiously trying to prove me wrong lol
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Feb 3, 2023 16:33
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So I've been getting into all of this stuff on and off the last couple years and wish I'd spotted this thread earlier! The document digging journey has been fascinating, although now I'm running into mysteries outside my understanding how to deal with. My great grandmother passed away giving birth to her second child, and shortly after her husband abandoned their children, so my grandmother was raised by my great grandmothers parents. Trying to track down my great grandfather is proving a challenge. The record situation is puzzling. This is all in rural Missouri, USA in the early 1920s, but I've found surprisingly good info for the area. I've found her death certificate and tombstone (is it normal for a tombstone to record it as "first name, maiden name, wife of X"? That struck me as odd.) These both confirmed the great grandfather's name. What I can't find is virtually ANYTHING else about the man. No marriage cert, even in the local county marriage records for time period, which I thought was my best hope of narrowing him down. You'd think marriages and deaths would be a bit better recorded in newspapers so starved for stories that "So and so is in town visiting their sister so and so" is front page news. Its all the more tragic because there are little mentions about my great grandmother I can find here and there. There's a lovely little newspaper mention about her having won an award for high school English grades, and having attended some local social gathering. On the other side, I am incredibly grateful to how thorough the local parish priests in Mexico were and how good that climate apparently is for preservation. Even with my limited Spanish I was able to spot another great-grandfather's misindexed name (thank goodness his name is unusual even now). Its really funny to start identifying specific priests by their handwriting and then wondering if they woke up half in the bottle one day when their handwriting is suddenly garbage. I was able to more or less trace the same family living in what is now Ayotlan, Jalisco for a couple hundred years until Catholic naming made it impossible to continue. WHY IS EVERYONE NAMED SOME PERMUTATION OF ANNA MARIA GERTRUDIS. THERE ARE OTHER SAINTS PEOPLE.
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Feb 5, 2023 22:06
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