Useful websites

[kiterunner]

Looks like it, yes.

[James18]

Looks like this is currently the best (only?) site for free electoral rolls. It does provide full addresses, rather than only the first line and then having to pay to view the rest.

It may already be in this thread somewhere I did search but nothing came up.

Australian Cemetery Index

http://austcemindex.com/

The Down Survey of Ireland

http://downsurvey.tcd.ie/

[Janet]

It's worth underscoring the usefulness of the free Fulton History site, fultonhistory.com, for old newspaper searches. I've used it for years, with sometimes spectacular results.

Pivot to Digital: A visit with the man who has digitized more newspaper pages than the Library of Congress
The article in the above link makes me aware once again of the enormous amount of material available there, and has opened my eyes to how much more is being constantly added.

One hint I would pass on to anyone wanting to mine its database is that I don't find its own search engine particularly user-friendly. But there is an easy alternative. Use your regular Google search in any browser, and after your search terms add a word space followed by site:fultonhistory.com (with no word space after the colon).

You can also use the built-in search engine on Fulton History as described here by Kiterunner:

Originally Posted by kiterunner

You don't have to be a member of ancestry or FMP to use the Fulton History site and it is free. I hadn't come across it before I saw it on that Rootschat thread. Just click on the link below and when the page loads, click where it says "Enter" or "Press here". Then you should see a page with search boxes on the left and you can enter the name you are looking for, and it might work best if you select "the exact phrase" from the dropdown menu. Then click on "Search" and you should get a list of newspapers that it has found matches in, and you can click each one in turn to see the newspaper page containing the article.

http://fultonhistory.com/Fulton.html

If you want a good comparison, you could for instance try searching each way with the name of my relative, children's book author Helen Fuller Orton, and you'll clearly see the difference.

[DanWaters]

Hi,

I found the sites on ThisIslandWiki which has sites for Guernseyand Jersey, very useful for finding relatives, a lot of the records go back to around 1530, and seem to be cross references to other family pages : https://www.theislandwiki.org/index.php/Main_Page

Another site I have found useful is Parrishmouse it contains Parrish records for a lot of counties, although it is incomplete, it is quite useful.

Dan

[Glen TK]

The internet archive has hundreds of books devoted to parish records, county pedigrees and town/county histories. They can be searched and viewed on the site or downloaded in several formats for offline use.

Bit of an odd site to link to as the homepage search isn't deep enough, the link should land a level or two deeper, As an example a simple search of Lincolnshire Pedigrees has resulted in me downloading several books already and I haven't really scratched the surface yet.

https://archive.org/search.php?

[Janet]

For those like myself who have loved the Wayback Machine, I lately received this notice from Internet Archive.

Access Archived Web Pages Through Google Search

Google Search has integrated a feature that links directly to the Wayback Machine, allowing users to access archived versions of webpages through search results. By clicking the three dots next to a search result and selecting "More About This Page," users can view how a webpage appeared at different points in time. The collaboration enhances public access to web history, ensuring that digital records remain available for future generations. More on the new collaboration, which emphasizes the importance of digital preservation in one of our latest blog posts.

LEARN ABOUT THE FEATURE

In one example I tried, I first clicked on the three dots, then on 'More about this page' and then, scrolling down, on
'Site first indexed by Google
More than 10 years ago
See previous versions on Internet Archive's Wayback Machine'.

[Janet]

In case anyone is still looking in the Caribbean, I just had a notice from Internet Archive that Aruba has now digitized a lot of historical materials.

Archiving an Island Nation
In the spring, Aruba took historic steps to preserve its rich history through a digitization initiative known as Coleccion Aruba. This digital heritage portal provides free global access to over 100,000 historical materials and cultural treasures. The collection features newspapers, images, and videos documenting Aruba's past and is an invaluable resource for researchers—all of which can be accessed globally via the Internet Archive.

The Aruba Collection (Coleccion Aruba)