Saturday, March 31, 2012

1940 Census Video 3

Originally posted August 25, 2011

The National Archives has made available a series of videos for the 1940 Census.  
This is Video 3 Census of Housing.

Watch Video 2 here.

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

5 Days Until the Release of the 1940 Census

Do you know where your people are in 1940? Without an index, the key to finding your family is going to be location, location, location! What are you doing to limit your 1940 census browsing fun? I've been visiting the One Step site by Steve Morse to review his 1940 finding aids and tutorial.

Steve has short tutorial quiz (don't worry, there are no wrong answers) to help you begin thinking about where you should be looking by Enumeration District. In addition to the tutorial, you will find a 1940 ED finding tool as well as a 1930 to 1940 ED conversion utility. If you are lucky and your people stayed put between 1930 and 1940, the conversion utility may be all you need to get you on your way.

If you are eagerly awaiting the release of the 1940 census, prepare now and be ready to hit the ground running on April 2nd. Now, let's hope the servers can handle the traffic! :)

Wednesday, March 21, 2012

1940 Census Video 2

I originally posted this on August 18, 2011.

The National Archives has made available a series of videos for the 1940 census.
 This is Video 2 Census of Population.



Watch Video 1 here.

Monday, March 19, 2012

GHLL Weekly Updates



Genealogy and History Data Updates March 19 - March 25, 2012.

Be sure to check out the beautiful Splash Page photo.  It's Spring!

Musings On A Munday Screen Shots from the iPad

I published a post last week showing how I save the show notes from podcasts to iBooks. I had a couple of people ask me how I was able to take screen shots on the iPad. I also heard a couple people at work saying they wished they could get screen shots from their iPad. Seems like inquiring minds would like to know.

It's very easy, simply hold down the Power and Home button at the same time and voila! The screen print will show up in your photo roll. Below is an illustration from Skitch showing this. By the way, Skitch is what I used to annotate the screen shots in my earlier post.








Sunday, March 18, 2012

1940 Census Video 1

I originally posted this video on August 11, 2011.


The National Archives has made available a series of videos relating to the 1940 census.   This is video 1 Introduction to the 1940 Census

Friday, March 16, 2012

GHLL Blogger of the Month for March 2012


The Genealogy and History Links Library's March Blogger of the Month is Susan Peterson!

Be sure to check out Susan's blog Long Lost Relatives as well as her guest post on the GHLL newsletter.

Friday, March 9, 2012

Enumerator Instructions 1940 Census

Wondering what details you will find on the 1940 census? I am!

I'm wondering if there will be a column asking the enumerated person what is the village name in Ireland that your family originates in? No? Wishful thinking on my part? Yes, that is too much to hope for, but there is still a wealth of information to be gleaned from the 1940 census!

What I am most excited about is the question asking where the person lived on April 1, 1935. I think this will be tremendously helpful, especially if you had a wandering ancestor with an all too common name. This question may lead you to the county or town that has the information you need, or this question may lead you away from the location you have been spinning your wheels in.

If you are curious about what other details you may find in the 1940 census view the Enumerator Instructions to help you prepare for your search.

Thursday, March 8, 2012

Genealogy Gems Premium Podcasts and the iPad

I am a podcast fan...maybe even a fanatic. I have a selection of multiple podcasts that I listen to on my commute to and from work. I'm finding out that I am a very auditory learner and podcasts are a perfect medium for me.

The Genealogy Gems podcast is one of my favorites and I am a Premium member as well. There are several perks of being a premium member, one of them being the show notes are provided to you in a PDF document. Not that big of a deal to you? It may be when you start listening and viewing the show notes from an iPad.

The Premium podcasts are available online for a limited time, because of this I like to download the show notes, so that I have the content and links to review as I have time. By doing so, I have ended up creating my own reference library in iBooks that I can refer to again and again. It's very simple to do and I've provided you with step-by-step screen shots (from my iPad, using the Safari browser and Skitch to annotate the images)

Select the podcast you are interested in.



Click the PDF document link to open it.

Choose to open in iBooks

Select the collection you wish to save the PDF in.


You can create custom collections as I have done.


My Genealogy Gems reference shelf.

As I go through the show notes I delete them to save space on my iPad, unless I find the episode contains too many "gems" and I keep those. I've been trying to force myself to use my iPad more and this is one way that I am. Once you have the PDF in iBooks you can open and read the PDF offline, however, you will need internet access for the links to work.

I received permission from Lisa Louise Cooke to share these Premium member screenshots.





Thursday, March 1, 2012

March 2012 Edition of Branching Out

Another guest author has visited the GHLL website to contribute to the March edition of Branching Out.  Susan Petersen from Long Lost Relatives discusses "Getting Connected with Internet Resources."