Books, e-books, cemetery transcripts, census substitutes, militia records, land records, memberships, and more!
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Vivid-Pix has a fun new Genealogy Whodunit Mystery Game
that is free to play!
Help Find Great-Uncle George!
Learn genealogy research and Vivid-Pix tips & tricks!
Those who successfully complete the challenge can enter to win great prizes, including a weekend in New York City, London or $1,000 USD, and photo gifts!
SOLVE THE MYSTERY!
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August 1st Marks Emancipation Day In Canada
In 2008 the Government of Ontario proclaimed August 1st as Emancipation Day to recognize the abolition of slavery in the British Empire (August 1, 1834). The Lieutenant Governor of Upper Canada had promoted passage of an Act restricting slavery in this jurisdiction in 1793.
On March 24th, 2021 the House of Commons of the Government of Canada voted unanimously to officially designate August 1 Emancipation Day.
This year, more than ever, Canadians “are invited to reflect, educate and engage in the ongoing fight against racism and discrimination.”
For more information about Canada’s Emancipation Day, there is a list of resources here!
Breaking News: On August 1st 2021 Nova Scotia will formally recognize Emancipation Day in that province. You can read their announcement here! Thanks to Kathryn Lake Hogan for letting us know!
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 Unusual Method Resulted in Discovery of Historic Graves
A cemetery in County Cork, Ireland recently “hired” sheep to help with cemetery maintenance, and it paid off with the discovery of grave markers previously unknown. The markers had been buried under vegetation, but the sheep ate away the covering, making it possible for the cemetery volunteers to “uncover headstones that haven’t been seen forever”.
You can read this “feel good” story here. Perhaps some of our cash-strapped municipalities should consider this alternative to mowing the cemeteries in their care – it could result in less damage to the markers and to discoveries like these ones.
Our thanks go to an eWeekly reader who sent us the link after discovering the story on Facebook.
Photo credit: Wikimedia Creative Commons.
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Before there was a country called Canada, First Nations people were trading furs, food and labour with men from England and Scotland who came to the “New World” as employees of the Hudson’s Bay Company. One of the things the “Company men” did best was to keep records. The archives of the Hudson’s Bay Company at the Provincial Archives of Manitoba are vast and rich with information. And much of their records are now accessible online, if you know where to look and are willing to invest the time. In this lecture Janice will introduce you to her ancestors — English mariners and fur traders, First Nations women, and their ‘country-born’ children — and the records she used to discover their stories.
Please join the Simcoe County Branch for this Zoom presentation as Janice Nickerson presents My Ancestors in the Hudson's Bay Fur Trade on Sat. August 7th at 2:00 pm EST. Registration link: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZwrc-uhrj4rH9BptdAYs_pkGuZReLsHMRIj
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See what school was like for your ancestors!
 Featuring a replica 19th century classroom and a display gallery, the Frontenac County Schools Museum houses thousands of artifacts, archival documents and photos that tell the story of early education in Ontario, particularly the schools in Frontenac County and the surrounding area. Visitors can sit in wooden desks that were once used in one room schools, write with a quill and ink, or participate in a lesson with our costumed school teacher!
The museum is open for in-person visits Tuesday - Saturday, 10:00 am – 4:00 pm until Labour Day weekend. Visit our website at www.fcsmuseum.com for more information on what to expect during your visit and the museum's Covid-19 protocols.
For those unable to visit in person, the museum's website also hosts a "virtual museum" program that features interactive online activities, interviews with teachers, and photos from the museum's collection. Research requests can also be accommodated. Please contact the museum at info@fcsmuseum.com with your inquiry.
The Museum is located at 414 Regent Street in Kingston (Barriefield Village). Look for us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube.
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August Webinar Will Help Us Use Google Maps
 Join Ontario Ancestors on Thursday, August 5th at 7:00 pm when Liane Kruger will guide us on using Google Maps for our genealogy research. Her presentation will include Google Maps for Migration, Brick Walls and Organizing a Trip to Your Ancestor’s Home.
If you haven’t had a chance to enjoy one of Liane’s genealogy presentations, you’re in for a treat. Her sessions are always well organized, fact-filled, and lots of fun!
Ontario Ancestors Webinars are free to everyone to watch the live session. Society members can watch the presentations any time in the Members Corner.
To register for this free event, click here.
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CGVRI 2022 Dates Announced
 With the success of Canadian Genealogical Virtual Research Intensive 2021, directors Christine Woodcock and Kathryn Lake Hogan announce the expansion of CGVRI to four courses in 2022. In-depth instruction of Canadian genealogical topics by Canadian genealogists! Details about the courses will be announced in January.
Mark your calendar and save these dates! Registration opens May 1, 2022.
Insert this link to the graphic: https://www.cgvri.com/2021/07/save-date-cgvri-2022-dates-announced.html
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Updates from our Favourite Bloggers
Shout Out – Thursday, August 5th is Blogger Day! Celebrate your favourite blogger by saying thanks!
The National Archives (U.K.) shared a story of a discovery hidden in their Elizabethan records. You can read about it in “Dude, where art thine quill?”
John D. Reid of Canada’s Anglo-Celtic Connections posted More from Canadiana.ca. He also provided an update in Who Do You Think Are the Top Tweeters? And John also wrote about webinars at the National Archives (U.K.) website in In Their Own Write: The Testimony of the Victorian English and Welsh Poor.
The Allen County Public Library will be hosting a webinar Lifting the Curtain in East European Family History Research on Tuesday, August 17th. You can learn more about it and register at this link. Thanks to the Ontario Ancestors’ Eastern Europe Special Interest Group for posting this on their Facebook page.
At Genealogy à la carte Gail Dever invited us to Celebrate Food Day Canada by exploring old family recipes to connect with your heritage. July 31st is Food Day Canada! She also wrote Scotland’s National Catholic Museum launches interactive virtual site. And check out Gail’s post Victorian mourning clothes for women and men, which provided a link to a post on Billion Graves.com on Victorian Mourning Clothes.
Ken McKinlay at Family Tree Knots posted 1911 Census of Canada and Addresses in Ontario.
At Olive Tree Genealogy Lorine McGinnis Schulze has a New Project: Obituaries, Haldimand County, Ontario, Canada.
Dick Eastman at Eastman’s Online Genealogy Newsletter asked Are We Really Better Off than Our Ancestors? He also posted No More Ransom Saves Almost €1 Billion in Ransomware Payments in 5 Years.
At The Hidden Branch, this week’s Tuesday’s Tip is about the use of the words “heritage” and “culture”.
This week’s Elevenses with Lisa from Lisa Louise Cooke was about FamilySearch Search Strategy Essentials. You can watch the video and see the show notes here.
At Finding Your Canadian Story Candice McDonald posted Immigration before 1865 at Library and Archives Canada Part 2. You can read Part 1 here.
Who Do You Think You Are? magazine reminds us that August 4th marks the anniversary of the beginning of the First World War, and posts an article about How to find First World War records.
The Drouin team at Genealogy Quebec posted 35,000 new marriages available on Genealogy Quebec, covering the years 2018 and 2019.
At Discover Genealogy Wayne Shepheard, or rather his wife Linda, relates the story behind a treasured piece of childhood memory in The Old Rocking Chair’s Got Me.
Lisa Lisson at Are You My Cousin? tells us how to Research Offline Genealogy Records – Even If You Cannot Travel!
At Family History Daily there’s a great article by Patricia Hartley 10 Ways to Improve Your Family Tree in 10 Minutes or Less.
Amy Johnson Crow gives us some practical guidance in How to Get Your Ancestor’s FindAGrave Memorial Transferred to You.
At The Ancestor Hunt Kenneth Marks give us Two Hidden Secrets to Find a Ton More Results from the FamilySearch Catalog – and it has a link to a free Quicksheet PDF!
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Eldon House Garden Walking Tour on August 7th
Brenna Ardiel, Eldon House Interim Program Coordinator
Join a Historical Interpreter for a guided tour of the Eldon House grounds on Saturday, August 7th at 10:00 am. View the beautiful and extensive gardens of the site and explore the original boundaries of the once Harris property; from the house, see the once-manicured terraces, and to what is now Harris Park. Please wear comfortable running shoes and prepare for the weather (rain or shine). Cost for this event is $12.00/person (incl. HST). To register, please visit www.eldonhouse.ca/events or call 519.661.5169.
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Ontario Ancestors, along with the Wellington Branch and the Scottish Special Interest Group are pleased to be participating again in the Festival this year!
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Take your genealogy skills to the next level with this FREE online genealogy conference, held each Friday in September: 30 live and pre-recorded webinars in all. Join live for all four Fridays or just one, and if you can't, we've got you covered! Enjoy the recordings at your convenience — they'll be free to view through the end of the month.
Register here to attend the live classes.
Here's the flyer. Print for yourself or share with your genealogy society and friends.
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What’s New at The Big 4?
 Explore 450 years of Scottish family milestones with millions of new parish registers! We've published over 10 million new baptism, marriage, and burial records, creating the largest collection of Scottish family history records available online.
This Findmypast Friday, we've added a vast new collection of 'Old Parish Registers' to the site in collaboration with local archives and organizations across Scotland.
These new additions include Scotland, Parish Births & Baptisms 1564-1929, Scotland, Parish Marriages & Banns 1561-1893 and Scotland, Parish Deaths & Burials 1564-2017.
We’ve just added 17 brand new newspapers and updated 28 others. The complete list can be found here.
You can also watch a video on Scottish Genealogy Research here.
 Ancestry’s Recently Added and Updated Collections include Norway Church Records 1812-1938 as well as U.S. new and updated collections for Massachusetts, New Hampshire and New York, and updates to the U.S. Newspapers.com Marriage Index, 1800s-1999.
Click the link above to see what’s new!
 Search 3.8 million more Netherlands historical records added this week at FamilySearch, and nearly one million more records from Ontario, Canada (1834-1899) and England – Nottinghamshire and Staffordshire.
Fill in missing family connections from added Catholic Church records from Chile, Costa Rica, Guatemala, and the Ukraine. US collections were expanded for Massachusetts, New Jersey, Utah and Wisconsin.
You can find the complete list of this week’s additions here.
Be sure to check out the Family History Library Classes and Webinars coming up in August. The wide range of topics ensures that everyone can benefit from this education, whether brand-new to family history or an experienced researcher. Along with basics such as Using the FamilySearch Catalog and Tips and Tricks for Finding Elusive Records in Family Search to country-specific sessions on German, Portuguese, and Nordic records, there are even webinars in Spanish and Chinese. For the full list of webinars in August, click here! And remember that the times given are in the Mountain time zone.
 We have recently published 4.7 million new records in three collections from New Zealand – Birth Index, 1840-1901, Marriage Index, 1840-1901, and Death Index, 1840-1901. Read more about these collections here! This week’s blog post tells the story He Was the First Olympic Champion in 1,500 Years… and No One Cared! And Daniel Horowitz tells us “research shows that kids who know stories from their family history are more emotionally healthy.” There are some great ideas in MyHeritage’s Knowledge Base article Children and Genealogy: How to Get Your Kids to Love Family History.
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Aurora Historical Society “How to Care for” Series
Proper care and maintenance of the heirlooms in your personal collection will ensure that they stay safe for future generations. Show and brag about your favourite family items while learning the simple tips and tricks to preserve them at home. These events will be virtual, pre-registration required. The upcoming events in this series:
- August 12th at 7:00 pm – Care of textiles, furniture, paintings, hanging works of art
- October 7th at 7:00 pm – Care of glass, ceramics, and metal objects
These events are admission by donation. Click here to register. https://aurorahs.com/how-care-series-1
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A Colonial Governor’s Creative Math
 In the latest Discover blog post, curator Forrest Pass puts some historical context around the recognition of British Columbia’s sesquicentennial of provincehood. Using a photo from LAC’s collection, the author writes about the changing face of the new province – in 1871 “a series of First Nations and Métis Nation communities with a very small settler one.”
You can read the full post here.
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FREE WEBINAR: Lianne Kruger
DATE: Thursday, August 5th at 7:00 pm EDT
Google Maps for Migration, Brick Walls and Organizing a Trip to Your Ancestor’s Home
We will use Google Maps to see where your ancestors walked, plot the migration of your ancestors, plot where your earliest known ancestor was located and organize a trip. This session will explain how to use Google Maps to:
- see what is now in the location of an ancestor’s home
- add these locations with stars and labels under your Google account share these with other family members
- plot the migration of ancestral families
- mark the locate of your Earliest Known Ancestors to organize where your research
- layout an ancestral trip by locating places to visit and the order to visit them such as homes and graveyards.
Lianne Kruger, is a professional genealogist and speaker specializing in Canada, homesteading for U.S. and Canada, video recording family history, and using technology in all aspects of genealogy.
For more information and to register, click here!
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Check out our Global Events Calendar on the our website to see the meetings and events coming up soon. During the pandemic all of the events listed will take place in an online environment.
Branch or SIG events will appear in the Calendar on the Ontario Ancestors website if it is included on the events calendar of the Branch/SIG website.
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