Inside the Utah State historical Society

When it comes to photos and artifacts of Utah's history, the Utah State Historical Society has it. Located at the historic Rio Grande Depot at 300 South and 400 West in downtown Salt Lake City, the state has preserved hundreds of thousands of photos and historic items. Doug Misner and michele Elnicky of the Sociey shared some of the hisoric treasures held within this treasure chest. They brought out one photo of LDS Church President Brigham Young, his tow counselors in the First Presidency, and the members of the Quorum of the Twelve. This photo was taken in 1868 by Charles Savage. The glass negative was found in the home of George M Ottinger's son at 273 F Street. Ottinger was a Utah painter who was an early partner of Savage between 1862 and 1867. Many recognize this historic photo, but it us usually cropped to only show about a third of the image. The parts of the photograph that are usually cut out give interesting glimpses into that moment when the photograph was taken. In the background is Brigham Young's schoolhouse. A young man and young women peak from behind the tent backdrop set up for the photo. The Ottinger family, back in 1964, gave nine boxes of photos and negatives to the state.

Another treasure at the Utah State Historical Society is the Savage Portrait Collection. If you are looking for a photo of a relative that lived in Salt Lake in the 1920's, this collection has over 19,000 photos with names of the individual portraits. An index can be found on line at history. utah.gove/research and collections/index. If you want to see photos of building, people and events, you can look at the Shipler Collection of over 100,000 images, or Clifford Bray, City Engineers Office, or peoples of Utah photo collections. Some 50,000 plus images are currently on line. The Utah State Historical Society is more than just photographs. It houses historically significant objects as well. For example, if you were ever wondering what happened to early Utah attorney, legislator, and later, U.S. Supreme Court Justice, George Sutherland's desk, it is in the basement at the Rio Grande. It keeps company with Kennecott mining giant Daniel C. Jackling's World War 1 uniform. Early Utah films of river rafting, skiing and parades are also there.

One of the most well used resources in the collection is the city directories, which goes from the late 1850's to present. The directories show the names, addresses and occupations of the residents of the city. Later, after people began to get telephones, these directories included phone numbers. They also have other major Utah cities in the collection. Not many people know about the Sanborn maps that started in the mid 1860's and ran into the late 20th century. The maps show every street and every building or home, including what they were made of and their dimentions. The maps were used by insurance companies to define individual insurance rates.

If you want to see a few thousand photos of the 2002 Olympic Winter Games, they are on their website. Another well used section is the yearbooks of Utah's high schools and universities. Many of them go back to 1900. If you can't find a printed item you want you can check the State Archives that shares the research center with the Hisorical Society at the Rio Grande. Both organizatins are happy to assist with your search for early documents and records.

Real Neat Information on Family History Research

It was done already. That's why Sean Sullivan, 57, never did much family history, until the Provo resident discoverd he was related to Samuel Clemens, better known as Mark Twain. Sean Sullivan made the connection on Relative Finder, a free Facebook application that uses data from FamilySearch.org to show how users are related to friends and famous people Since then, he has spent hours, logging 40 hours in one week, digesting ancestor research online. This year family history viewers have topped 149 million, based on website statistics from Compete.com, as users, typically aged 45 and older, seek out connections to relatives.

More than 100 million records will be made available this year via companies like Salt Lake City based FamilySearch International, owned by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Provo based Ancestry.com Inc and Palo Alto, California based Archives.com. Part time ancestral sleuths are turning to the internet to find their progenitors, with companies trying to keep up with a growing market. "Stuff keeps changing on FamilySearch almost daily, "Sullivan said. "You go back today and look at a family line, you may find it goes back deeper than it was last week, or even yesterday. For some reason I hadn't tapped into it before." With more interest in the market, there is a scramble to gather content in order to keep up with the growth. This has even led to major partnerships, including FamilySearch partnering with Ancestry to digitize the content in the LDS church's Granite Mountain Records Vault, where only 20 percent of the 4 billion records have been digitized.

FamilySearch's total searchable names have risen 15 percent to 2.3 billion this year, after a 54 percent jump in 2010. FamilySearch will open its third data center in Kansas City. The 63,000 square foot building will house computer servers that contain digitized documents. The site also allows users to share findings, adding a social aspect that enhances the searching experience and ensure the names in their family tree are accurate. Only 10 percent of the site's visitors are members of the LDS church. The vast mahority of the records of the world are still offline and are not searchable by computers as yet. Familysearch's name indexing uses 125,000 volunteers which are able to do the indexing 40 times faster than previously was done.

Riverton and Salt Lake Family History Classes

"Marriages, Death, Divorce and Munchkins: Grandma Poff's Legacy of Love and Family History" is the title of Dan Poffenburger's keynote address at 9:a.m. on September 17 at the Riverton FamilySearch Library. Pottenburger, a senior content strategist for the patron services division of the LDS Church's Family History Department, credits his Grandma "Poff" for his love of family History.

She was a devout Baptist, the daughter of parents with seven marriages between them. She was also an orphan, who turned tragedy into triumph, and the lessons she taught have inspired young and old for generations. He has been researching professionally for 23 years and is accredited in England research by the International Commission for the Accreditation of Professional Genealogists (ICAPGen). After his presentation, there will be two blocks of one-hour classes. At 10 a.m., the classes include: "Lassie! Go for Free Genealogy Help!" by Robert Raymond; "City Directories: More Than Names and Addresses" by Jason Harrison; "Using State Archives and Local Libraries Online" by Luana Darby and "Everything You wanted to Know about Fold3 (formerly Footnote.com), by Bret Petersen. At 11 a.m., the classes include: "Best Strategies for Searching Ancestry.Com" by Chista Cowan; "U.S. Land Research" by Beth Taylor: and "Research Strategies and Websites" by Diana Toland: and "Everything You Wanted to Know about Fold3 (formerly Footnote.com" by Bret Petersen. The seminar is fee and registration is not required. The Riverton FamilySearch Library is at LDS Riverton Office Building at 3740 Market Center Drive at the intersection of Bangerter Highway and 13400 South, just east of The Home Depot

A seminar on Enland intermediate research will be held on September 17 at the Family History Library in downtown Salt Lake City. Classes include: " Records of the Poor" at 9 a.m.; "Probate Records & Indexes" at 10 a.m.; "Practice Time" at 11 a.m. and 3 p.m.; "Nonconformist Church Records" at 1 p.m.; and "Pre-1837 Research Strategies" at 2 p.m. Other mid-week classes include "English Census Records and Indexes" at 1 p.m. on September 15; "Church of England Records and Indexes" at 2 p.m. on September 22; and "Finding English Pre-1837 Marriages" on September 29 at 1 p.m. To view the class schedule online, go to www.familysearch.org. The library is located west of Temple Square on West Temple between North Temple and South Temple Streets in downtown Salt Lake City. On Saturdays, parking is free to library patrons and is located behind the Church History Museum. To register for these free classes, send an email to FHLClassReg@familysearch.org or call 1-801-240-4950.

Ancestry.Com Releases the 1930 Mexico National Census

Ancestry. Com, the world's largest online family history resource, announced a significant addition to its growing collection of online Mexican and Hispanic historical records. With nearly 13 million records, the newly available 1930 Mexico National Census (El Quinto Censo General de Poblacion y Vivienda 1930 Mexico) is the most comprehensive historical Mixican census available online., It is estimated that this census counted approximately 90 percent of the population, therefore for nearly 30 million Americans who can trace their families to Mexico, it provides a valuable gateway to begin researching Mexican family history, especially if family, vital or religious records are lost.

Mexico's first formally recognized federal or national census was taken in 1895. Starting in 1900, censuses were taken every 10 years, making the 1930 Mexico Census the fifth official government census, or formally the Fifth General Census of Housing and Population. This particular census is significant in Mexican history as federal officials sought to make it a vehicle for national unity. A successful campaign urging citizens to take part as a civic duty resulted in an extremely high participation rate-primary reason why the 1930 Mexican Census is considered the best Mexican census conducted in the 20th century. The 1930 Mexico National Census provides a wide spectrum of details about individuals and families and can offer valuable insight into their lives. In addition to demographic data such as name, age, gender, birthplace, address and marital status, the census form also recorded nationality, religion, occupation, real estate holdings, literacy and any physical or mental defects. The millions of records in the collection reveal some interesting statistics about life in Mexico in 1930: 1. The most common given female name was Maria and the most common given male name was Juan. 2. The three most common surnames were Hernandez, Garcia and Martinez. 3. Nearly 18 percent of the population were recorded as single, 11 percent were civil and church marriage, 10 percent were church marriage and 8 percent were living together without marriage. 4. The four most populous Mexican states were Puebla, Veracruz, Jalisco and Oaxaca. 5. Famous Mexicans found in the collection include Maria Felix (1914-2002), who was among the best known Mixican actresses and Carmello Torres Fregoso (1927-2003), a renowned bullfighter who later became a successful businessman. "As the United States is home to the second largest Mexican community in the world, Mexican-Americans comprise 10 percent of the total U.S. population therefore it is fitting that the world's largest online family history resource now has an expansive collection to serve this important demographic," said Josh Hanna, Ancestry.Com Executive Vice President. While the 1930 Mexico Census is the newest and largest collection of Mexican records on Ancestry.Com, there are a number of other collections that may be helpful when conducting Mexican family history research, including Border Crossings: From Mexico to U.S., 1895-1957; Nuevo Leon and Tamaulipas, Mexico, Selected Parish Records, 1751-1880; and the Spanish-American Family History Guide. To start researching the 1930 Mexico Census for free, please visit www.ancestry.com/Mexico.

How to Read Old English Handwriting

One of the best websites to learn how to read old English handwriting is www.NationalArchives.gov.uk/paleography. The use of the website is free and has many tutorials that will help you learn to read the handwriting found in documents written in English between 1500 and 1800.

At first glance, many documents written at this time look illegible to the modern reader. By reading the practical tips and working through the documents in the tutorials in order of difficulty, you will find that it becomes much easier to read old handwriting. This website has many many documents to practice on to improve your reading skills of old English handwriting.

You will be able to practice your reading skills of old English handwriting for the 16th century, the 17th century and the 18th century. To the surprise of some, after 1733 official documents were written in English. Before that time, official documents were written in Latin. The website has tutorials to teach you to read Latin.

The website also teaches your about dates. 1752 was the first year in England to officially begin on 1 January. Until the Calendar Act of 1752, the year in England began officially on 25 March (Lady Day), and not 1 January (even though this was when New Year's Day was celebrated). Arabic numbers were not used in England until the 16th century, and even after then Roman numerals continued to be used.