My Tangent – Christmas Lights – Google Ngram Viewer: Use For Genealogy

Morning,

It has been raining this morning… and I am so, so glad. And the prediction is that there is another cold front heading our way.

Yesterday I decided to get into some sort of Holiday spirit and decorate the front yard of our house. I am so glad that it was a beautiful day, cause if I had waited until today, which is wet, and damp, and cold, and overcast, you would never have seen any type of electronic Cheer emanating from this house.

Google Labs has just introduced a great, great new tool, the Books Ngram Viewer. It is a very handy and good tool if you are a bibliophile and/or a logophile.

This tool is a must for this genealogy researcher. In the due course of my work, there are times when I find that understanding the meaning of a word or phrase from a specific time or period can help me narrow the scope of a search. As I comprehend the usage of a word or phrase, and when it was used, I am able to construct a scenario of the events based on time and meaning of the same.

Given a specific word, it may have a particular meaning today, that is now in 2010, but it could have had a different meaning in 1810.

Having this tool assists me to pin-point the use of a word or phrase by providing literature, cross-referenced to Google Books that may have published at the time. This in due course helps to discover associations of my ancestors and/or connections.

Enjoy,

Jim

Click here to continue reading...

Part 317o – Olton Genealogy – Some Research Aids

Afternoon,

Happy National Pecan Pie Day… I wonder if you get many pecan pies in Ontario, California, or Austria?

I thought I would pass on a couple of ideas regarding the search and research for Manfred Percival Olton. You can see a Time Line of his life listed under my Analyses tab below the header.

There is a limited preview of this book – Genealogies of Barbados Familes: From Caribbeana The Journal of Barbados Museum and Historical Society – online at Google Books . Some of the key Olton pages are missing from the online Google version.

The book is actually available through Amazon.com for $55.00. There are some used versions available from $44.50 to $217.55. plus shipping. There are also new versions offered for between $52.00 to $200.62 plus shipping. The Amazon deal appears to be the best deal.

There is a copy of the same book at the Toronto Public Library. There are also copies at the Sacramento Public Library and the Hillsborough County Public Library in Tampa.

World Vital Records has Genealogies of Barbados Families cross-referenced online at their website. The book has been indexed and there are 69 hits for the surname Olton. Main issue here, you may need to have a membership subscription.

Check out the following by Donald L. Hinson, Jr. – Barbados Family Research Reference Guide.

Another good source is The Monumental Inscriptions In The Churches And Churchyards Of The Island of Barbados, British West Indies by Vere Langford Oliver dated 1915 at Archive.org. There are seven Olton hits. He, Oliver, is also the author of the Caribbeana Volumes. In The Monumental Inscriptions there is a Samwel Perry Olton.

There are six Collections indexed and available at the new Family Search Beta site that all may relate to births, baptism, marriages, and deaths in Barbados.

Enjoy,

Jim

Click here to continue reading...

My Tangent – Could Be A Genealogy-Support Tool

Morning,

Just chanced upon this relatively new product this morning, at Book of Joe. It’s the next generation of a portable white board. I haven’t tried it as yet but it appears that it would be somewhat beneficial for my cramped research space. It can stick and adhere to most backgrounds. I usually have reams of post-its stuck all over my monitors. I also like to sketch out quick and immediate diagrams and doodles without having to check to see if I have some software that could do the same.

Here is an image of the available sizes.

The brand name, WhiteyBoard, may not be sacrosanct. The individual sizes are called Sonia, Alice, and Bertha. The Alices are already sold out at their site. Check it out at their website.

Enjoy,

Jim

Click here to continue reading...