World Digital Library

Interesting site, useful for students and genealogy/history research. The best part is it's free! This is a site for the whole world, there are maps, history, images, all sorts of info. It is divided basically by continent. I tried Europe and found a lot I want to look over. I picked one item, a map of Austria-Hungary, and was able to zoom in very close to read the names of cities. I will definitely be going back to look at info on my areas of research. It is available in several languages too. :)

about the project
http://project.wdl.org/project/english/index.html

the actual library
http://www.wdl.org/en/

Free searches and software

Family Search is especially helpful for those starting out or not wanting to invest money in software. The LDS (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints), offers so much at their website. You can search and use their free software, PAF (Personal Ancestral File), plus they have help files and forms to print out. I was directed to do searches at their site and found the help available useful. They even have info by country and dictionaries etc. Since I have many countries I need to research, I make sure to check with them and recheck months later. They are adding new info all the time too. In fact you can get lost for hours researching and reading all the info available on the site.

Also be sure to check for a Family History Center near you. :)

Search, software, a local center, helps etc, find it all here:

Family Search

Happy Earth Day!

Well it is Earth Day once again. It gets more attention this year than it has in a long time. It seems every decade since the 70s movement to save the environment by recycling and reuse, things change for a while. I remember buying books for my sons when they were young, about saving the earth and wildlife. There were even some kids shows about it, along with it being taught in school. The attitude to change and be more earth friendly seems to come and go. I wish it would stay for good this time. I want the world to be a clean, beautiful place for my sons, their future children and future generations. Okay off my soap box. :)

Find Alternate Surname Spellings

This site is really great for helping with researching, especially more difficult surnames. I tried it and found spellings I never would have thought of before and you can also try the search on given names. :)

http://www.familytrackers.com/ftprelogin/soundexsurname.jsp

Secret from WWII

I found a very interesting story in my recent GeneaNet newsletter. Women were truly doing their share of fighting in WWII by the jobs they held. This story is about a woman in Fresno, California whose job was one of an elite group of interceptor operators. Their job was to type the Japanese radio broadcasts to be decoded. To read more:

http://www.fresnobee.com/local/story/1339552.html

Surprises all around

I found a way to sign up to receive notices from the CDC (Center for Disease Control) and the FDA (U.S. Food & Drug Administration). I cannot believe how many notices a day I receive! The CDC does give out some good health info for women etc, you can pick what you want. The FDA sends out recalls which aren't only food, but also plasma, blood, drugs, surgical devices, even surgical instruments! One notice today was for surgical scissors that had rough outer edges that could cause injury to blood vessels during surgery, and another was a recall for plasma and blood because a donor had traveled in Malaria infested areas! I signed up because of all the food recalls on the news but never expected the variety of things being recalled. Like there isn't enough going on these days!

I signed up for Genline to do some Swedish research, only to find out my antivirus will not allow me to install their viewer, says it has a Win32 trojan installer. I contacted Genline and explained my Kaspersky found a trojan and what should I do. I received a quick reply, they tried it out with Kaspersky and had the same result, so they contacted Kaspersky labs and I am waiting to hear if anything can be done. At least I was given the option to get a refund or wait and see. I would like to try them out and see if I can find any info, I don't have much to go on.

Great short genealogy tips

I hope you had a nice Easter, I did, even though part of the day was spent cooking and cleaning up.
I found a blog with some really great genealogy tips I wanted to share.

http://georgegmorgan.livejournal.com/

Happy Easter!

I hope you have a wonderful Easter. I'm still working at organizing my genealogy and thinking I will start a journal on the computer, it takes too long to write it out plus I might misplace it. I was thinking whenever something reminds me of the past, whether growing up or my kids, I could write it out and have it for family history or for scrapping. I sure wish previous generations had done that so I would know more about how life was for them. :)

Free ebook through Family Tree Magazine

I was just reading through old email and found this link for a free ebook from Family Tree Magazine. You have to sign up for their newsletter, but the ebook, Best of the Photo Detective, is from Photo Detective and worth signing up. Plus the newsletter is worth receiving also. You don't have to subscribe to the magazine, although I do and enjoy all the tips and links. If you get a pop up to subscribe to the magazine you can click no if you aren't interested. You only need to give your email address and after clicking "submit" you will be taken to the page with the download link. It is in pdf format so you can save it. It is 42 pages of how to look for clues in old photos, especially helpful if you aren't sure of the time period.

http://www.familytreemagazine.com/enews