Updates and New Pages for the Week of June 7 - 13, 2009

Updates:

British Columbia - eight new links from Our Roots

St. Clair County, Illinois - one link from Ancestry

Essex County, Massachusetts - three links, one each from InternetArchive, DistantCousin and Eve and Don

Articles - added five links to articles about researching city directories. The one by Kory Meyerlink is especially helpful and detailed, in my opinion.

New Pages:

United Kingdom

England* - with four links

Bristol County, Massachusetts - with three links

Hampden County, Massachusetts - with one link

Hampshire County, Massachusetts - with one link

Middlesex County, Massachusetts - with two links

Norfolk County, Massachusetts - with four links

Plymouth County, Massachusetts - with two links

Suffolk County, Massachusetts - with twelve links (Boston is in Suffolk County)

Arizona - with one link

Maricopa County, Arizona - with four links

Pima County, Arizona - with two links

*I haven't decided yet if I will break up the four countries of the United Kingdom (England, Scotland, North Ireland and Wales) into county pages. For the time being, I will leave it. If I find too many links to keep the pages neat, organized and unconfusing, I will further categorize them by county.

I've also begun adding county pages for all the United States. These county pages are not "live" and do not have links on them. However, it will make it easier for me when I come across resources; I'll be able to put the links on the already-created county pages and then make them live. Creating pages is one of the more time-consuming details of my webmaster tasks, and although this behind-the-scenes activity isn't readily obvious to my readers, it will eventually speed along the process of getting data on the website.

Thank you to all who continue to send me links. My list is ever-growing! Also thanks to you all who are being patient with me while I correct and update pages that I first created weeks ago in the old format.

Happy Hunting!

NY and QC Updates

The last few days, I've added many new pages and added links to old pages:

New York State:

Broome County - one link from Distant Cousin

Monroe County - 64 links, many from the Monroe County Library District, but a few from some other resources

New York City - two new Brooklyn links from Distant Cousin

Oneida County - one new link from Distant Cousin

Ontario County - two links

Ulster County - one link

Wayne County - one link

Canada:

Quebec - seven links from Library and Archives Canada

African-American Residential and Business Directories

Do you have African roots? Then you'll be pleased to discover there are many city directories that can help you in your genealogical research. Many cities and large communities had either a section of the city directory, or a separate directory altogether, dedicated to listing African-American residents and businesses. In the 1800s and early 1900s, these were often called Colored Directories or Negro Business Directories.

To find these on my site, use the search engine located in the upper right-hand corner on any page. Search for colored or negro. To find these on the directory websites themselves, even in directories that don't prominently display a separate section for African-Americans, do a directory-wide search, again for the words colored or negro. Sometimes the compiler would list one of these words after a resident's name in the directory. Although this was a racist act, it does help those today who are tracing their African roots.

NYC Updates

I added the Tremont Baptist Church Directory of 1916 to the New York City page.

What's in the works: Monroe County, New York - Stay tuned! There are tons of links for this county to many resources, and those with Monroe County/Rochester roots will be pleased to know that this collection will cover 1827 to 1947 with very little gaps!

Even More IL Updates

The Cook County, Illinois pages are now corrected and updated through the year 1890. I also discovered that the New England Historic Genealogical Society has a digital library containing city and other directories on its website (you must be a subscriber to access the images). I linked to the Chicago City Directory of 1858 at that site.

More IL Updates

The Cook County, Illinois page links have now been corrected and updated through the year 1880. More to come. Again, thanks for your patience with this!

E-mail Address, Screen Resolution, and Opening a Page

Because I've been getting so much spam, I've changed the way I display my e-mail address on the site. When you look at the bottom of any page, you will now see "Report errors and broken links or send suggestions for new listings here." When you click on the link, it will open your e-mail software and input kidmiffATgmailDOTcom in the address line. You will, of course, need to change the AT to @ and the DOT to .

I've also made a note about the screen resolution at the bottom of each page. I've had complaints that sometimes the tables on the pages appear to go off the screen on the right. This happens if you have a monitor with 800X600 screen resolution. You'll need to change it to 1024X768, if possible (sometimes if your monitor is older, you will still have "issues" or different issues, if you change the screen resolution). To change your resolution on a PC, go to Start, Control Panel, Display, then click the Settings tab. Move the slider over until it says 1024X768, then click either OK or Apply.

Every page link to another page on the site now opens in the same tab or window in which you are viewing. Links to other sites will still open in a new tab.