Comments on: Why such little interest in Central and South American records?

By: barcelona spain

barcelona spain — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 11:33:48 +0000

I agree that it’s quite strange although gary has hit the nail on the head I think with his respones.The horse definitely has to come before the cart when dealing with South America.

By: Andy Hatchett

Andy Hatchett — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 02:59:09 +0000

Just exactly why should they show interest when Ancestry itself has shown practically none?

Very few records, very few south American countries shown in drop down menus, etc…

Little accomodation for the non-english spreaking…

Recitfy these and maybe there would be enough on Ancestry to attract their attention… maybe

By: Ana Montoya

Ana Montoya — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 05:26:48 +0000

It would be extremely nice to have a section in Ancestry.com dedicated to Central/South America. I agree with other commentaries when they say that if Ancestry provides that service people will follow. I have being doing genealogy for the last 20 years and helping others do theirs. I use Ancestry to work on my italian side for the tree, but I can’t use Ancestry for the rest. It is quite difficult to search for records, specially in Peru. I use the FHCenters (I volunteer in one of them) and order microfilms from them, but they don’t have everything. We need Ancestry to come forward and provide a service that so desperately we are looking for.

Regards,
Ana Montoya

By: Katuska Serrano Christensen

Katuska Serrano Christensen — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 15:05:15 +0000

I fully agree with the first response to this article form Randy Seaver. I have found virtually no information here so I have turned to FamilySearch and to local family history centers that have proven to be truly invaluable. As a member of the peruvian genealogy group in yahoo I have noticed that while many interested genalogists want access to more records they need information to be in spanish and there is also the issue of cost. When you convert the cost of a subscription to ancestry to the local currency and what you get for it so far, it simply seems to be not worth it.
Regards,
Katuska Serrano de Christensen

By: OFRAME

OFRAME — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 07:20:48 +0000

Dear Gary,
I feel that your information is terribly skewed for the following reasons.
1. I have written to your company various times asking that you include
“Mexico” on your drop down menu of countries. Years later I have yet to see it listed. How do you expect someone to find their ancestors on a site that doesn’t even acknowledge this latin american country which shares a border with the US let alone any of the other hispanic countries in the western hemisphere?
2. I also find that the lack of data your site has related to this has made me and others look elsewhere for information-other hispanic genealogy web groups, LDS, european genealogy database companies similiar to yours which are all free of charge and have more content. Your company charges a fee and offers hardly any content for that price.
3. Your search engine software needs to acknowledge the difference in surname customs-not only for hispanics-because currently your search engines do not differentiate between paternal and maternal ordering. Not having a way to show both surnames and prioritize them correctly makes using your site extremely frustrating to hispanic users.
4. Language barrier- your site doesn’t even have a spanish language web listing or web page for that matter.
5. Cost- also stated that many hispanic genealogists may find your fees a little too high given the cost of inflation in their countries and the non existent cost of living increases to their paychecks.
6. Internet access- many hispanic genealogists have limited internet access and have to pay per use fees for internet access unlike most american households with unlimited 24/7 access.
All of these problems lend themselves to making you site extremely unfriendly and hostile to hispanic users and also gives your company an air of arrogance which many hispanics find offensive. The Anglo-Saxon way is not the one and only way to do things in the world and even more so in genealogy. I hope that your company does take these issues into account and makes changes to its format in the very near future.

By: Robert Lowe

Robert Lowe — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 11:00:00 +0000

I am a UK based user mainly focused on my English Ancestry.
However my mothers family featured heavily in the British West Indies. I was born in Jamaica, I lived a number of years in British Guiana (Now Guyana) I cannot access any information from there, although I know a rich archive of information exists in Guyana, although it is very much being destroyed by time, records exist of slaves being imported from West Africa.
It would be brilliant if we could save those records and make the content available.

Regards
Robert Lowe

By: Gary Gibb

Gary Gibb — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 18:04:17 +0000

Thanks for the additional comments. This feedback is very useful. I appreciate your desire for more records from Mexico, Chile, Peru, etc.
It is true that we don’t have Mexico listed on the some current search drop down lists but if you try the new search (look for it on the home page or search page) then you can put in Mexico as a location.
The new search interface should help people more easily find the Central and South American records we do have and help show case them as we add many new records.
Thanks again
Gary Gibb

By: Arlene Miles

Arlene Miles — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 03:12:37 +0000

Will you be adding any newspapers from Long Island New York?
The Long Island Advance
Newdsday
New York Daily News

I sure do miss these now that I live in California.

By: Tom Santa Cruz

Tom Santa Cruz — Sun, 01 Jun 2008 19:36:20 +0000

Those of us doing Latin American research have had to look else where for records. The Family History Center has been a great resource, the Online Spanish Archives [pares.mcu.es] are another, also GeneaNet.com, I saw last year that WorldVitalRecords.com included family records from Argentina and others (some have already been referred to in earlier comments.)

Ancestry.com has generally neglected Spanish records in the U.S. There are records for Florida, Louisiana, Colorado, the Southwest and California that are all but ignored. There are a few books in ancestry.com that address these areas. Someone already mentioned that wow the US Censuses for Puerto Rico are about all that is found for this U.S. territory.

Hispanic Genealogy is not any more homogeneous that that of New England. Even Mexican genealogy varies across the county and even more across Latin America. The practice of the two surnames differs across Latin America. There are country specific websites with databases, certainly nothing on a par with Ancestry,com in size for non-Hispanic records.

I hope that I addressed your open question.

By: Robin Mina

Robin Mina — Sat, 31 May 2008 21:12:56 +0000

Gary, I am interested in records from CHILE. I know a lot of info was also registered in England, but not enough. In particular, Santiago– where most Chileans live–or Valparaiso are large population centers for English-speaking immigrants from the UK (many still speak English).

On another note, living in Texas, I know there is a large potential market for Mexican records. A friend I recommended to Ancestry has been held up by the lack of Mexican resources and will probably cancel if she hasn’t already. I will mention to her your post about the Mexican records.

I would also like to see records from Spain since my genealogy may involve Spain to Napoleonic Italy.