World Archives Project

It’s been a while since you’ve heard from us.  But, we’ve been busy cooking up some exciting things for you in the coming weeks and months.

FIRST UP – we published two new collections to you for keying yesterday.

Seaman’s Protection Certificates contain proof of citizenship used by seamen to apply for protection certificates at ports in Maine, New Hampshire, Louisiana, and Pennsylvania between 1792 and 1868.  Once again I’m struck by one of the things that I absolutely love about being involved in the Ancestry World Archives Project – namely, there are records that exist that I would never even know existed if not for my involvement in this great program.  So, I will key these records – not because I expect that one of my ancestors will be in this particular collection but because I want to familiarize myself more fully with the kinds of records that exist and what kind of information is found in these records.  I know it will only make me a better genealogist.  Oh, and I’ll also key them because I believe in genealogy karma – if I’m keying this maybe it will help someone find their elusive sailor ancestor.  And just maybe someone else is keying a record that contains one of my elusive ancestors.

The other project we published for keying yesterday is the London, England Land Tax Valuation (1910).  Considering it has only been out there for less than 24 hours and is already over 10% complete you might want to jump on this quickly if you want a peek at these records.  It contains a list of tenants and property owners in that place and time.  It is pretty interesting stuff.

NEXT UP – we have been busy planning our conference season.  We will kick that off by hosting a FREE Ancestry.com Webinar entitled: Getting the Most Out Of Your Ancestry.com Subscription.  This webinar will be held on Thursday, April 8th at 6:00 pm (Mountain Time) and it will be taught by yours truly.  We hope you will make plans to join us for that.

And, if you are going to be at any of the following conferences, please be sure to look for us.  We would love to meet you and thank you personally for your contribution.

28 April – 1 May – NGS Family History Conference

11 -13 June – Southern California Genealogical Society Jamboree

11-16 July – International Conference on Jewish Genealogy

18-21 August – FGS Annual Genealogy Conference

THIRD – we’ve held a couple of virtual keying parties and they’ve been pretty successful.  Hundreds of us all get online at a pre-arranged time to key.  We each share what projects we are working on and cheer each other on as we complete image sets.  All of the AWAP staff also participate which makes us available (through Twitter) for immediate chat and feedback.  Our next keying party will be held Monday, April 5th from 10:00 am to 2:00 pm (Mountain Time).  In the meantime, we are going to try having various staff members available on Twitter for live chat within a day or two of launching new projects.  That means, this Friday (March 26th) we’ll be on Twitter from 11:00 am – Noon to answer any questions you might have about these two new projects.  You can follow us here:  http://Twitter.com/WorldArchives or you can use the hashtag #awap to track the conversation and responses.

FINALLY –  as busy as we are, you’ve been even busier.  You have already keyed and arbitrated over 2.3 million records so far this month.  That’s amazing!  Thanks to each of you for your contributions to this amazing program.

Phew!  That is a lot going on around here.  So, I guess…

Until next time – Happy Keying!

P.S. – we are cooking up something big for summer time.  We think you’ll be excited about it.  We know we are.  The details aren’t all set yet so we can’t talk much about it.  But, be sure to watch this space for the big announcement.