The Good Old Days!!!!!

[maryphil]

A lot of people that I research for, especially those from overseas are relying more and more on DNA to prove their genealogical origins.
It got me thinking back to when I first got interested in Family History in the mid eighties. Nothing like Ancestry or Find My Past existed and to look at a census you had to travel to Portugal Street. the census reading rooms there opened in 1972 and coincided with the release of the 1871 census. All the other census 1841,51 and 61 had their own rooms. You sat at these huge microfilm machines, oh how I hated them. Everyone was very quiet all concentrating on the few precious hours that they had to find as many of their ancestors as they could. I do remember one lady shouting eureka out loud when she found something and everyone looked at her most disapproving.
Our Beds Society used to make and occasion of it once a month hire a mini van and drive down. Some went to Portugal Street and others to the S.O.G., we were lucky the driver was a member and dropped us off right outside. In December we went home through Oxford Street so we got a trip to see the lights. Then we had the big trip down to the T.N.A., that was really the highlight of the year. If you think the system there now is complicated, it was even more so in those days.
I've got loads more memories of my early days in Family History. Does anyone else remember those times?
I think we are so lucky now and have it all handed to us on a plate.
Regards
Mary

[Lindsay]

My dad started to investigate the family tree in the 1960s, and he took my sister and me to Somerset House to track down some BMD certificates.

I was only about 10 and didn't really understand what we were doing - but I loved the enormous books, and I can still remember how amazed I was at being allowed to touch something that old.

Come to think of it, I still feel much the same when I look at original documents at the RO!

[Merry]

Yes, we have lots of information handed to us on a plate, but that just means we are more greedy!

OH and I have been researching our trees for decades too, but I've only been to London once for proper research - to Myddleton Strreet in about 1995. OH has been to Kew and the Hyde Park FHS and dozens of times to our "local" county record office in Dorchester which takes about the same length of time to get to as London!

For me, researching my tree in the '80s comprised of writing down what I knew about my mother's side - quite a lot on some lines - back to my 3 or 4xg-grandparents, though mainly names and places only, not dates. Also thinking I would be the one to sort out the 2,000 Victorian photos which I could see were going to come may way some time. (only fully getting to grips with that now lol). We spent several years through the '80s and '90s searching for a distant cousin's "genealogical book" and eventually found it in the loft of his grandson in Somerset in 2003. By this time I had researched most of the lines recorded in the book and it was fascinating to compare that with my cousin's work carried out between about 1890 and 1960. His book extends to about 2,000 people.

On my dad's side it was a completely different story. I still have the bit of paper I wrote the list of his siblings names on in 1974 or 1975 (when I was about ten). I got the names from two of my aunts who struggled to name all their siblings (14 altogether) and certainly were not sure of the right order! Neither of them knew their own father's exact full name and it was years before I made any headway with this side of my tree - almost none until online records started to become available.

I do remember going to our local reference library (I don't know when it was - maybe 1990?) to look for OH's 2xg-grandparents on the 1881 census fiche, getting excited when we found them and very surprised to see his g-g-grandmother was born in Denmark. It took a while (years? :o) before we realised she was not the right wife to be OHs ancestor!

OH shouted Eureka in the Dorset CRO when he found my 7xg-grandparents marriage after about a year of visits and endless trawling of fiche and film (that would be 50+ round trips of about 80 miles). Some people glared, but quite a few smiled! Now the entry pops up on Ancestry at the click of a button!

[Phoenix]

The gorgon in charge at Portugal Street scared us stiff! You couldn't just walk in either, you had to be vouched for that you were a responsible member of the community. I think I got my college tutor and my doctor as referees. Nor could you pick up a reel of film: you had to put in a slip, go to the counter.... and discover someone else had already taken it out. And if you didn't arrive when it opened, you'd have to queue for a seat.

I can also remember going to a Federation Meeting where a member of the LDS church told us that one day we would have census images delivered to our computers, possibly even in colour. That seemed the stuff of science fiction.

[Olde Crone]

I almost fell at the first fence, over 40 years ago now. Local records office, the couple in charge thought it was their own private library and like Phoenix, I had to have a reference before I could enter the hallowed portals.

I've told this tale before but.......with the supreme optimism of youth, I ordered up an old marriage agreement. When it came it was all in Latin - and mediaeval Latin at that. I was aware that I was being watched with sneering contempt, so I got out my notebook and scribbled copiously, a mock shorthand which meant nothing at all. I finally left and started the long and tortuous journey home, only to discover I'd left the incriminating notebook in the archive!

It was years before I went back to any kind of archive!

OC

[Janet in Yorkshire]

Oh gosh, half term breaks spent in Surrey with daily train journeys to London - St Catherines for BMDs (running the risk of braining someone as you lifted a heavy volume from the top shelf) Portugal St for census and Somerset House for probate.
Other holidays at my mother's, with day trips to the central library for East Yorkshire census and the local record office for parish history and some church records. Then it was the Borthwick Institute at York for the parish records of other archdeaconries or for pre 1857 Yorkshire wills. Or a weeks holiday in Norfolk to visit churches, with a couple of days in Norwich for the library & record office.

Jay

[Phoenix]

Gawd, OC reminds me of the very first time we went to a local register office. Turned up brightly, convinced the ancestors were married in that RD.

The elderly gents in charge said NO. You don't know the church, no way are we looking through every volume. We backed off, discomfited, and I've NEVER ordered a local certificate.

[Olde Crone]

Oh, the complicated arrangements necessary to visit a church and look at the record - took months of planning cos I had three small children. Finally managed it, my dad drove me to the remote church and dropped me off, with my instructions to pick me up in two hours.

Vicar had forgotten I was coming, Vicar's wife NOT pleased to see me at all but allowed me about ten minutes and then firmly chucked me out (I wonder if she had a lover, lol). No mobile phones in those days, so I stood in the graveyard in the pitch dark for nearly two hours till dad picked me up.

OC

[Phoenix]

Some vicars, though, were lovely. Best mate turned up for the holiday, newly pregnant. We'd walked the four or five miles to the church and she was not a happy bunny. I might have been given short shrift, but she was found hassocks to sit on. He apologised for the lack of facilities (what lack? There were the original registers, after all) and gave us a lift back to the market town. As we pulled in, he said "There's one set of loos here, and another round the corner!"

Best of all, I had my great aunt with me when I tackled the churchwarden of her church. He was backed into a corner when she and his daughter told him that registers did exist before 1812 and I was allowed to look at them in the comfort of my aunt's front room. The down side was that he'd been equally prepared to lend the earliest registers to an elderly local historian and those have gone missing.

[Nell]

I well remember my visits to the Family History Centre in Islington - conveniently close to Islington Local History Centre and the London Metropolitan Archives.

The joy of spooling microfilm all over the floor and hoping no-one had noticed! Asking the people on either side if they could decipher the faint 1841 writing on the census form.

The exhausted triumph of finding a marriage after trawling through 20-odd hefty ledgers (gosh my arms ached the next day!)

Peering into microreaders at the London LDS Centre.

Now, so much is available online and I was able to find 2 misrecorded baptisms very easily by putting the mother's unusual first name into the search box, when I'd already gone through pages and pages of microfilm at the Guildhall Library in vain.

But I do appreciate what is online now as I know the effort of filming and transcribing and indexing that goes on.

And of my many happy memories of visits to Kew, are ones of having coffee, lunch, giggles and shared discoveries with my fellow family history enthusiasts!

[ElizabethHerts]

I too made many visits to the Family History Centre in Islington, sometimes going to the LMA as well.

The first time I went was with my Mum, and it took us ages looking at the 1851 census and finding nothing, but the joy of just two birth registrations! This took all day.

Then, the pleasure of going with my elder daughter and Mum and my daughter's positive delight at finding just the smallest snippet of information, and my Mum being so happy at being able to share an obsession.

[Phoenix]

How lovely to have three generations interested, Elizabeth.

Nell, there's nothing to stop us going back to Kew, you know. I have purist friends who can't understand why anyone should wish to visit a record office with a companion. Okay, my visits to the Norfolk Record Office have always been planned like military campaigns and executed like exams, but a giggle over a coffee (or something stronger afterwards) makes the day a success whether or not you find anything.

[JBee]

Have you ever come across someone you know at a records office?

My first trip to Kew and I didn't really know what I was doing. Anyway after ordering and viewing records for the 71st Regiment of Foot - finally thought I'd have a look at other departments to see what else they had which might be useful.

So who should I bump into whilst on the stairs but the boys barber at the time. Over 100 miles from home!! lol

OH had taken himself off to Kew Gardens!!! and it was his ancestors I was researching!!!

[marquette]

I remember my first visit to the local LDS library. It was really crowded and there was a separate room of microfilm and microfiche readers. Lot of people avidly peering at microfims. I ordered the 1841 census for Martock Somerset microfilm and looked at their various indexes and resolved to be better organised next time ! Waited three weeks for the microfilm. In the end I transcribed all 5 E.D.s for Martock, as there were so many rellies there, it was easier just to write them all down for later searching. I still used it sometimes even when the 1841 became available on ancestry.

I remember nearly falling off my chair and wanting to shout EUREKA very loudly, the first time I found something that was a missing piece - now I cannot remember what it was, but I remember the feeling of triumph and satisfaction, very clearly.

My first trip to the NSW State Library was also to use their microfilms - newspapers ! But now its nearly all on line with Trove ! Then there was the day, when I requested a book from the stacks - they said you have to sit over there, where we can see you and wear these gloves - wow, this was a rare book !

Di

[KiwiChris]

I remember sitting at the row of fische readers at the local library with a number of others, we all smiling when someone whispered loudly YES!

One memorable visit as I had trawled though several years of birth records looking for the birth of my ellusive grandmother and sighing loudly at yet another failure. The woman sitting at the next reader asked me who I was looking for and I gave her the name. "I collect information on Hendersons" she said "and I am sure I have her name somewhere, don't go away."

With that she left the library, returning about half an hour later with a large folder. There she had the information on the divorce of my great grandparents, and the information that my grandmother was adopted!

Thanks to that unknown woman who happened to be at the library at the same time as me that day, I found my grandmother!

On line does not even come close to that experience!

[Margaret in Burton]

I've told this story before but here goes again.

Hubby was working delivering wines and spirits for Bass at the time and finished earlier than expected. He was in Leicester and knew that we needed info from the record office there. He called his boss and asked permission to go, in his own time of course. Boss said yes as the lorry was empty and obviously parked safely.
When he got to the record office he asked for the fiche for baptisms, burials and marriages for Exton, Rutland. He's told that another gentleman had those out but as there was a seat vacant next to him perhaps he wouldn't mind sharing. He didn't mind and asked OH what name he was researching. OH told him, Newey. He was amazed and said, that's my name who are you? OH explained that it was my family and discovered that he was talking to a second cousin of mine. I knew of him as he'd met my uncle many years before, well before I started research and I did have a copy of the tree he gave my uncle. OH gave him our number and he called that night. His grandfather and my grandfather were brothers. His grandfather is a mystery, we still haven't found his death but that's another story. I still haven't met my second cousin but we do exchange Christmas cards and email and phone occasionally. He often remarks on the sheer luck of that visit to Leicester.

[tenterfieldjulie]

Goosebumps Marg.