Australian newspapers

The National Library of Australia has begun digitizing their old newspapers and making them available online - and there's nothing I like more than new online databases to explore! So far it's just their initial beta release, but I've struck gold already on the Wing front. If you are connected to the HOUNSLOW or MOORING families there's a very nice human interest story regarding the repayment of a debt in The Courier from Hobart in 1854 - searching for Wing plus Hounslow should bring it up.

The optical character recognition is a little dodgy at this stage. Promisingly, they have a "Help Fix This Text" feature, so I have fixed up the glitches in that Wing story.

I'll be keeping an eye on this to see what more Wing stories might come out of the woodwork as the project is rolled out. Check it out here.

Stood up

The mystery of which film has arrived in at my local LDS family history centre will have to wait until next week. There must have been a mixup or problem because no-one arrived to run the family history centre this evening, so after waiting 20 minutes I gave up and went home.

I should probably devote this unexpected spare time to my own family research. I may however just blob on the couch for a bit and see what, if anything, I fancy doing....

Slow month

What's everyone else been up to research-wise? I haven't been up to a lot myself yet this month, between being busy at work and being busy in the garden with spring planting I've barely had a chance to think about genealogy. Those of you up north are presumably farewelling summer and planning to get stuck into your research over the coming months?

Late last month I ordered some films at the local LDS and they rang today to say one was in, so I do have some Wing-related research to do tomorrow evening. Exactly what it is still a surprise as I forgot to ask which film of the three it was!

HOUNSLOW and DIMMOCK

I'm currently looking at the HOUNSLOW and DIMMOCK families to see what I can see to help out a couple of researchers who have contacted me. If you have connections to these families, now might be a good time to email me?

And apologies in advance if I'm a bit slow in responding over the next couple of weeks - I'm expecting to be very busy at work including being away on a conference for a few days.

September update

At last it's here - my transcription of the 1891 census for Wing! I hope you find it useful.

I've also updated the "For Sale" page. This lists resources (that include a comprehensive listing for Wing) available for sale from commercial enterprises. There are no new resources I'm aware of, but there has been the periodic movement in your range of options for purchasing census scans, transcriptions and indices.