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Copyright© 2003 by Richard W. Eastman. All rights reserved.

Items marked with a Plus Sign (+) appear only in the Plus Edition newsletter.

Newsletter subscribers attending the annual conference of the National Genealogical Society in Pittsburgh later this month will have a chance to win an iPAQ handheld computer, along with a copy of the Pocket Genealogist Advanced Version, a leading genealogy program for that computer. This offer extends to Standard Edition subscribers and Plus Edition subscribers alike.

I will have a booth in the Exhibitors' Hall at this year's conference. Newsletter editor Pamela Clark Cerutti and I, along with several of our "informal support staff" members, will be there to meet current newsletter subscribers and to show the newsletter to potential new subscribers. We will have online and printed copies of current and past newsletters to show and will be inviting conference attendees to sign up for either the Standard Edition or the Plus Edition.

I love my handheld iPAQ and enjoy keeping my entire genealogy database, along with all notes and source citations, in my pocket. I decided to offer a similar prize to one lucky subscriber of this newsletter. The iPAQ h1910 has 64 megabytes of memory, more than enough to hold the records of ten thousand ancestors or more. It is a half-inch thick and weighs less than five ounces. It easily slips into a purse or overcoat pocket. Its color screen is easy to read in almost all lighting conditions. This is an excellent device to take on your next trip to the courthouse or other genealogy archive. The iPAQ also includes a docking cradle and all the software required to transfer data from a desktop to the handheld and then back again.

The Pocket Genealogist by Northern Hills Software is perhaps the leading genealogy program for handheld PocketPCs, including the iPAQ. It allows you to take your genealogy data with you on your PocketPC or other "Windows Powered" mobile device. Using the industry standard GEDCOM format created from your favorite desktop genealogy program, the desktop component of Pocket Genealogist creates databases on your PocketPC device when it is connected via the docking cradle. After synchronization, you can disconnect and take your data with you!

The combined value of the iPAQ h1910 and the Pocket Genealogist Advanced Version is $334.00 (U.S. funds).

At 2:15 PM on Saturday afternoon, I will give away an iPAQ h1910 handheld and the Pocket Genealogist software to someone who has visited our booth and is a subscriber. The new iPAQ will be on display in the booth. I will also be demonstrating my own iPAQ and the Pocket Genealogist to anyone who wishes to see it in operation.

Shortly after awarding the main prize, I will also give away two additional consolation prizes: copies of the Pocket Genealogist Advanced Version (although this time without the accompanying iPAQ handheld computer). Again, you must be a newsletter subscriber in order to win a consolation prize.

Winners do not need to be in attendance on Saturday afternoon. If the winners are not there, I will notify them by the e-mail address they used for their subscription. However, you must register in person sometime before Saturday at 2:00 PM in order to enter the drawing.

Any current subscriber can enter the drawing by filling out a card at Booth #103. Anyone who is not yet a subscriber may become a subscriber to the Standard Edition while at the booth and therefore instantly become eligible for the drawing.

I'll see you in Pittsburgh!

S&N Genealogy Supplies has released version 3 of its popular London 1891 census index CD-ROM. I had a chance to use it this week and found it to be a great genealogy product.

The London 1891 Census Index CD-ROM lives up to its name: it contains an index to the 1891 London Census, while images of the original census records are also available from S&N Genealogy Supplies on a separate set of disks. Remember that the original census records are not indexed. Searching for an ancestor in the millions of listings for the City of London is a real "needle in a haystack" experience unless you have S&N's index.

The new version contains a partial name index with more than 1,300,000 names listed. The index was created by a group of volunteers, each of whom has his or her name listed on the CD-ROM itself. These hardy transcribers go through census records and enter specific data into a database, which eventually is distributed on this CD-ROM. Keep in mind that it is strictly an index, not a full listing. Like an index in the back of a book, only a few significant facts are listed, such as name, location, and the page number in the original census where the full listing may be found. To read the full details, you will need to look at the original record, available on CD-ROM from S&N Genealogy Supplies as well as on microfilm.

The data on the CD-ROM is stored in Adobe Acrobat format, a good choice in my opinion. It should work equally well on Windows, Macintosh, Linux, or UNIX. The commands used in this London 1891 Census Index CD-ROM are the same as on hundreds or even thousands of other CD-ROM disks, minimizing the time required to become familiar with this product. Since I have used many other Adobe Acrobat disks, this one was a simple "insert the disk and go" operation. No software installation was required beyond the Acrobat Reader.

I did a search on my own surname and quickly found a few records listed. Here is a copy of one that shows the sort of information available:

Armed with this information, I should be able to go to a copy of the original 1891 London Census records volume 140, page 47. There I can look at line number 14002374 to see the entire record of Ann Eastman and her family. Information available on the original census records is much more extensive than what can be found in the index. The full census records typically include occupation, other family members' names, exact street location, and more.

I found that I could not "copy and paste" the information on this CD-ROM using the normal Windows commands. However, it was easy to print the page that contained this index entry.

The London 1891 Census Index CD-ROM really needs to be accompanied by the original census records. S&N Genealogy Supplies makes that easy: when you purchase the images of the original census on CD-ROM, you may also order the London 1891 census index CD-ROM for an additional £5.00 (about $8.00 in U.S. funds). If you already have the original records on CD-ROM or on microfilm, you may order the London 1891 Census Index CD-ROM separately for £14.95 (about $24.00 U.S.). S&N Genealogy Supplies uses a secure online ordering system for your safety. Of course, use of a credit card makes it easier for buyers in other countries to order the disk without having to purchase (expensive) checks or money orders in Pounds Sterling.

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This week I had a chance to watch a delightful new video that features Tony Burroughs talking about how to find family treasures in your home or the home of a relative. The video is called Finding Your Family History in the Attic and features Tony explaining how to discover old documents and other artifacts that can help you in your genealogy and family history discoveries. The video is produced by 123 Genealogy, a company that has produced a number of genealogy videotapes.

Over the last five years or so, I have listened to Tony Burroughs speak a number of times at various genealogy conventions and other events. I must say that he is one of my favorite speakers. He always presents facts, adding humor in a very entertaining manner. He also presents the facts in a way that makes them easy to remember. If Tony ever decides to abandon his genealogy efforts, he could make a good living as a motivational speaker and trainer.

Tony's personality and speaking manner really shine on this videotape. I have watched a number of genealogy videotapes made by a number of experts. Most feature a speaker seated at a computer, talking about the topic at hand. Most people are obviously a bit uncomfortable while "on camera." Not so with Tony; he opens the video while standing in someone's living room. He talks about the subjects to be covered, then moves "on site" to show how in-person research is done. Tony appears relaxed at all times and delivers information as if he is talking one-on-one with the viewer.

Tony first describes the difference between genealogy and family history. In short, genealogy is the discovery of names, dates, and places, while family history is the addition of stories, or biographies, about those people. On this videotape he obviously is after the histories.

Tony enters someone's house and immediately starts rummaging around. He first describes the information often found in old family Bibles, using one such Bible as an example. He also digs into old family photographs and then starts rummaging around in old desk drawers, finding old Social Security cards, funeral records, horse whips, books, business records, farm account books, old belts with silver buckles, birth certificates, obituaries, funeral cards, certificates of baptism, deeds, newspaper clippings, tax returns, baby clothes and other family memorabilia.

Hey Tony, whose house is that? They kept everything!

Tony then examines several of these items in detail. For instance, he closely examines the handwriting in an old family Bible to determine if the information was written at the time of the events listed (and therefore probably accurate) or if it was information recorded at a later date that might contain some inaccuracies. Tony explains that a bit of handwriting analysis and examination of the inks used can tell you a lot.

The remainder of the video shows Tony Burroughs rummaging through all sorts of memorabilia, explaining what to look for in each type of artifact. This was, indeed, a tour through someone's attic. Tony also talked at some length about how to preserve family artifacts and, when appropriate, how to make copies. In the course of making this videotape, Tony Burroughs covers a lot of related topics.

I enjoyed this videotape and suspect you will also. This 73-minute video should accomplish two things: (1.) give you hints on how to find treasures in your family memorabilia and (2.) give you the motivation to start looking!

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- Online Roots: a Book Review

This week I had a chance to review a new book, entitled Online Roots, How to Discover Your Family's History & Heritage with the Power of the Internet. This book is one of the new series from the National Genealogical Society published by Rutledge Hill Press, Nashville, Tennessee.

Author Pamela Boyer Porter has undertaken a big task with this book in trying to describe the hundreds of thousands of genealogy sources on the Internet. She has done this well. She hasn't actually listed all the sources. Instead, she describes in considerable detail how you can search to find the sources of interest to you. While she does list the major online repositories, the focus is always on how to search for yourself and especially WHERE to search.

The chapters in this book include:

1. Getting Your Feet Wet (an introduction to the Internet)
2. Doing the Right Thing (describing the need for source citations, verification of data and much more)
3. Wading In Deeper
4. Finding People in the Modern Era (Social Security records, telephone books, etc.)
5. Revealing Family Sources
6. Acquiring Vital Records
7. Finding Ancestors in the Census or Other Lists
8. Visiting the Courthouse
9. Coming to America: Immigration, Naturalization and Ethnic Sources
10. Finding Clues to Military Service
11. Discovering Ancestors at Work and Worship
12. Finding Ancestors in Unusual Places (lists of poor, orphans, insane, divorced and in criminal records)
13. Using Libraries and Archives Effectively
14. Putting Your Ancestors in Context
15. Seeing Your Ancestors – in Pictures and in Print
16. Sharing with Others
17. Now That You're Hooked…

The book ends with the National Genealogical Society's Guidelines for Using Records, Repositories and Libraries, followed by the NGS Guidelines for Publishing Web Pages on the Internet. The book also has a glossary of terms and an index.

Despite the book's title, this is not a book that focuses only on online genealogy research. Instead, it is a book about how to conduct genealogy research in the age of the Internet. It covers both online and offline uses. For instance, the chapter on "Visiting the Courthouse" describes in-person visits, not virtual visits. However, that chapter describes how to find the correct courthouse by doing some online research in advance of your visit. By using the Internet first, you save wasted time and thereby increase your research productivity.

Pam Porter has a winner here. Online Roots, How to Discover Your Family's History & Heritage with the Power of the Internet contains 310 pages of information of value to the American genealogist in an online world. I'd strongly recommend it to newcomers researching U.S. ancestry. It does not, however, contain much information about other countries.

Online Roots, How to Discover Your Family's History & Heritage with the Power of the Internet sells for $19.99 and should be available through any bookstore if you specify ISBN 1401600212.

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- Ohio Proposal to Raise Fees

The state of Ohio is planning to raise fees for all the documents that genealogists typically order. Buried in the 2,281-page House budget bill is language that would prevent state and local officials from providing uncertified copies and instead would offer only certified copies.

Ohio has long allowed uncertified copies to be supplied for pennies per page while certified copies, typically used for obtaining passports, college loans, and other legal reasons, cost more. This change, along with a new state fee of $5 per copy, means certified copies will cost at least $12 because counties themselves can’t charge any less than $7. The state already charges a fee of $3 for a child-abuse fund; the $5 fee would be on top of that.

The new fee and elimination of uncertified copies are being proposed to fund Ohio’s efforts to modernize and digitize vital records, as well as to cut down on fraudulent use of vital records, according to Jay Carey, Ohio Department of Health spokesman. The modernization will speed reporting of crucial health data, something for which Ohio is one of the worst states in the country, according to Mr. Carey.

Mr. Carey emphasizes that the proposal won’t change public access to vital records in Ohio, which is one of only 10 states with unlimited public access to such records.

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I wrote about this topic a year or more ago, but it resurfaced this week. I heard from a person who wanted to start an online registry of "who owns which genealogy CD-ROM disks." Then, if someone wanted to look up information on a particular CD-ROM disk, that person could send an e-mail to an owner of the particular CD-ROM in question, asking for the information. In this way, not everyone has to purchase every CD-ROM disk. At the outset, this sounds simple. However, I believe it is a rather clear violation of U.S. copyright laws. I'll leave it to newsletter readers in other countries to decide if the same is true of the copyright laws in their countries; I will focus only on U.S. laws.

When I mentioned the copyright issues to my correspondent, she replied that surely I was mistaken. After all, the information is public domain, so the CD-ROM producers could not possibly claim any copyrights. Regrettably, many others believe the same thing. However, I must point out that such a belief ignores a number of points in the copyright laws.

To be sure, when talking about U.S. birth, marriage, and death records as originally recorded by local or state government officials, the original facts certainly are public domain in the United States. That is, these statements of fact are not copyrightable. The same is true for most other records of genealogical interest, such as church records, military records, pension applications, and so on. The person or company who compiled these facts into book or CD-ROM format looked at public domain information, just as you, too, are free to look at the same original facts and to compile them into some other format as you wish.

The difference arises when you begin to talk about compiled records or indexed records or whatever other improvements have been made to the original records. When a person takes old records and transcribes them into some format that is easier to read or is indexed for easier access or has other improvements added, all of those improvements are copyrighted. If you use the improved version, you must abide by the copyright laws involved.

You may find it easy to insert a CD-ROM disk into your computer to look up information. In fact, using a CD-ROM version is much easier than traveling to the original records repository and looking at original, faded records with difficult-to-read handwriting. That improved access on CD-ROM is copyrighted, even though the original facts are not. The software that does the lookup is probably also copyrighted and can only be used for the purposes specified by the copyright holder. When you use the software, you are bound to the terms specified in the license agreement.

Genealogy.com produces hundreds of genealogy CD-ROM disks, so they obviously have an interest in this topic. The copyright statement on all their most recent Family Archives disks is very clear and is an excellent explanation of this topic. Here is an extract from their copyright statement:

• Selecting which records and data fields to compile;
• Filling in missing or incomplete areas by merging sources;
• Interpreting ambiguous information;
• Arranging their compilation in a unique format;
• Adding retrieval software to make the data easy to search.

While the above is from a Genealogy.com CD-ROM, almost all other genealogy CD-ROM producers have somewhat similar copyright statements for their own protection.

These copyright claims are based on clear case law. The best-known case concerning copyright improvements to public domain data is that of Rural Telephone Service Co. versus Feist Publications, Inc. This case went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which eventually ruled that a third-party could republish material from telephone directories. However, in that decision Justice O’Connor clearly defined what may or may not be copyrighted. Justice O’Connor wrote:

Justice O’Connor went on to explain:

When Justice O’Connor wrote that it "possesses at least some minimal degree of creativity," she clearly covered indexed records or records converted to electronic format. These electronic records possess much more than a "minimal degree of creativity."

Finally, Justice O’Connor wrote some words that every genealogist needs to read. In the same U.S. Supreme Court decision, she specifically wrote about copyrights of compilations of U.S. census records:

This seems clear to me: public domain records that have been compiled in such a manner that the compilation author decided what facts to include and then decided how to arrange those facts, even providing the necessary software to display those facts, has indeed added copyrightable value and thereby deserves protection under the U.S. copyright laws.

To be sure, an occasional, single query from a friend or relative asking you to look up something in a book, a magazine, or a CD-ROM won’t raise any eyebrows. Copyright holders generally ignore this sort of casual request. Conversely, don’t try to set up a large-scale enterprise offering such services to the general public. Should you do so, you may find an unwelcome letter in your mailbox from a legal firm.

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- Bill Gates is Surprised at the Popularity of Computer Genealogy

According to a story in television station KSFY's Web site, Bill Gates was amazed when he recently learned that a lot of people are using computers to find their ancestry. Gates expressed amazement when told that the computers that he and his wife donated to the Watertown, South Dakota, Public Library are used mostly for genealogy research.

I am surprised that Bill Gates did not know that genealogy is one of the three most popular topics on the Internet, according to a number of published reports. You really do have to get out with people more often, Bill.

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Do you write a newsletter for your local genealogy society, historical society, or some other organization? Perhaps you maintain a Web site for the organization? If so, you already know how difficult it is to obtain appropriate articles for your publication.

I thought I would remind you that you may place information from my newsletter into your non-profit genealogy newsletter or Web site. The following words apply to every issue of Eastman’s Online Genealogy Newsletter:

• You do so strictly for non-commercial purposes
• Articles marked with a Plus Sign (+) are not to be redistributed. These articles are solely for the use of Plus Edition subscribers.
• You may not republish any articles containing words attributed to another person or organization until you obtain permission from that person or organization. While you do have permission to republish words written by Richard W. Eastman, you do not have automatic authority to republish words written by others, even if their words appear in this newsletter.

Also, please include the following statement with any articles you re-distribute:

Thank you for your cooperation.

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This is a "preview" from a Plus Edition-only article that is available only to subscribers to the Plus Edition of this newsletter. To learn how to subscribe to the Plus Edition, go to http://www.RootsForum.com/plus

More than five years ago, I wrote in this newsletter about AltaVista Personal 97. In the January 19, 1998 newsletter, I wrote:

I loved that program and used it for a long time. However, AltaVista dropped it soon after I wrote the above words, and AltaVista Personal 97 is no longer available. I have changed computers and operating systems two or three times since then and no longer have AltaVista Personal 97. I have also started using the newer Google search engine although AltaVista remains as the #1 backup. I have been looking for a replacement program to search my hard disk, something that is still supported and something that is either free or available for a modest charge. I have tried a number of programs but never found any that I liked as well as my "old friend." This week, however, I think I have a new friend that fills the bill. In fact, I like the new program even better than the one I used five years ago.

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It is with sadness that I report that New Hampshire has lost its state symbol. The Old Man of the Mountain, on Cannon Mountain in Franconia, stood for centuries. This rock formation looked like a man's face, a face that was rugged, like of the character of many New Hampshire citizens over the years.

Long before the arrival of the White Man, local Indians worshipped the image as a god. Early settlers were also in awe of the image high on Cannon Mountain. Daniel Webster once said, "Men hang out their signs indicative of their respective trades; shoe makers hang out a gigantic shoe; jewelers a monster watch, and the dentist hangs out a gold tooth; but up in the Mountains of New Hampshire, God Almighty has hung out a sign to show that there He makes men."

The image of the Old Man of the Mountain appears on the state quarter, on state road signs, and on countless souvenirs and tourist brochures. It also appears on state license plates. However, the symbol no longer exists. Last week the stone face collapsed as a likely result of heavy rains, high winds, and freezing temperatures, probably accompanied by ice freezing in the stone crevices. I used to live just a few miles away from "The Old Man" and drove by him hundreds of times. I'll miss him, as will many others. The Old Man of the Mountain now lives only in memories.

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To submit your genealogy page to this newsletter, enter the necessary information at: http://www.rootsforum.com, click on "add your genealogy Web page to this list." Due to the volume of new Web pages submitted, I am not able to list all of them in the newsletter.

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The PR Budget for this newsletter is $0.00. I rely upon "word of mouse" advertising in which you recommend this newsletter to your friends. This newsletter is a private project of mine, and I have a zero budget for a publicity campaign to get more readers.

Thanks.

COPYRIGHTS and Other Legal Things:

1. You do so strictly for non-commercial purposes
2. Articles marked with a Plus Sign (+) are not to be redistributed. Those articles are solely for the use of Plus Edition subscribers.
3. You may not republish any articles containing words attributed to another person or organization until you obtain permission from that person or organization. While you do have permission to republish words written by Richard W. Eastman, you do not have automatic authority to republish words written by others, even if their words appear in this newsletter.

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