Week 2: 52 Weeks of Abundant Genealogy

Amy Coffin of The We Tree Genealogy Blog in conjunction with GeneaBloggers has called for bloggers of genealogy and family history to take on the 2012 challenge of  52 Weeks of Abundant Genealogy. This is my post for Week 2, slightly late, but better late than never. I’ve scheduled next weeks task in the diary so that it isn’t late again. The task for Week 2 is Paid Online Genealogy Tools: Which paid genealogy tool do you appreciate most?  What special features put it at the top of your list? How can it help others with their genealogy research?

My favourite paid tool can change from week to week, depending on what family line I am researching or what I’m writing about. This weeks favourite online tool is  British Newspaper Archive I’ve spent many hours poring over the newspapers of the areas of my ancestors. I’ve found many articles relating to my family – obituaries, death notices, births, marriages and reports in the social pages. Of course I must mention the crime reports that I found mentioning  family members, sometimes as victims but most often as perpetrators of petty crimes. I’ve also been able to research  a farm that my family worked as tenants. There were newspaper reports about this farm from the 18th century through to the mid 19th century, which have enabled me to build a very reliable picture and develop a sense of place regarding the farm and surrounding areas.

Pages can be printed at home, or it’s possible to order a higher quality printed copy. So far, I have printed my own pages, as the cost of ordering a print is quite high. I have only recently subscribed to this page, but I’m looking forward to losing many hours poring over the newspapers covering the areas where my ancestors lived.