Local LDS Family History Centers* (FHC) can provide a wealth of genealogy information. We had Carol Hutchinson of the main branch of the FHC Calgary meet with our Alberta Family History Society Special Interest Group (SIG) on Saturday to provide us with information about the available resources. She was giving us specific tips for researching in Quebec but most of her suggestions would apply to folks researching roots at a Family History Center anywhere.
Popular Websites available for free through local Family History Centers are:
Fold 3 (formerly Footnote) – a subscription based website featuring searchable, original documents. Mostly US based but do have items of interest to the Quebec historian.
Godfrey Memorial Library – extensive collection of resources including newspapers, city and business directories, vital records, printed census records, state, county and local histories, as well as numerous family histories, family bible records, service and pension records.
Heritage Quest/ProQuest – includes a complete set of U.S. Federal Census Images from 1790 to 1930 including names and indexes for many. Users will be albe to find people and places located in over 20,000 published family and local histories and PERSI, an index of 1.9 million genealogy and local history articles. Other online database include Revolutionary War Pension, Bounty-Land Warrant Application files and the Freedman Bank Records.
Kindred Konnections – has over 230 million pedigree linked names with submitter information. There are additional databases of birth, marriage, death and census records that are automatically searched along with the pedigree linked data.
World Vital Records– provides access to research helps and a wide variety of international records, including more than 60 parish registers, Scottish death records, UK marriages and Irish prisoner records. There are more than 300 newspapers with 100,000 pages added a month and over 500 online databses. This source has the most specific sources to the Quebec researcher.
For Calgary area researchers visiting the main FHC*, go to the blue binders for the catologue of available resources:
These include bibliographies, cemetaries, 1825 census, church records, Loiselle films and card index (Quebec marriages), maps, atlas, etc. Also is indexed according to Quebec/County/Township.
Carol also suggested looking in Vermont, Maine, and other neighbouring state records because of geographic proximity to Quebec. She said Google Images is a good source of old maps. (search term: “Quebec maps”).
Record Search Pilot Project
Also check out Familysearch.org’s Record Search Pilot project (go to www.familysearch.org , search records/Research search pilot in the drop down menu). At present this pilot project has Ontario Deaths and Quebec Catholic Parish Records. Don’t dismss either locations even if at first glance your ancestors weren’t in Ontario or weren’t Catholic. People may have moved to Ontario to be with their children and died there. Sometimes the priest recorded Protestant births and other events in the parish records.
Books for Quebec Researchers
She also suggested we check out the book Je Me Souviens about American Canadian French and available the LDS FHC* library. The FHC library along with Alberta Family History Society library ** have another good resource book called Finding Your Ancestors in English Quebec by Althea Douglas. This is also available online for purchase at www.genealogystore.com
*Calgary Family History Centre, 2021-17th Avenue SW, Calgary, 403-571-3700. Call for operating hours.
**Alberta Family History Society Library, 712-16 Ave NW. More info here