Be Sure to Visit my new 1900 Galveston Storm Website at: http://freepages.genealogy.rootseb.com/~barnette 

IRISH RESEARCH ON THE INTERNET

The Ireland National Tourism Service hosts a website that Americans of Irish ancestry will enjoy visiting. Located at http://www.goireland.com the site contains search engines that tell the history of Irish surnames and locate the most popular Irish surnames in each Irish County.

The website also contains links to the Irish Family History Foundation (IFHF) which is the co-coordinating body for a network of government approved genealogical research centers in the Republic of Ireland (Eire) and in Northern Ireland. These centers have computerized tens of millions of Irish ancestral records of different types. The process of computerizing records has been ongoing since 1990 and currently 500 individuals are engaged daily in continuing this task at centers in the Republic of Ireland (Eire) and in Northern Ireland.

The main computerized sources of information available are: church records of baptisms, marriages and burials (the starting dates of which vary from parish to parish): civil records of births, marriages and deaths: major sources relating to property (tithe records from circa 1830, valuation records from circa 1850) and census returns.

Once on the IFHF website for a particular county, one will find the address of the county IFHF center, a list of common surnames found in the county and the dates and types of records available for research in that county. Actual records are not online. To access records one must write or visit the IFHF center. It is possible some of the records may be available on microfilm through Houston area Mormon Family History Centers.

Included on the website is a multitude of links to all types of websites featuring anything Irish or about Ireland. By clicking the visitors guide button, one will find links to restaurants, hotels, museums, informational travel guides, tourist agents, transportation links and most anything one planning a trip to Ireland would wish to locate.

GENEALOGICAL CLASSES

Emily Croom will teach a two part Finding Your Roots class at Houston Community College's 1681 Cartright campus in Missouri City. The class will be held from 9 A.M. to 12:30 P.M. Tuesday March 27 and Thursday March 29. For more information and to register, contact HCC at 281-835-5539.

Paula Perkins Parke will teach a three hour class, Soul Searching: Cemetery and Denominational Newspapers Research at Grace Presbyterian Church, 10221 Ella Lee near Sam Houston Tollway. The class will be held from 2 P.M. to 5 P.M. Monday March 26. For more information and to register, contact Michelle Schultz at 713-267-5020.

Paula Perkins Parke will teach two separate classes of Understanding Family Tree Maker Software. A daytime class will be held at Houston Community College's 1681 Cartright campus in Missouri City from 1 P.M. to 4 P.M. Wednesday March 28. For more information and to register contact HCC at 281-835-5539.

Parke will also teach an evening session of Understanding Family Tree Maker Software at Leisure Learning's 2990 Richmond campus. This class will be held from 6:30 P.M. to 9:30 P.M. Wednesday March 28. For more information and to register contact Leisure Learning at 713-529-4414.

GENEALOGICAL SEMINAR

Dallas librarian, Lloyd Bockstruck will be the featured speaker at the Grayson County Texas Genealogical Society workshop on Saturday March 31. The workshop will be held from 9 A.M. to 4 P.M. at the Harvest Time Church in Sherman. Topics will include Finding Maiden Names of Women and Finding Substitutes for Birth and Death Records. For more information call 903-892-7240 or 903-564-3097.

CD'S INDEX CULTURAL GROUPS

Heritage Quest, a division of SierraHome, recently announced a new series of genealogy CD's called the World Immigration Series. The CD's are collections of information and data concerning different world ethnic-cultural groups. To date, CD's on Germany ($29.95), Great Britain ($29.95), Ireland ($39.95) and African Americans ($39.95) have been released. These CD's may be purchased online at http://www.heritagequest.com

The CD's index individuals listed on the census as being born in the featured country and live in any of the states enumerated in the 1870 US Federal Census. The names of those indexed were derived because they were the head of a household, had a different name than the head of the household in which they were enumerated or because they were over the age of 50. For each person indexed the following information is given: name, age, sex, color/race, birthplace, locality, county and census series or roll number.

In addition to the census index data, the CD's contain a history of the featured ethnic group and research related articles which were published in Heritage Quest Magazine about that group.

Researchers will find these CD's can be quite helpful, particularly, when using creative searches of varying database queries.