What is: The Ryerson Index

The Ryerson Index to death notices and obituaries in Australian newspapers is pretty much what it says on the tin. It was started in 1998 by members of the Sydney Dead Persons Association so it is most complete for the Sydney and NSW papers, but they have volunteers working in other regions too.

This index will give you full name (as shown in the newspaper), age, date, type of notice, newspaper name and date, and other details which may include the location of death and/or where the person was from. It doesn't include the name of the person who inserted the notice or other family names so you'll need to go to the original notice for that.

Fun with census records

I love the English census records, except when I don't. :-)

Here are a couple of ways the census data can muck you about:

Podcast: It's About Time

Ancestry.com has commissioned a genealogy podcast narrated by the very marvellous Sir Tony Robinson, available free on iTunes and Google Play. It's About Time is a combination of anecdotes about people and specials on particular things in genealogy (e.g. DNA research). It's a little heavy on the Ancestry advertising, which shouldn't be a major surprise, but the podcasts I've listened to so far are quite interesting AND it's Tony-freaking-Robinson who could make a shopping list sound like the most interesting thing in the world.




Episode 5: A Story of Identity revealed that Peter and I are both genetically much more British than the average resident of England. (I'm spot on for the average English native at 60%.)