Friday, March 02, 2007

Berkshire indexing on FreeReg

BerksFHS Home Page
about 93 parishes
and about 73 indexed and North Berkshire was Oxfordshire so indexed by the Oxfordshire FHS

FamilyHistoryOnline - searchable databases for family history & genealogy in England & Wales
is where the Berkshire FHS is placing their indexes in the database

is there anyone with good contacts in http://www.berkshirerecordoffice.org.uk/

or with the Archdeacon of Berkshire
or
these Funding Partners of the Berkshire Record Office,which is funded by the 6 unitary local authorities in Berkshire:
Bracknell Forest Borough Council, Reading Borough Council, Slough Borough Council, West Berkshire Council, the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead, and Wokingham Unitary.

The Office is managed by Reading Borough Council on behalf of the other authorities.
West Berkshire Council is the authority responsible for the archive collections."

who can help http://www.freereg.org.uk/ get indexing of BERKS under way
or do some transcriptions so that Berkshire does not become a black hole :-(

Imagine if Reading was missing from FreeBmd or ancestry.co.uk because of parochialism

Updating this I have had some useful discusssions with leading members of the FHS and Dr Peter Durrant, the current County Archivist, who took over in 1988.

In the first year of the Record Office there were merely 180 visitors; compare that with the 7783 visitors in 2004/2005 - no wonder they needed a new building.

>> Hi Hugh:
I don't think there is a shortage of willing and able volunteers out here to transcribe parish registers for FreeREG.

Our problem is getting access to the film/fiche of those registers. As long as Dr. Pete Durrant, the Chief Archivist chooses to only allow the LDS to release the registers on film or CD to the Berkshire FHS, those volunteers, of whom I would be one, can only access the registers at LDS libraries or at the record office - and most of us would prefer to transcribe in the comfort of our own homes.

The Norfolk Record Office (and others I believe) have given permission to the LDS to release the parish register films on CD which the Norfolk FreeREG Coordinator then sends to the volunteer transcribers. The result - 51 parishes transcribed in 6 months!

Compare that to Berkshire FHS woeful effort of 20 registers in as many years.

I understand that there is some resistance on the part of the Church, but I suspect the primary resistance is from Berkshire FHS who see a revenue drop happening if they don't have exclusive rights to transcribing the registers and then selling them on CD.

After all, the Church allowed the original filming of the registers by FHS.

As I said on another Berkshire message board regarding this topic - there seems to be an unholy alliance between the Church, Berkshire Record Office and Berkshire FHS, which is not serving those of us with Berkshire ancestors, and in fct, runs contrary to the mandates of the Record Office and the FHS.

Regards
Peter Hyde
Alberta, Canada <<
from Rootsweb/localities.britisles.england.brk.general

BERKSHIRE RECORD OFFICE was established in 1948 to locate and preserve records relating to the county of Berkshire and its people, and to make them available for research to anyone who is interested in the county's past.


Opening Times
Tuesday 9.00 a.m. - 5.00 p.m.
Wednesday 9.00 a.m. - 5.00 p.m.
Thursday 9.00 a.m. - 9.00 p.m.
Friday 9.00 a.m. - 4.30 p.m.

Please phone or email to make a booking (booking also on Mondays).

Postal address:
Berkshire Record Office
9 Coley Avenue
Reading
Berkshire
RG1 6AF
Tel: +44 (0118) 901 5132
Fax: +44 (0118) 901 5131
Email: arch@reading.gov.uk

Dr. Peter Durrant Tel: +44 (0118) 901 5132 is the guy to telephone and may be complain that they are not fulfilling their mission as seen from outside UK

"Comprehensive Performance Assessment" is the latest buzz phrase

"and to make the rcords available for research to anyone who is interested in the county's past."

indexing is valid research

after him phone the local politicians :-)
http://www.reading.gov.uk/
Councillor Bet Tickner
The Right Worshipful the Mayor of Reading
tel: 0118 939 0900
Mayor https://secure.reading.gov.uk/forms/AZContact.asp?id=9822

Tel: 0118 939 0071 Council house

and librarians
http://www.berkshirerecordoffice.org.uk/links/index.asp

Berks FHS - Research Centre Opening Hours and Location: "Berkshire Family History Society Research Centre
Yeomanry House, 131 Castle Hill
READING RG1 7TJ
Tel: 0118-950-9553

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