The following announcement was written by TheGenealogist:

This week TheGenealogist is pleased to be releasing almost 60,000 records from the 1851 Dublin City Census Index. This new release will be a great aid for those researchers with ancestors who may have been living in Ireland’s Capital City on the 30 March 1851 at the time when the census was taken.

Jaunting Cars In Dublin from TheGenealogist’s Image Archive

Researchers will find the Index to the 1851 Dublin census to be a wonderful tool for anyone searching for people in Dublin city in the mid-nineteenth century. It provides the names and addresses of approximately 59,000 heads of household and was compiled by Dr D A Chart.

You can search over a million early Irish census records from 1821 to 1851. Also the only complete surviving censuses for Ireland that exist, 1901 and 1911 (over 8 Million records) can be searched via TheGenealogist’s unique search tools, allowing you to search for an ancestor using their address or keywords.

Earlier records compiled for 1813 to 1891 were destroyed at the government's request or by the civil war in 1922. This only leaves census substitutes for researchers of nineteenth century Ireland to use in their quest to delve into their family history.

Fortunately for Dublin Dr. D. A. Chart used the census to compile a “1851 Dublin Heads of Household Index” in 1915. At the time this was primarily to assist staff working in the Public Record Office of Ireland (PROI) searching for proof of age for applicants for the old-age pension.

This index survived the fire and is one of the few remaining fragments of census information available for that time.

TheGenealogist also has a number of Irish Trade and Residential Directories that can be useful for those researching their Dublin ancestors, as well as the previously released Dublin Will and Grant Books.

The 1851 Dublin City Census Index in this current release covers the parishes of

About TheGenealogist

TheGenealogist is an award-winning online family history website, who put a wealth of information at the fingertips of family historians. Their approach is to bring hard to use physical records to life online with easy to use interfaces such as their Tithe and newly released Lloyd George Domesday collections.

TheGenealogist’s innovative SmartSearch technology links records together to help you find your ancestors more easily. TheGenealogist is one of the leading providers of online family history records. Along with the standard Birth, Marriage, Death and Census records, they also have significant collections of Parish and Nonconformist records, PCC Will Records, Irish Records, Military records, Occupations, Newspaper record collections amongst many others.

TheGenealogist uses the latest technology to help you bring your family history to life. Use TheGenealogist to find your ancestors today!

Ask the owner of any Apple iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch or the owners of several competitive Android devices: "What's the best thing about your device?" Many owners will reply, "The screen." Indeed, Gorilla Glass and similar glass products on many of today's handheld devices produce better displays than that of any traditional desktop computer screen. The Apple MacBook Pro I am using to write this article also has an excellent video display, called a Retina Display, that produces better video than any other laptop I have ever seen.

Corning knows something about the glass business as well as about computers, as the company makes the display screens for many of today's laptop and handheld computers. Now Corning has released a video showing the company's vision of the future of computer displays. The video has nothing to do with genealogy but can you imagine using these tools to view images of census records and other old documents?

The video seems to show "computers everywhere." I found it interesting that there is not a single desktop computer shown with a separate screen and separate keyboard and a beige-colored box containing the rest of the components.

I don't expect all computer manufacturers to switch to these displays overnight but I suspect we will see something similar to these display screens within a few years as prices continue to drop.

You can watch the "Glass Computers of the Future" video at http://youtu.be/6Cf7IL_eZ38. I suggest you watch it in full-screen mode to get the maximum effect. (On my screen, that is the icon that looks like a square box in the extreme bottom right of the display window.)

I have written before about the U.S. government's Geographic Names Information System (GNIS) database at http://geonames.usgs.gov/index.html that provides exact latitudes and longitudes for thousands of cemeteries and other named places within the United States. To find a cemetery, all you do is search the GNIS database, find the latitude and longitude for the cemetery you seek, enter those coordinates into a GPS, and follow the instructions shown on the GPS to drive directly to the cemetery.

NOTE: Nowadays, you do not even need a dedicated GPS device. Most Android phones and all iPhones have available apps that will provide GPS capabilities within your cell phone. Some of them will even display the latest traffic reports along your planned route while you are driving. Many of these GPS-emulation apps are available free of charge while a few cost a modest amount of money, always less than the cost of purchasing a dedicated GPS device.

There is but one problem with the government's GNIS database: it doesn't include all the cemeteries! For years, it did not list the small, rural cemetery where several of my relatives are buried, where I already own a burial plot, and where I intend to spend eternity. However, I checked again when writing this article and found that the Morse's Corner Cemetery is now listed in the GNIS database. So much for the idea of my being buried at an unlisted address!

Despite my recent success, the GNIS database still does not list ALL cemeteries. Luckily, I found another source of possible information.

The POI Factory is an online service that provides exact geographic coordinates to owners of GPS devices, including anyone who owns a cell phone with a GPS app installed. (The letters "POI" apparently stand for "Points Of Interest.") The web site has more than one million locations in the database with everything from highway rest areas to state parks to fast food restaurants. These include a lot of cemeteries. There’s even a list of the locations of Red Light Camera intersections and Speed Cameras. That last list is updated weekly.

Like the GNIS database mentioned earlier, not every cemetery is listed in the POI Factory. However, if I cannot find a cemetery's location in one database, I'd quickly look in another.

To find cemeteries or any other place listed in the POI Factory's database, go to http://www.poi-factory.com and click on "Search for POI Files."

Next, enter a keyword for whatever you are seeking. In this case, enter "cemetery" and then click on SEARCH.

You will then be presented with a list of hundreds of cemeteries, too many to search manually. In the unlabelled box just below the POI Factory logo near the top left corner, enter identifying words or phrases. For instance, in my case I would enter "Maine" or (even better) "Penobscot" (the name of the county where I know the cemetery is located). If I already know the name of the cemetery, I might enter that, such as "Evergreen." Then click on SEARCH once again.

A new list will appear that contains cemetery locations that match your search terms. Latitude and longitude are also displayed.

The POI Factory will even create a computer file containing the names and exact locations of all the locations found. In theory, that file can be copied to some GPS devices, although not all, and then used to easily find locations without any need to manually enter the geographic coordinates. Instructions for use of the files will vary from one GPS to another; see your GPS owners manual for instructions.

Of course, the use of the POI Factory is not limited to finding cemeteries. It will find all sorts of named locations and even many unnamed ones. The list includes country courthouses, hospitals, medical centers, stores, fast food restaurants, and much more. In fact, the POI Factory already contains dozens of pre-loaded files showing the precise locations of many locations of all sorts of common-searched-for locations, including: all the Wal-Mart, Sam's Clubs, and Super Wal-Mart Centers in the United States and Canada, all the Costco locations in the U.S. and Canada, locations of covered bridges, Motorcycle Campgrounds And Lodging, airport and aviation locations, national parks, and lots of cemeteries with a separate file for each of many U.S. states and several other classifications as well (U.S. National cemeteries, Presidential grave locations, and more).

If you own a GPS or a cell phone with a GPS app installed, you need to know about the POI Factory! You may not need to use it often but, when you do have a need, it can be valuable.

The POI Factory is available at: http://www.poi-factory.com.

You can find cemeteries by starting at: http://www.poi-factory.com/taxonomy/term/22.

A series of tutorials about the use of the POI Factory web site and about several other GPS-related topics may be found at http://www.poi-factory.com/tutorials.

Now, go visit a cemetery!

The Centre for Latin American Migration Studies (CEMLA) has created a database spanning 160 years, helping Argentines discover how their ancestors arrived in the country.

The database spans 160 years – from 1800 to 1960 – through which users can find out the ship of arrival and professions of over four million immigrants.

CEMLA has now made the historical records of immigrant arrival in Argentina available online. With just minimal data, users can probe the information available on their ancestors and their vessels with just a click, discovering unknown details about their personal history.

Those wishing to search need the full name of the person being investigated, and the database (with information from 1800 to 1960) will reveal the ship on which their relatives sailed to Argentina, or the person’s line of work.

This database comprises over 4.4 million people in total, featuring information on 200 countries of origin, over 75 years of records up to 1960, and over 3,500 vessels where they travelled to settle in this country.

You can read more (in English), including instructions on how to access the database, in an article published in the Buenos Aires Times at https://bit.ly/3lMtSQN.

NOTE: This article is off-topic. That is, it does not concern anything to do with genealogy, DNA, or related topics normally found in this newsletter. However, I suspect that many newsletter readers will be interested in this article for many different purposes.

If you use Gmail's free email service but do not like Google's invasive practice of having software read every email message you send and receive, you may be interested in a new announcement from Proton describing a new (although paid) company direction, complete with a VPN to keep your communications secret:

The way Google defines privacy is, “Nobody can exploit your data, except for us.”

Proton, the encrypted-email company, popular with security-conscious users, has a plan to go mainstream.

Since its founding in 2014, ProtonMail has become synonymous with user-friendly encrypted email. Now the company is trying to be synonymous with a whole lot more. On Wednesday morning, it announced that it’s changing its name to, simply, Proton—a nod at its broader ambitions within the universe of online privacy. The company will now offer an “ecosystem” of linked products, all accessed via one paid subscription. Proton subscribers will have access not just to encrypted email, but also an encrypted calendar, file storage platform, and VPN.

This is all part of CEO Andy Yen’s master plan to give Proton something close to a fighting chance against tech giants like Google. A Taiwanese-born former particle physicist, Yen moved to Geneva, Switzerland, after grad school to work at CERN, the nuclear research facility. Geneva proved a natural place to pivot to a privacy-focused startup, thanks to both Switzerland’s privacy-friendly legal regime and to a steady crop of poachable physicists. Today, Yen presides over a company with more than 400 employees and nearly 70 million users. He recently spoke to WIRED about the enduring need for greater privacy, the dangers of Apple's and Google's dominance, and how today’s attacks on encryption recall the rhetorical tactics of the War on Terror.

This interview has been condensed and lightly edited and is available at: https://www.wired.com/story/proton-mail-calendar-drive-vpn/.

Written by Clarity Amrein, Community Content Coordinator, Genealogy & Local History Department, Downtown Main Library

Over 50 years of protest posters, photos, slides, and flyers from the community organization Over-the-Rhine People’s Movement are coming to CHPL’s Digital Library, opens a new window.

The images, part of the upcoming Contemporary Arts Center (CAC) exhibit, Artist Run Spaces, include protest posters, photos, slides, and flyers from fifty years of organizing work by the community organization Over-the-Rhine People’s Movement. The images are now available for high resolution viewing on the Library’s Digital Library, opens a new window.

Produced by the Storefronts art collaborative based out of the Miami University Center for Community Engagement in Over-the-Rhine, the exhibit People Moving: Stories and action from 50 years of the Over-the-Rhine People’s Movement runs from May 27, 2022 to September 11, 2022 at the CAC.

You can read much more at: https://cincinnatilibrary.org/blogs/post/over-the-rhine-peoples-movement/.

The following announcement was written by the Board for Certification of Genealogists (BCG):

The Board for Certification of Genealogists (BCG) will host six live webinars, free and available to the public, as this year’s Reisinger Memorial Lecture Series on 7 October 2022. The hour-long webinars begin at 9:00 a.m. MDT (11:00 a.m. EDT and 4:00 p.m. GMT) and continue throughout the day. Six leading genealogists will speak on topics related to the Genealogical Proof Standard, solving genealogical problems by discovering and using a wide variety of appropriate sources, and immigration. The webinars are part of the Joy Reisinger Memorial Lecture Series and are presented in conjunction with Legacy Family Tree Webinars. To register for the Reisinger Memorial Lecture series, use this link: https://familytreewebinars.com/reisinger/.

The lecture series is presented annually in memory of BCG’s former trustee and vice president, Joy Reisinger, who began this lecture series for Family History Library staff during BCG’s fall board meetings. Joy was an advocate for open records access, a lecturer on research methods, and an expert on Canadian resources, especially those of Quebec.

The schedule for the lectures is:

9 a.m. MDT. "When Wrong is Actually Right: Constructing Proof Arguments for Counterintuitive Conflicts," Meryl Schumacker, CG

Name changes, enumerator errors, and terrible informants can combine to create major inconsistencies in documentation. Records that, at first glance, appear to be major mismatches can later turn out to be correct. Researching non-English-speaking immigrant families requires a comfort level with these layered conflicts-upon-conflicts. This session demonstrates how to use logic to confirm that a wrong-name, wrong-age, wrong-everything record can actually be right, with an emphasis on immigrant families. Participants will learn how to transfer that logic to a written proof argument.

10:15 a.m. MDT. "Peeling the Onion: Getting to the Original Sources," Gary Ball-Kilbourne, CG

Genealogy Standards 38 and 58 strongly express a preference for using original sources. Diligent researching and a few tricks of the trade enable genealogists to find original sources that underlie authored narratives and derivative sources.

11:30 a.m. MDT. "The Hub of the Wheel: How Tracing a Brother with no Children Connected Ten Siblings," Mary Kircher Roddy, CG

A family from Ireland emigrated in a chain migration scheme to western Pennsylvania between 1825 and 1845. See how using the standards for researching connected the siblings and their descendants and led to their origins in County Tyrone.

1:30 p.m. MDT. "Consult via…Explore with…Discover through…Literature Reviews," Jan Joyce, CG, CGL

What if you could consult with genealogical experts each time your work slows? Together you could explore options for new paths of discovery. The right approach to a literature review allows you to do that. Other experts have encountered the same challenges that you do, and they have written about them even if not overtly. These challenges could range from beginning work in a new geography to parrying with a difficult brick wall. Learn how to conduct a targeted literature review, cull the information you need, and advance your research. A case study on use of negative evidence will highlight the methodology.

2:45 p.m. MDT. "Finding Henrietta: Reconciling Conflicting Evidence to Reveal a Woman’s Identity," Nicole Gilkison LaRue, CG

Henrietta Dixon was never enumerated with individuals identified as her parents in a federal census. Records revealing her family members, including her father, are often conflicting and open up new questions. Additionally, multiple marriages further obscure her identity. This case study uncovers Henrietta's maiden name and emphasizes the importance of a focused research question when attempting to meet the Genealogical Proof Standard.

4:00 p.m. MDT. "Hidden Stories: Using Analysis to Explore the Unexpected in Family History Research" Jennifer Zinck, CG

Tales of illegitimacy, divorce, and desertion aren't limited to soap operas and modern reality television. Discovering trails that lead to unanticipated events can be shocking, confusing, and exciting all at the same time. This session will explore how genealogists can utilize the law, conflict resolution, and tools like date calculators and timelines to help build a clearer understanding of some potentially challenging historical situations.

I have long had an interest in Abbot-Downing Concord Coaches, probably the most popular brand of stagecoach ever produced in the United Sates. Judging by the e-mail that I have received from a short mention in a previous article, it looks like many people are interested in these old stagecoaches. I thought I would write a bit about these important transportation methods in American history.

If you ever see one, you should realize that you are looking at history.

In the 1800s and very early 1900s, the Abbot-Downing Company of Concord, New Hampshire, built more than 3,000 of these stagecoaches and then sold them all over the United States. Properly called Abbot-Downing Coaches, a few were even shipped to New Zealand, Australia, and South Africa.

Lewis Downing started a carriage-building business in Concord, New Hampshire, on August 3, 1813. By 1826, feeling the need of an expert carriage maker, Downing engaged the services of J. Stephens Abbot, and the men entered into partnership in the next year.

Abbot-Downing became known the world over for its Concord Stagecoach, but the company actually manufactured over 40 different types of carriages and wagons at their wagon factory in Concord. The Concord Stagecoaches were built as solid as the Abbot-Downing Company's reputation and became known as coaches that didn't break down.

After twenty years in business together, Abbott and Downing went their separate ways in an amicable split. Downing continued to build Concord coaches, and the two companies merged again in 1865, when Lewis Downing, Jr., and J.S. and E.A. Abbott Company formed the Abbott-Downing Company. They continued to manufacture coaches, wagons, and carriages under that company's name until 1919.

Most of the time, the Abbot-Downing Company employed about 300 people. All were men except for one: from 1865 to 1895 Marie F. Putnam stitched leather seats and trim for every stagecoach that rolled out of the Concord factory, including those purchased by Wells Fargo & Company. For the entire 30 years, she was the company's only female employee.

Each coach was given a number by the Abbot-Downing factory, and each has its own story. The Concord Coaches had a reputation for being sturdy, roomy, and comfortable. Having seen several Concord Coaches, I have to say the mid-1800s definitions of "roomy" and "comfortable" were far different from today's definitions.

These stagecoaches were used from eastern Maine to San Diego and were the coaches most of us visualize when we think of the stagecoaches in the Old West. Indeed, thousands of these stagecoaches were sold west of the Mississippi. Wells Fargo Bank still uses an Abbot-Downing Coach in its corporate logo and owns several restored coaches.

Buffalo Bill used Concord Coaches in his Wild West Shows. Old western movies filmed in the 1930s or 1940s usually used authentic, old Concord Coaches in their scenes. In fact, you can watch some of the older westerns to see crashes in which the movie studios filmed these antique coaches running off cliffs and smashing into the canyons below. You won't see that in modern westerns as the original coaches are now worth hundreds of thousands of dollars each!

If your ancestors have been in North America for more than 100 years, chances are that many of them rode in Concord Coaches. Sometimes the passengers both walked and rode, as described by the stagecoach fares in and around Lincoln, New Hampshire:

• pulled by 6 horses

• 1st class: $7.00 (rode all the way)

• 2nd class: had to walk at bad places on the road

• 3rd class: same as above, but also had to push at hills

Based upon the interest expressed in e-mail, I considered writing an article about Concord Coaches. I have a casual knowledge of the topic, having seen quite a few of the Abbot-Downing coaches in the past forty years or so. However, as I began to research the topic, I found numerous web sites owned and written by true experts. I decided to refer you to the excellent articles already available.

If you are not familiar with these delightful remnants of Americana, I suggest that you look at the pictures on these web sites. Then try to imagine your ancestor riding for hours in these cramped, uncomfortable seats in a back and forth rocking motion as the stagecoaches lurched along over muddy unpaved roads, bouncing in and out of wagon ruts, at speeds typically of 8 to 10 miles per hour. Not only was travel by stagecoach uncomfortable, it often was also unsanitary. Passengers were always advised to “spit on the leeward side of the coach.” A stagecoach passenger may have had to get out and walk in places, or perhaps even place a shoulder against a wheel on the steeper hills. It was an exhausting and usually dirty ride!

Start first with the pictures on the "Abbot-Downing Concord Coaches" pages at http://theconcordcoach.tripod.com/abbotdowning/ and on the "The Concord Coach Gallery" at http://www.over-land.com/ccoachg.html.

If you have never seen a Concord Coach, you need to find one! There is an excellent list of almost all the Concord Coaches that are on display at http://theconcordcoach.tripod.com/abbotdowning/id14.html. There are several on exhibit in New Hampshire, of course, but others can be seen in California, Pennsylvania, Maine, Vermont, New York, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Ohio, Colorado, Missouri, Arizona, and South Dakota. Again, visit one in person, and then visualize your ancestor's travels for hours as the coach bounced along unpaved roads.

Here is a list of other web sites that describe the historic Concord Coaches:

The Concord Coach: http://www.over-land.com/ccoach.html and the many links at http://www.over-land.com/coach.html.

Concord (New Hampshire) Historical Society: https://www.concordhistoricalsociety.org/the-concord-coach/.

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abbot-Downing_Company

Abbott-Downing Historical Society: http://www.concordcoach.org/

1891 Abbot Downing Concord Coach at the Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation: https://www.thehenryford.org/collections-and-research/digital-collections/artifact/237451/.

The Abbot and Downing Company: http://www.over-land.com/ccoach.html.

Abbot-Downing coaches in San Diego, California: http://www.sandiegohistory.org/journal/1962/january/concord/.

The story of coach #80, built in 1850, survived three fires (!) and is now on display at the Concord Group Insurance Company, in Concord, NH (I have seen this coach many times): http://www.concordgroupinsurance.com/aboutus/concordcoach

Hundreds of photographs of Concord Coaches: https://bit.ly/3sSKDh6

If you find other web pages that describe the Abbot-Downing Concord Coaches, please post a comment at the end of this article and let everyone know about them.

A newsletter reader wrote recently and asked a question that I think many people should thunk about. I replied to him in email but thought I would also share may answer here in the newsletter in case others have the same question.

My correspondent wrote:

I am relatively new to genealogy technology. Are there tips you can provide to ensure the security of personal information? Would building a family tree in software only my computer be more secure than syncing it to a webpage (like MyHeritage)? Is it a good idea to not include details (name, date and place of birth) for all living relatives and maybe back a generation or two? Thanks.

My reply:

Great questions! However, I don’t have a simple answer. In fact, I can offer several answers and suggestions.

The various web sites have lots of controls to control privacy. Your computer on your desk and your laptop computer and tablet computer probably have no such controls. Hackers around the world are constantly trying to access your computer at home (and millions of other computers) through the Internet. In addition, there is even more danger when you take your laptop or tablet computer out of the home where it is exposed to loss, theft, and other risks.

Generally speaking, placing genealogy information or any other information in the cloud is more secure than keeping the same information in your own computer. I speak from experience; I had a laptop computer stolen a few years ago from the trunk of my automobile. The thief obtained everything: my bank account info, my credit card numbers, my Social Security number, the email addresses and phone numbers of most of my friends and business acquaintances, my family tree info, and more. Had I been smart enough to only keep that info in a secure area in the cloud, the thief would have obtained nothing.

I do that now. I still have my family tree info in my own laptop and desktop computers. After all, family tree information isn’t secret anyway. Almost all genealogy information is publicly-available info available in various public government records and elsewhere. (Hey, that's where I found it!) However, I now keep my bank account info, my credit card numbers, my Social Security number, the email addresses and phone numbers of most of my friends and business acquaintances, and more ONLY in the cloud and only by encrypting it first before sending it to a cloud web site. I never keep sensitive information in plain text on my own computers where it can be accessed by thieves and/or visitors to my home.

For the information I store on MyHeritage, I know the web site (and almost all other genealogy web sites) have excellent controls where names, dates, places of birth, and other personal information for all living people are never displayed to anyone else. When I log in with my user name and password, I can see that information. However, if you or anyone else looks at the information there that I made public, you do not see the personal information for living people.

I also keep backup ENCRYPTED copies in various locations, including one encrypted copy on my laptop computer, one encrypted copy in a plug-in external hard drive of my desktop computer, one encrypted copy in a backup service in the cloud that I pay for, one encrypted copy in Google Drive (which obviously is also stored in the cloud), and one UNencrypted copy in one of a relative’s computer.

By the way, I do keep a lot of non-sensitive information in my own computers where it is available to me and probably to thieves at all times, even without an Internet connection. Copies of most things are also kept online. My calendar, my shopping list, my favorite recipe for vegan chili, the jokes I collect, copies of my past newsletter articles, and hundreds of other items are not secret. I don't encrypt those and don't lock them up. Probably 98% of the things I save online and offline are not secret. Heck, if anyone wants a copy of those things, just drop me a note and I will send them to you! I don’t see a need for security for those items.

In contrast, anything that I wish to keep secret is kept under lock and key (the key is called "encryption") only in secure web sites where I can access the information whether I am at home or traveling. Sometimes, “traveling” means that I am at the grocery store or at the doctor's office, but I still might need to access the information while I'm out and about. I strive to have all information securely available at my fingertips at any time, regardless of where I am.

I also want to keep my information away from thieves, whether they are located overseas or if they are standing behind my automobile, attempting to break in and steal my laptop or tablet computer.

Your need for security will undoubtedly be different from my needs. However, I strongly suggest you think about what you need to protect and the create your own security to make sure your private information remains private. The word “encryption” should be a major item in your plans.

How much personal information are you willing to give the government? Would that answer change if your unique data could help solve a crime? Millions of people don’t get to make that choice for themselves if they use certain online genealogy kits without reading the fine print.

You can read the full story in an article by Elizabeth Wadas and published in the NBC15 web site at: https://bit.ly/3wMs2Et.