Archive for January, 2009
News from 1911
You can now search for variants for both first names and last names on the 1911 census website http://www.1911census.co.uk. So for Heywood, you can also check Haywood, Heyward and so on. The variants search facility is essentially a large thesaurus identifing common variants, misspellings and alternative spellings. This should be of great help in tracking down elusive ancestors. Click on the "Show advanced fields" button. New features to be added shortly include the ability to use a wildcard as the first character, and an increase range of birth years available to be searched (currently set at a maximum of +/- 2 years).
One of the more unusual entries is that for Adolph Hitler’s half-brother Alois. Like many young German men Alois came to Britain becoming a waiter in Dublin where he met his future wife Bridget. They settled in Liverpool and at the time of the 1911 census they were living at 102 Upper Stanhope Street, Toxteth Park. Their son William Henry was born a few days before census day. It has been rumoured that Adolph visited his half-brother in 1912 or 1913, but there is no evidence that he did. Alois seems to have returned to Germany in May 1914 abandoning his family in the process. The American journalist John Gunther claims to have found him working as a barber in Berlin in the mid-1930s. William Henry emigrated to America and served in the US Navy during the Second World War. You can read more about the Hitlers of Liverpool at http://www.bbc.co.uk/legacies/myths_legends/england/liverpool/user_1_article_1.shtml.
Birds Survived Mass Extinction That Wiped Out Dinosaurs Because Of Their Larger Brains
The Cretaceous–Tertiary mass extinction 65 million years ago may have wiped out the dinosaurs, but those that survived — the ancestors of today’s birds — may have done so because of their bird brains.
Modern feet step back 1.5 million years
Footprints preserved at an African site suggest that the feet of a 1.5 million-year-old human ancestor looked much like those of people today
Fossil footprints reveal our modern walk in the making
Ancient footprints left in Kenya 1.5 million years ago were made by human ancestors with essentially modern foot anatomy and gait<img width=’1′ height=’1′ src=’http://feeds.newscientist.com/c/749/f/10897/s/34ee7dd/mf.gif’ border=’0′/><div class=’mf-viral’><table border=’0′><tr><td valign=’middle’><a href="http://res.feedsportal.com/viral/sendemail2.html?title=Fossil footprints reveal our modern walk in the making&link=http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn16673-fossil-footprints-reveal-our-modern-walk-in-the-making.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=online-news" target="_blank"><img src="http://rss.feedsportal.com/images/emailthis2.gif" border="0" /></a></td><td valign=’middle’><a href="http://res.feedsportal.com/viral/bookmark.cfm?title=Fossil footprints reveal our modern walk in the making&link=http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn16673-fossil-footprints-reveal-our-modern-walk-in-the-making.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=online-news" target="_blank"><img src="http://rss.feedsportal.com/images/bookmark.gif" border="0" /></a></td></tr></table></div><br/><br/><a href="http://da.feedsportal.com/r/33263709759/u/0/f/10897/c/749/s/55502813/a2.htm"><img src="http://da.feedsportal.com/r/33263709759/u/0/f/10897/c/749/s/55502813/a2.img" border="0"/></a>
HIV-1 protease inhibitor induced oxidative stress in pancreatic B-cells: thymoquinone protection
(<i>Society for Experimental Biology and Medicine</i>) Researchers at the Tulane University School of Medicine, New Orleans, Louisiana have discovered that the HIV-1 protease inhibitors, such as nelfinavir included in highly active antiretroviral therapy regimen for the treatment of HIV-1 patients, induce deleterious effects on insulin secretion mediated through the oxidative stress pathway. They report a significant decrease in the levels of the antioxidants, cytosolic superoxide dismutase and glutathione, whereas mitochondrial SOD levels remained unaffected in pancreatic beta-cells exposed to nelfinavir.
ProGenealogists, Inc. Helps Trace President Obama’s Irish Roots, Assists Clients in Obtaining Dual Irish Citizenship
<P>ProGenealogists, Inc., announced today that it helped trace President Barack Obama&#039;s Irish roots back to Moneygall, County Offaly, Ireland with Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak. ProGenealogists, Inc. assists clients to obtain dual Irish citizenship. Irish genealogy expert Kyle Betit leads a team of researchers in the United States and Ireland to help descendants of Irish immigrants gather the necessary documents. (PRWeb Mar 20, 2009)</P>
<P>Read the full story at <a href="http://www.prweb.com/releases/2009/03/prweb2248754.htm">http://www.prweb.com/releases/2009/03/prweb2248754.htm</a></P>
Dino feathers may have had earlier origin than thought
Hairlike filaments found on ‘wrong’ side of dino family tree
FOR KIDS: Pondering the puzzling platypus
Scientists are studying the mixed-up looking mammal for clues to animal ancestry
Catch Up
It’s been a while since I’ve had time to post anything. But here are four items of news which may be of interest. The first is hardly news – that much of the 1911 census is now online at http://www.1911census.co.uk. There’s a pretty good atmosphere at The National Archives as the fact that the launch has gone so well. The media coverage has been extremely positive and there has been none of the problems which dogged the 1901 census. Indeed the site seems to be coping well with the demand. We’ll be looking in detail at the new census in the issue on sale on 5 February. On a much smaller scale Royal Marine registers of service, in series ADM 159, are now available through the Documents Online service at http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documentsonline. They cover the period between 1842 and 1936. There’s a feature on Royal Marines in the March issue. The Europeana website, which Chris Paton mentioned in a recent Internet News, is now up and running at http://www.europeana.eu. Europeana provides a searchable database of images held by many European museums and libraries, including the British Library and the Scottish SCRAN service. Lastly the new series of Who Do You Think You Are is due to be transmitted on Wednesday 4 February at 9pm on BBC1: the celebs featured are Rory Bremner, Fiona Bruce, Rick Stein, Zoe Wanamaker and Kevin Whateley.
GenealogyBank.com Reports Addition of 170 Historical Newspapers — 93 Million Family History Records Digitized Since 2006 Launch
GenealogyBank.com, the leading provider of digitized historical and recent newspapers for family history research, reports explosive growth of its archives for research of American ancestors. (PRWeb Jan 15, 2009)
Read the full story at http://www.prweb.com/releases/2009/01/prweb1865934.htm