Hayley wrote: > Hi There. I was wondering if anyone knows if the Ryerson Index is complete > or is being updated constantly. I have a death in 1981 which is not listed > on the index. Is is possible there could be a notice and it just has not > been listed yet?? Should I look anyway?? > > > > Many thanks > > Hayley > > Perth WA : D It depends on the location, Hayley. We have no volunteers in WA yet.:( You may be able to obtain your notice at the State Library. The Index is of newspaper notices only. To see how it works, have a look under the "About Us" link. If nobody put in a death notice, it won't be in the Index. This can happen with country papers that don't publish every day; I scanned the Mackay Qld papers for a fortnight, but there was no notice for a current death. The Ryerson Index is a volunteer effort. It started when Joyce Ryerson gave her collection of Sydney indexes to the NSW Dead Persons' Society. The bulk of its entries are still for the Sydney Morning Herald (about half the total) and the Sydney Daily Telegraph. With time, other papers have been added, and are still being added. In each case. we do current issues first, on a daily basis, and back issues as time permits. We are currently working hard at back-indexing to fill the gaps, but that depends on several things, mainly availability of the back issues, preferably at no cost, and availability of volunteers. As an example, I index the Bendigo Advertiser. That was first indexed in November 2005. As well as keeping it up to date, I am working backwards, one month at a time. September and October 2005 are now complete, and this afternoon, I will be at the local Library indexing more of August. I would like to be doing it more quickly, but my concentration lets me down. To find out whether we are indexing the paper you need, go to the "Newspaper Coverage" link. Choose your paper from the list, and you can navigate to a list of the dates we have indexed. A paper cannot be indexed unless somebody is sending it in. If your paper isn't listed, it is because nobody taking that paper is willing to donate a few minutes a day or week to send it in. The whole site is updated fortnightly on average. One man does all the co-ordinating and uploading of data, and recently, he has been receiving *over 250 updates a day* from his team. As a result, we have had to streamline our procedures at that point, but there should be no difference as far as users are concerned. That gives you an idea of the size of the operation. Without volunteers, it would fall to the ground. We need more volunteers. Training and indexing software are provided. If you are interested, there is a link on the site. The Index is an index only. There is a very limited service providing look- ups of notices indexed, but that is provided by volunteers as well. They do this for their hobby, and do not appreciate being abused for not having the details back the following day. Unfortunately, we do receive messages like that, occasionally. Please look at other options first, then follow the procedures under "Requesting a Lookup." I would be happy to answer any further queries. Doug Laidlaw, Committee Member, Ryerson Index Inc.

Hello Doug. Many many thanks for your explanation. I will now take a closer look at the site. It is a fantastic resource for genealogy. I have found many notices that have helped me fill in gaps in my tree. Thank you Hayley : D -------Original Message------- From: Doug Laidlaw Date: 16/11/2009 9:10:44 AM To: genanz@rootsweb.com Subject: Re: The Ryerson Index Hayley wrote: > Hi There. I was wondering if anyone knows if the Ryerson Index is complete > or is being updated constantly. I have a death in 1981 which is not listed > on the index. Is is possible there could be a notice and it just has not > been listed yet?? Should I look anyway?? > > > > Many thanks > > Hayley > > Perth WA : D It depends on the location, Hayley. We have no volunteers in WA yet.:( You may be able to obtain your notice at the State Library. The Index is of newspaper notices only. To see how it works, have a look under the "About Us" link. If nobody put in a death notice, it won't be in the Index. This can happen with country papers that don't publish every day; I scanned the Mackay Qld papers for a fortnight, but there was no notice for a current death. The Ryerson Index is a volunteer effort. It started when Joyce Ryerson gave her collection of Sydney indexes to the NSW Dead Persons' Society. The bulk of its entries are still for the Sydney Morning Herald (about half the total) and the Sydney Daily Telegraph. With time, other papers have been added, and are still being added. In each case. we do current issues first, on a daily basis, and back issues as time permits. We are currently working hard at back-indexing to fill the gaps, but that depends on several things, mainly availability of the back issues, preferably at no cost, and availability of volunteers. As an example, I index the Bendigo Advertiser. That was first indexed in November 2005. As well as keeping it up to date, I am working backwards, one month at a time. September and October 2005 are now complete, and this afternoon, I will be at the local Library indexing more of August. I would like to be doing it more quickly, but my concentration lets me down. To find out whether we are indexing the paper you need, go to the "Newspaper Coverage" link. Choose your paper from the list, and you can navigate to a list of the dates we have indexed. A paper cannot be indexed unless somebody is sending it in. If your paper isn't listed, it is because nobody taking that paper is willing to donate a few minutes a day or week to send it in. The whole site is updated fortnightly on average. One man does all the co-ordinating and uploading of data, and recently, he has been receiving *over 250 updates a day* from his team. As a result, we have had to streamline our procedures at that point, but there should be no difference as far as users are concerned. That gives you an idea of the size of the operation. Without volunteers, it would fall to the ground. We need more volunteers. Training and indexing software are provided. If you are interested, there is a link on the site. The Index is an index only. There is a very limited service providing look- ups of notices indexed, but that is provided by volunteers as well. They do this for their hobby, and do not appreciate being abused for not having the details back the following day. Unfortunately, we do receive messages like that, occasionally. Please look at other options first, then follow the procedures under "Requesting a Lookup." I would be happy to answer any further queries. Doug Laidlaw, Committee Member, Ryerson Index Inc. ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to GENANZ-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message