I have regularly used the British Library [London] set for both my ONS and my own families. It is hard slow work. The quality of the fiche for some years is poor; the viewers are basic; and the area is within the Social Sciences room, requires a Reader's Ticket and demands use of pencil and paper or laptop. I agree with others that the deaths are most useful, particularly if starting from a probate entry on the England & Wales online index https://probatesearch.service.gov.uk/#wills [The current lack of detail on probates since 1996 that used to be available at First Avenue House and Court 38 is another story.] I could do an hour a month on my regular trips to London, but this would produce limited results. David Wharton -----Original Message----- From: John Hanson Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2017 6:26 PM To: 'Stephen Daglish' ; goons@rootsweb.com Subject: Re: [G] GRO Post-2005 BMD Transcription Project Stephen I am not sure that it is now really a practical option A friend recently did the deaths and marriages for the Halstead study. 14 fiche for each option so with births a minimum of 42 for each name. But with my study I ended up with 58 photographs rather than the 28 one would expect as some of the fiche are not particularly clear. It then took my a long time to transcribe the 750 entries. Just my thoughts Regards John Hanson, researcher, the Halsted Trust, http://www.halstedresearch.org.uk New family history conference in 2018 http://www.secretlives.org.uk -----Original Message----- From: GOONS [mailto:goons-bounces+john.hanson=one-name.org@rootsweb.com] On Behalf Of Stephen Daglish Sent: 15 May 2017 21:10 To: goons@rootsweb.com Subject: [G] GRO Post-2005 BMD Transcription Project I would appreciate any thoughts on this please. For some time, the Guild has had a project to look up post-2005 Birth Marriage and Death indexes in England and Wales. These indexes are not available online and can only be viewed on microfiche at a small number of locations in the UK: Birmingham Central Library Bridgend Reference and Information Library The British Library City of Westminster Archives Centre Greater Manchester County Record Office Plymouth Central Library For those who live outside the UK, or who are in the UK but not near one of the places where the records are available, it is difficult to access these records. The project was set up to enable entries to be searched and transcribed on behalf of members. The project has a co-ordinator who receives requests for look-ups for registered study names and passes these to a band of volunteers able to visit one of the places and extract the data. However, in practice we do not have these volunteers and the co-ordinator role is vacant - so we have no way to respond to any requests received. We think that this is still a potentially useful service for members, since these are key records for one-namers who have interests in England and Wales, and members who do not live near to the record offices are disadvantaged in terms of accessing these records. But without volunteers, the current process will not work. One suggestion is to try to see if this might work as a look up offer, rather than an ongoing project. If we could find members who are planning visits to one of the record offices and who might have some spare time, then they might make an offer to do some limited look ups. However, it is difficult to estimate the level of work that might be required to fulfil a request. For smaller names this might be manageable but for larger names this can become a significant task - which gets larger as additional years are added. In practice, few requests are currently being received. This may be because members are not aware the service is offered or perhaps there is little interest in these records. Should we seek to continue to offer this service and to look for volunteers who can help? Are there any alternative approaches that we might look at? Any thoughts welcome. Thank you. Stephen Daglish (4509) Volunteers Co-ordinator _____________________________________________ Information and admin page: http://one-name.org/guild-information-administration/ ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to GOONS-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message _____________________________________________ Information and admin page: http://one-name.org/guild-information-administration/ ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to GOONS-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message --- This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software. https://www.avast.com/antivirus