Our Magazine
Continuously published since the Society was formed in 1975.
Published and distributed to all members in March, June, September and December, our Magazine is available in both paper and digital formats. It has twice won the Family History Federation's award for Best Overall Journal of the Year. A complete set is available for reference in our Research Room .
Each issue aims to keep members up-to-date with Society business, news and forthcoming events including local talks and fairs. There are regular features such as reports from meetings, progress on projects, members’ research enquiries, details of new publications and a selection of articles about family or local history topics submitted by members.
Your articles, letters and reports should be submitted to the Editor at: editor@bafhs.org.uk.
It is only three years since the first appearance of the 1901 census, and although there were substantial teething problems, it is now established as one of the prime sources for British family history.
My article in the September 2004 issue contained information about 1837online, the pay-per-view website that gives access to images of the GRO registers of births, marriages and deaths. The way the images were indexed made searching something of a hit-or-miss affair, so it is good to report that latest improvements to the site make it much easier - and cheaper - to use.
There still seem to be some people who claim to research their family history without obtaining certificates of birth, marriage and death, but most of us appreciate the extra information such documents contain, and the confirmation they give of the details of our ancestors.
I start this quarter’s article with a website nearer to home – that of the Bristol Record Office. The BRO has recently received collections from two of Bristol's most famous photographers - Jim Facey and George Gallop, and has made 500 of these photographs available online.
The past year has seen some major changes in the number and style of family history websites, so in this issue I thought I would provide a summary of recent developments, especially for new readers and for those who have recently joined the Internet, There is also some information about other sites that you may find useful.
In the last issue, I looked at some websites and CDs which contain the basic national information for family historians – records of births, marriages and deaths, and the census. This time, the details are of websites with a more local focus, and some which will help you expand and put in context what you already know.
Even your Webmaster has problems with his computer, and the first draft of this article is being written on the number 2 machine, which is six years old, dreadfully slow, and uses a dial-up Internet connection.
As usual, since my last article there have been some major developments in the availability of family history information online, so much of what I write this time will be to update things that were in the last Journal.
The big news is that the GRO has agreed to lift the 100-year restriction on the publication of information on births, marriages and deaths.
Things happen quickly and unexpectedly in the world of on-line information, which means that sometimes what I write is out-of-date by the time you read it. That is the case with some of things I described in my article in the December 2002 issue of the Journal. Here is an update.
The big Internet family history development in the U.K. for 2002 was the late launch of the online 1901 Census. This became available on a trial basis in late August, and is now in the finals stages of testing and modification.