FOD families who moved to Queensland Australia in the 19th C (General)
by sidtoomey01 
, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, Friday, September 09, 2016, 03:47 (2991 days ago)
Hi
If any one is trying to research FOD Ancestors who may have moved to Australia, there is a fabulous free site called "Trove" which contains digitised newspapers among many other items of interest.
http://trove.nla.gov.au
When researching my Ancestors in Brisbane, I found a list of residents who were eligible to vote in the Queensland State Elections for the seat of Enoggera in the year 1887. The edition of the Newspaper is as follows.
The Telegraph (Brisbane, Qld. : 1872 - 1947) Thursday 21 October 1886 p 5 Advertising
The information listed was:-
Name
Residence
Qualification
Situation of property
Polling District.
For my Ancestor, this information together with a subsequent edition helped me to pinpoint the street in which he lived. I have driven past that street thousands of times without knowing. Pretty amazing really. At the time Brisbane had only been settled by Europeans for around sixty two years and was still very much undeveloped.
No promises, but there may be other Newspaper editions covering different years and Electorates.
I trust someone may find this information helpful.
Sid Toomey
(Family History Addict)
FOD families who moved to Australia & New Zealand in 19th C
by Jefff , West London, Middlesex, Friday, September 09, 2016, 15:46 (2991 days ago) @ sidtoomey01
Hi again Sid, thanks very much for that welcome post.
As we've recently had some queries relating to New Zealand, I've had a look to see if there are any similar websites for that part of the great Down Under. This one looks very useful, from the National Library of New Zealand. Like your Australian site, it appears to be entirely free to use.
FOD families who moved to Australia & New Zealand in 19th C
by jhopkins , Saturday, September 10, 2016, 05:29 (2990 days ago) @ Jefff
Jefff, that NZ site is seriously good as a research tool. NZ had such a tiny population for so long, the newspapers covered lots of events that don't get a look in in the media these days - the comings and goings of ordinary folks are no longer news nowadays. In those days, ordinary citizens got written about, not just the irritants in society like politicians.
As examples, I was able to follow the cycling progress of my great uncle (first generation born here) through accounts of sporting events in small towns and villages across the South Island. There are accounts of wrestling matches, one of which led to the eventual death of a great uncle. Two or three of my great uncles were involved with the Oddfellows lodge, and the papers had regular lodge news and election results. Similarly with school board elections - the papers even have accounts of the new teachers being appointed to the schools of one horse villages (of course most of these "villages" no longer exist - when travelling around the country you come across an old hall or a war memorial, with no houses or shops left around them).
Fortunately I didn't find my relatives in the Court news, but there is a lot of that in the papers as well. There are many accounts in those papers of ship arrivals and departures to what was called "Home" (Mother England to some), so you can often find passenger lists and vivid accounts of the conditions on immigrant ship voyages to NZ.
In some ways it is sad that the newspapers nowadays cover the daily doings of vast numbers of irrelevant people like so called celebrities. However, in the days of PapersPast, ordinary people got recorded. The focus was tiny and close up; now it is far away from most people's reality.
FOD families who moved to Australia & New Zealand in 19th C
by Jefff , West London, Middlesex, Monday, September 12, 2016, 17:44 (2987 days ago) @ jhopkins
Hi Janet,
glad you agree that's a useful site. You're dead right about the fantastic coverage in the old newspapers, especially local ones, I've spent many happy hours searching them from the BNA and excellent free-access Welsh Newspapers sites. The local Dean Forest papers I've used most are the Gloucester Citizen & Journal, which still covers the Dean very well, sadly the Dean Forest Mercury and Lydney Observer are not yet digitized for the net. As you've found, it seems that if one's ancestors were local movers & shakers, sportspeople or scoundrels then they often got mentions in the papers. Even if the articles aren't our ancestors, they still give a great snapshot of local life of their time, often making modern life seem so easy in comparison.
Your mention of your cyclist G Uncle made me smile, this was my hobby/sport for many years, so although the following article is not my relation, it's still one of my favourites of the hundreds I've downloaded. I found it while searching my dad's Lydbrook ancestors, it just happened to be on the same page as one of those. I'd got used to the fact that any accident made local news in the Victorian papers, but to see this in a "modern" one really tickled me. I think the fact that the old papers were pages of small text, with no photos and few adverts, so they HAD to use all available stories to fill each day's print.
The article from the Gloucester Citizen of Tuesday 27 September 1927 reads thus,
====================
Lydbrook.
-----
BICYCLE LEFT ON ROAD.
William John Hughes, farmer of Stowfield Farm, near Lydbrook, when returning home on his motor cycle on the Stowfield-Lydbrook road, ran over a pedal cycle which was lying in the middle of the road. He was thrown to the ground some distance away and received numerous abrasions. Having recovered from the shock he went back and discovered that the owner of the pedal cycle was lying fast asleep on the roadside.
====================
GlosBMD suggests it was quite a year for him
Marriage Details
Groom Surname Groom Forename Bride Surname Bride Forename District Parish Building Year Register Entry
HUGHES William John WILLIAMS Eleanor Forest of Dean Monmouth Register Office [Closed] 1927 30 51
FOD families who moved to Australia & New Zealand in 19th C
by jhopkins , Wednesday, September 14, 2016, 01:01 (2986 days ago) @ Jefff
Hi Jefff
Just to let you know, two things:
1. I am not Janet, I am John! Seriously, my sister IS called Janet and we got a bit of stick at school where the Janet and John books were the main early readers in NZ at the time (notorious for things like "Run John, watch Janet" or "Throw the ball John, Janet watch John"... Good training for a sexist society!
2. Great Uncle Charlie raced on Penny Farthing cycles...
Thanks for your thoughts as ever, Jefff.
John
FOD families who moved to Australia & New Zealand in 19th C
by Jefff , West London, Middlesex, Wednesday, September 14, 2016, 01:18 (2986 days ago) @ jhopkins
Hi John,
oops, sorry abt that ! Oddly enough, after posting I did remind meself to check I had your name right, but as usual with me these days I then promptly forgot...
No idea where I got Janet from, but hey I wasn't far away, all things considered !.
Ref the Janet and John books, yes they taught me to read too, in the mid 60s. As you say all terribly non-pc, yet (incredibly ! - or not in fact), hugely effective too. I guess NZ had the Ladybird kids books too, BBC4 did an excellent documentary abt them a few years back, superbly planned, written and illustrated, happy memories of my primary school days which I loved.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/tv/entries/130295e9-2940-3881-8c05-a029620eaa23
Ref your Great Uncle, well I've done some pretty crazy things on bikes, had a few nasty accidents too, but even in my carefree childhood I'd have NEVER even ridden never-mind raced on a penny-farthing, looks incredibly dangerous to me, so very fast and a long way to fall, so all credit to brave Charlie !
Thanks again JOHN for your interesting posts, atb Jeff
FOD families who moved to Australia & New Zealand in 19th C
by admin 
, Forest of Dean, Monday, September 12, 2016, 14:54 (2988 days ago) @ Jefff
We have no added this link to our Links pages under Genealogy Research.
Our thanks to Jeff.
FOD families who moved to Queensland Australia in the 19th C
by admin , Forest of Dean, Monday, September 12, 2016, 14:47 (2988 days ago) @ sidtoomey01
The link to the Trove website can now be found on our Links pages under Genealogy Research.
Our thanks to Sid Toomey for bringing it to our notice.