Miscellaneous tips

A collection of miscellaneous tips and tricks not covered in other articles that might help you with your research.

Access some subscription websites with a Library Card

• There are a number of websites including Eighteenth Century Collections Online (ECCO), House of Commons Parliamentary Papers, The [London] Times Digital Archive 1785-1985, The Illustrated London News 1842-2003, 19th Century UK Periodicals and other newspaper sites, JSTOR (many journals), which may help you in your research, where access is restricted . Card holders of participating Libraries including the following National Libraries (noting there is generally a residential requirement) Scotland, Wales, Ireland, Australia, State Library of NSW, and many University Libraries can access some, or all of these websites, generally remotely on their own computers. Many of these websites including ECCO may also be accessed from the British Library Reading Rooms. Also see Subscription websites-online newspapers, journals and directories
  • JSTOR Register & Read—Free Reading of Historical Scholarship. Read up to three items from the archive every two weeks.
• In England, a Borough or County Library Card may enable you to access The Times remotely but probably not other historical newspaper sites. However, enquire what is available to you both from your local library and the libraries of surrounding boroughs as what is on offer can differ widely and membership requirements are usually easily met. Popular choices available online include The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography and Who's Who & Who Was Who. Other subscription sites may be available from terminals in the library itself e.g. Ancestry - this may sound restrictive but, if you already subscribe at a base level, may be useful for consultation when you want to look up a source restricted to premium subscribers.

As an example, Suffolk Reference Direct shows the databases available to the users of the 44 local libraries of Suffolk County Council. Ancestry and FindMyPast are available but must be accessed in a local library or record office, while other databases are available on home computers.

Access an obsolete website in archives.org

• Go to http://www.archive.org/web/web.php and type in the website you require in the Wayback Machine and click <Take Me Back>.
• A helpful website which has closed is regiments.org, here is the archived site at January 2008. This is the Regiments page, the Numeric list of British Army Regiments page and the British Army 1881 Regiments page; An overview of the South Asian Armies page, Alphabetic Index,South Asia page and Numeric index, South Asia page

Search for books on a particular topic

Bibliography of British and Irish History (BBIH), previously called the Royal Historical Society Bibliography on British History may be of use if you are researching a particular topic and wish to find books written about the topic. As an example, entering East India Company produced over a thousand results, mainly books and articles written in the last forty years. This is now accessed through a subscription service, but is available free at the British Library as part of the Electronic databases available in the Library's Reading Rooms

Search for a Library which holds a book you want to read

• Worldcat.org. Note that the British Library does not appear to be part of this database.
• Trove for Australia. (National Library of Australia)

Find the meaning of words used in India

• Hobson-Jobson: the Anglo-Indian dictionary by Henry Yule, Arthur Coke Burnell, William Crooke published by Wordsworth Editions, 1996. Limited View Google Books or full view at the Internet Archive website
• The Oriental Interpreter and Treasury of East India Knowledge: A Companion to "The Hand-book of British India." by Joachim Hayward Stocqueler 1848, Full View Google Books
• This Glossary is from the British Empire website
• Glossary to The History of the British Empire in India by Edward Thornton 1859. Google Books
• A-I Vocabulary: A lexicon of long-forgotten Anglo-Indian words www.tapmal.com
• Later publications include Sahibs, Nabobs and Boxwallahs: a dictionary of the words of Anglo-India by Ivor Lewis and Hanklyn-Janklin, a glossary of Indian English, by Nigel Hankin who is described in the The Telegraph obituary of 9 Jan 2008
• A Glossary of Judicial and Revenue Terms. See Dictionaries online

Convert a date which has used the Bengali Calendar

• Bengali Calendar Wikipedia

Find an exchange rate

• Rupee exchange rate 1871-1892 Wikipedia

Find out the meaning of an archaic medical term

Useful for interpreting the cause of death on a burial record or the medical conditions on a soldier's service record.

• Glossary of Medical Terms used in the 18th and 19th Centuries from Craig Thornber’s History of Medicine
• From Genealogy Quest-Glossaries-Diseases Part 1, A-C, Part 2, D-L, Part 3, M-R, Part 4, S-Y.
• Rudy's List of Archaic Medical Terms A Glossary of Archaic Medical Terms, Diseases and Causes of Death by Rudy Schmidt. Lists in English and many other languages, including German, French, and Dutch

Read old handwriting

• Palaeography: reading old handwriting 1500 – 1800 A practical online tutorial The National Archives, Kew.
• Reading English Handwritten Records from FamilySearch Learning Center. Covers "Secretary Hand" used in the 1500s and 1600s
• Copperplate Victorian Hand Writing Causeway Museum Service
• A Guide to Reading Old Handwriting in relation to Postal History by allanoliver1937@msn.com
• Deciphering Old Handwriting by Sabina J. Murray
• This blog (hintsandechoes.wordpress.com) contains examples of the Spencerian script (used in the United States from approximately 1850 to 1925) and the later Palmer script

Photographs

Scan photographs

• Blog by Ken Watson blog : Scanning–DPI does count recommends scanning photographs at 600 dpi and slides and negatives from a 35mm camera at 3200 dpi
• Creating & Editing Digital Photos: Tips for Scanning & Restoring About.com Genealogy
• A few scanning tips scantips.com
  • Never used a scanner before?
• What Kind of a Scanner Should I Buy? 1, 2, 3, 4 from Tech Tips Family Search

Digitally restore old photographs

• Digital Restoration of Old Photographs from Tech Tips Familysearch.org
• What do I Need to Restore Damaged Photographs? by James Tanner. Parts 1 and 2, December 2012. Family Search Blog
• Photo Restoration, a subforum of WW2Talk. (You must be a logged in member of WW2Talk to view any images displayed, see Mailing lists)

Scan negatives

• Scanning old film negatives from Tech Tips Familysearch.org

Date family photographs

• Find My Past has a series of blogs about how to date family photographs

Aspects to consider when hiring a professional researcher

• Hiring a Professional from Cyndi’s List which includes Selecting and Engaging a Professional Researcher from Ancestry.com

Copy Information from Full View Google Books

Refer Google Books

Scan and edit a document-OCR (Optical Character Recognition)

• OCR anything with OneNote 2007 and 2010. howtogeek.com. OneNote 2010 is included with all edition of Microsoft Office 2010 except for Starter edition. OneNote 2007 is included with Office 2007 Home and Student, Enterprise, and Ultimate.
• Microsoft Office Word 2007 instructions on how to Scan and edit a document, from Microsoft Office Online.
• Microsoft Office Word 2003 instructions About Microsoft Office Document Imaging from Microsoft Office Online.

Send money to India

• This India List thread and this India List post dated May 2012 suggests some methods.

Use the Virtual Magnifying Glass

You may find this Virtual Magnifying Glass is useful.