POLAND-ROOTS-L Archives
Archiver > POLAND-ROOTS > 1999-02 > 0918112800
From: Carla <>
Subject: Re: [POLAND-ROOTS] Re: Ellis Island News Story !!!
Date: Wed, 03 Feb 1999 23:20:00 -0800
Dear Terry and Poland-Roots List Friends,
MANY THANKS indeed to Terry in California for typing the entire news
article below!! And definitely thanks for sharing such exciting news as
this.
I sincerely hope they can successfully achieve their goal of putting the
information online. . .and that they don't LIMIT it to *only* emigrants
who passed through Ellis Island. Ellis Island did not begin operating
until *1892,* so excluding those emigrants from the database who arrived
in New York in the pre-Ellis Island days (prior to the year 1892) would
leave too many researchers out in the cold and disappointed.
Let's cross our fingers that they somehow, eventually, include ALL our
ancestors who arrived via New York!
Thank you, again, Terry, for a great job and a terrific favor.
Best wishes,
Carla HELLER (also in California) :-)
Los Angeles
=========================================
wrote:
---SNIP---
> ARCHIVE PUTS HUDDLED MASSES ON-LINE - Volunteers scanning Ellis Island
> Records. (SF Examiner 2/2/99)
>
> Climbing the family tree will take a lot less clawing as soon as a nonprofit
> foundation finishes a more than $15 million project to post Ellis Island
> immigration records on the internet.
> By helping people to access information instantly that previously was buried
> in a bureaucratic quagmire, the project will revolutionize genealogicial
> research for many of the more than 113 million Americans who already actively
> pursue their family histories.
> Officials at the Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation in NY, the same
> organization that gave Lady Liberty a face lift in 1986 without any public
> funding, estimate that more than 40% of Americans can trace their European
> ancestry back to Ellis Island.
> "This is going to be a reference point", said Vern Deubler, Pres. of the
> Calif. Genealogical Society, which was based in San Francisco for a century
> before moving to Oakland this year. "It's going to provide people with very
> important leads".
> By the end of next year, the foundation hopes, people will be able to enter
> any information they know about a progenitor and the program will search more
> than 20 million records for a match. The software will even be able to
> tolerate misspellings.
> If a match is found, the researcher can choose to print out a photo of the
> ship and a copy of the original manifesto that marked the immigrant's arrival.
> At Fisherman's Wharf on Monday, Stephen Briganti, Chairman of the
> foundation, said the new database would especially help Bay Area researchers.
> He said the Bay Area remains one of the major hubs for Eliis Island
> immigrants and their descendants. Tens of thousands of immigrants came here
> after arriving through the port, first to fuel the Industrial revolution and
> later to farm wine grapes. He said first generation travelers from the main
> Ellis Island years - 1892 to 1924 - still live in the area.
> Briganti added that Californians' interest in Ellis Island immigration
> research, based on requests for the foundation's resources, is outstripped
> only by New yorkers'.
> The database - which organizers say could be ready by the end of 2000 -
> will catalog records of almost 20 million immigrants who flooded the tiny NY
> Harbor island. Until now, those documents have been stored at the National
> Archives and Immigration and Naturalization Service in the clunky microfilm
> format.
> The first phase of the project was to collect and digitize records and
> install computers at the museum.
> Now, Briganti said, putting the information on the Internet has become a top
> goal as well.
> "We're pretty confident this is going to work," Briganti said. "It's not
> perfect, but it's light years ahead of going to the Archives."
> A demonstration of the system showed that a reseacher can enter information
> in any or all of 11 fields, which ask for personal information such as the
> subject's name and country of birth, and immigration, like the subject's port
> of entry.
> Foundation spokeswoman Peg Zitko said the project got off the ground when a
> nationwide network of Mormon volunteers agreed to digitize the microfilm
> information for free. Thousands of volunteers have logged more than 2 million
> hours; they've entered 3/5's of the data so far.
> A spokesman for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Salt Lake
> City said the project was important to the church's mission. "We've always
> been involved in genealogy," said Dan Rascon, "because linking to our family
> helps us understand who we are and what we may become."
> Information on the project may be found at www.ellisisland.org on the
> internet.
>
> (And I just want you all to know that I typed this, not scanned, so I hope I
> get some appreciation out there!!!!!!!! Best, and good night! Terry in
> Calif.) PS, Please feel free to pass this along to other genealogy lists.
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