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Life
in Early New England
Local
and Family Histories: New England, 1600s-1900s
(Family Archive 449)
Reviewed by Marthe Arends
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All genealogists know that in-depth research is required to flesh out
an ancestor if you want a picture of how that person lived, what
their environment was like, what events effected them — in
other words, how they lived their life.
There are many reference books that can tell you things like what
major wars occurred during an ancestor's lifetime. Yet books on a national
scale, while interesting, often overlook the local information needed.
Enter local history books: they are most often written in the region
they feature, by a local historian or society, and they detail local
events, people, history, and many times describe the surrounding area.
Likewise genealogies often give background information on a family,
detailing everyday events as well as births, deaths, and marriages.
Most genealogies also include biographical details about the individuals
included, as well as extracted information from sources such as wills,
obituaries, lists, and other records.
This CD offers researchers a chance to access twenty difficult-to-find
family and local histories. The books contained on the CD are:
- To the Descendants of Thomas Dickinson, Son of Nathaniel and
Anna Gull Dickinson of Wethersfield, Connecticut and Hadley, Massachusetts,
by Frederick Dickinson
- The Downers of America, With Genealogical Record, by David
R. Downer
- History of the Dudley Family, by Dean Dudley
- The Dudley Genealogies and Family Records, by Dean Dudley
- The Descendants of Thomas Durfee of Portsmouth, Rhode Island
(Volume II), by William F. Reed
- History and Genealogy of Deacon Joseph Eastman of Hadley, Massachusetts,
by Guy S. Rix
- The Eaton Family of Nova Scotia, by Arthur Wentworth Hamilton
Eaton
- The Edmimster Family in America, by Frank Custer Edminster,
Jr.
- Edson Family History and Genealogy (Volume II)
- History of Ellenwood - Wharton and 20 Allied Families, by
Willard White Ellenwood
- Some Descendants of John Endecott, Governor of Massachusetts
Bay Colony, by Mabel Mcfatridge-Mccloskey
- Memoir of Samuel Endicott With a Genealogy of his Descendants,
by William C. Endicott
- Record of the Descendants of James Ensign and His Wife Sarah
Elson, by Martha Eunice Ensign Nelson
- Genealogical Records of Descendants of John and Anthony Emery,
of Newbury, Massachusetts, by Reverend Rufus Emery
- History of the Town of Bristol, Grafton County, New Hampshire,
by Richard W. Musgrove
- History of Brookline, New Hampshire, by Edward E. Parker
- History of Pembroke, New Hampshire, by Reverend N.F. Carter
- A History of the Town of Sullivan, New Hampshire (Volumes
I and II), by Reverend Josiah Lafayette Seward, D.D.
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February
3, 1999
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Although there is no comprehensive index included on the CD, it
is fully searchable using the Search Expert feature. Searches
can be conducted by name or keyword, allowing full-text searches
of location names, subjects, or other items; multiple word searches
(up to four words) are allowed if the CD is used with recent versions
of Family Tree Maker or Family Archive Viewer.
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The number of items contained on this CD is seemingly endless.
In browsing through the books contained, I saw obituaries,
genealogies, biographies, histories of the countryside,
town histories, military lists, membership lists, deeds,
municipal notes and minutes, petitions, and much more. It
should be noted that the CD contains transcribed information
rather than actual images of the books; hence illustrations
and maps that may have been included in the originals are
not included on the CD.
In my opinion, books on CD will never replace the satisfaction
received when physically browsing through a book, however,
CDs such as this one make it possible for researchers to
use books they might otherwise never be able to find. The
information contained on the CD offers family historians
an excellent starting point for further research, and gives
readers a glimpse at times long past and places that are
forever changed.
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Marthe Arends has
been involved in genealogy for 18 years and is the editor of the computer genealogy
newsletter Online Pioneers. She has lectured on computers and genealogy
to many groups, has been the SysOp of a Fidonet genealogy BBS, has written articles
for a variety of genealogy publications, and currently teaches several online
genealogy classes. Marthe has also written Genealogy
Software Guide and Genealogy
on CD-ROM, both published by the Genealogical
Publishing Company.
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