Most French-Canadian genealogists will find that they have several soldier ancestors who were members of the Carignan-Salières Regiment, a unit sent to the young colony by King Louis XIV in 1665 to protect it from the attacks of the Iroquois. In episode #41, Bill Kane, vice-president of La Société...
More KKK members in New England than the South? Really? Yes, at one time in the early 20th century this was true. And they were attacking Franco-Americans. Why? Dr. Eileen Angelini will tell us this interesting story about a little-known chapter in American history. In Language Tip #39, we’ll...
You’ve probably heard many times, “Parish registers are easy to read. Once you know how to read one type of record, you can read them all. They follow a pattern.” “Oh, no! This record is different!” And that’s true – for the most part. But what happens when you...
Today we conclude our French-Canadian parish record triad with the burial record. Perhaps the easiest of all three record types to abstract, even without knowledge of French, we discuss words and terms as well as the structure of these records. Remember to sign up for the Maple Stars and...
Most French-Canadian genealogists are familiar with the PRDH, but are you familiar with all three versions? Today we’ll describe each while discussing the pros and cons. To help you out, you can download a PDF copy of the Key to the Repertory, the English translation of the instructions for the printed...
‘Tis the season for family, friends, and food. The one food above all else associated with traditional Christmas festivities in any French-Canadian household is the tourtière. Join me and our guest Juliana L’Heureux for an in-depth look at this tasty treat! Keeping with our festive theme, in Language Tip...
Are you planning a trip to France? If so, take along your ancestors’ hometown information so you can visit and make it a truly memorable experience. A listener wrote in asking about the reliability of the Fichier Origine database. She had found some intriguing information on her ancestors’ origins and...
In episode #13, we delved into the components of a French-Canadian baptism record. Today, we dissect a marriage record, the backbone of our reconstructed ancestral families. Lengthier than either a baptism or burial record, the marriage record contains more variation and complexity. So in this episode you’ll learn common,...
Thanks to the hard work of hundreds, if not thousands, of volunteers across Canada and the United States, those of us who were researching our French-Canadian ancestors a decade or two ago were very grateful to have a multitude of repertoires at our disposal. Once we discovered to which...
The goal of every genealogist is to get back to the original record whenever possible. Tanguay (episode 6), Jetté (episode 8), and the published Drouins (episode 9) are great as finding aids and indexes. With the microfilming of the Drouin collection based on the civil copy in the 1940s and...
