Anglo-Celtic Connections

Scotland, Red Book of Scotland (1100–1600)

Find 99,822 records added from this multi-volume genealogical reference for tracing medieval and early modern Scottish lineages. It focuses primarily on land-owning families, and gentry.

Scotland, People of Clackmannanshire (1700–1850)

Adding 23,284 records, these social history records capture church communicants, in kirk session censures for absence, or within local community disputes.

Scotland, Modern and Civil Deaths & Burials (1855–2024)
This collection has 8,504 new transcripts giving the individual’s full name, birth and death dates, grave number, cemetery location, and the name of the registrant.

Sussex Baptisms (1538–1921)

Transcripts of 7,810 records added, bringing the full collection to over 17,000 records.Find names, baptism dates, locations, parental details, and occupations. The sources are Billingshurst Local History Society, Family Roots (Eastbourne & District Family History Society), and the Tunbridge Wells Family History Society.

Newspapers

Miscellaneous items I found interesting this week.

Ukraine war now longer than the First World War – the similarities are unsettling
An opinion piece that holds that casualties on both sides are about the same, not much larger for Russia as often stated. How can you know the truth when the contest is also in the media? Sources such as the Guardian suggest that Russian losses are probably substantially higher than Ukrainian losses.

County Wicklow Heritage
Wicklow roots? You may be amused by wandering through these pages.

A New Home for TNA Blogs

GEDminer
A free, privacy-first GEDCOM analysis tool that helps family historians and genealogists understand, validate, and improve their family tree data – entirely in the browser. This is a notice; I’ve not tried it.

Latest Updates from Ancestry

	Title		Records
	Web: Manitoba, Marriage Index, 1881-1945		507,141
	UK, Recommendations for Honours and Awards, 1935-1944		178,284
	Web: Saskatchewan, Canada, Birth Index, 1875-1924		1,178,570

Full-Text Search + Research = A Win!
Another instructive post from Ken McKinlay on his Family Tree Knots blog shows how Full-Text Search started him on a journey to identifying early 19th-century ancestry in Ireland.

Funny British Sayings
You’ll be Gobsmacked, and I’m not taking the Mickey.

Thanks to the following individuals for their comments and tips: Ann Burns, Anonymous, Barbara May Di Mambro, Brenda Turner, Gail, Sunday Thompson, Teresa, and Unknown.

 

 

The data below for 21 societies were collected from their websites on 11 June 2026.

$50 is the median annual fee.

UPDATE: Kelowna & District Genealogical Society, annual fee of $50.

There is a bimodal clustering: a low-fee group ($10–$25, mostly small local/county societies, and a higher cluster ($50–$75, mostly large provincial/national-scope societies).

To evaluate whether your society offers value for money, further analysis of benefits would be essential. Higher fees may include print journals, research databases, or dedicated library access; lower fees may offer only newsletters or occasional access to in-person meetings.

Society	Annual Membership Fee (CAD)
Nanaimo Family History Society	$35
Campbell River Genealogy Society	$40
Victoria Genealogy Society	$65
BC Genealogical Society	$65
Alberta Genealogical Society	$50
Alberta Family Histories Society	$55
Saskatchewan Genealogical Society	$70
Manitoba Genealogical Society	$60
Ontario Genealogical Society	$63
Upper Ottawa Valley Genealogical Group	$10
Bruce County Genealogical Society	$20
Lanark County Genealogical Society	$35
British Isles Family History Society of Greater Ottawa	$50
Quebec Family History Society	$75
Société généalogique canadienne-française	$50
Société de généalogie de Québec	$50
Société historique acadienne	$40
New Brunswick Genealogical Society	$40
PEI Genealogical Society	$25
Genealogical Association of Nova Scotia	$59
Family History Society of Newfoundland and Labrador	$45

 

 

This will be of interest on the off chance you have someone in your family tree who worked in Eastern, North Eastern, Scottish, Southern, Western and London Midland regions of British Railways from the late 1940s through to the early 1960s?

If so, you’ll want to check out more than 60 issues of British Railways regional magazines now online from TheGenealogist. Included are staff changes, appointments, transfers, promotions, retirements, long-service presentations, workplace presentations, obituaries, sporting reports, staff outings, social club news, photographs, departmental updates and stories from depots, stations and offices across the regions.

On Saturday at 9 AM, BIFHSGO’s Annual General Meeting will be held for members. On the agenda are reports, elections to the Board of Directors for President, Vice President, Treasurer, Communications and Membership, and presentation of awards.

All are welcome to join at 10 AM; there will be three Great Moments presentations:

William Wallace: Family Myth, Brick Wall, Loyalist
Presenter: Carolyn Brown
Breaking the brick wall of this Loyalist ancestor meant first exploding a family myth and then using every genealogy pathway to learn his true origin.

Secrets: The Pullman Family Revisited
Presenter: Patty McGregor
Patty’s grandmother, Sadie Pullman Weir (1896-1981), had always wondered about her father’s origins. The search to find the family of her father, John Pullman (1841-1905), was the subject of a BIFHSGO talk back in 2003. As it turned out, his weren’t the only secrets the Pullman family kept close. New information has challenged those original findings, and led to questions about the well-documented ‘paper trail’.

Nottingham’s Old General
Presenter: Marianne Rasmus
While researching one of her direct lines, Marianne Rasmus stumbled across a distant cousin, whose otherwise unremarkable life made an unforgettable impact on the people of Nottingham—a story which remains part of the city’s lore to this day. Beginning with a present-day search for a statue, Marianne will examine available records and newspaper articles and share the remarkable story of Nottingham’s Old General.

Plus a Book Grab at the breaks.

For details, go to https://www.bifhsgo.ca/events

A hiatus in updating UK Historical Records at FamilySearch, since the start of June, is over. Six collections have been updated. The Bedfordshire, Lincolnshire and Armed Forces collections have images.

	Collection Title	Records	Updated
	England, Bedfordshire, Parish Registers, 1538-1983	369,450	9 June 2026
	England, Northamptonshire, Non-conformist Records, 1651-1895	69,192	9 June 2026
	England, Lincolnshire, Parish Registers, 1538-1990	1,312,197	8 June 2026
	England, Surrey, Parish Registers, 1536-1992	1,733,702	8 June 2026
	England and Wales, National Index of Wills and Administrations, 1858-1957	8,412,453	8 June 2026
	England, Armed Forces and Overseas Vital Records, 1360-1981	19,923	5 June 2026

I have found no additions to Full Text Search since 18 May, nor any updates in June for Canada in Historical Records or Full Text Search.

Growing up in England, Trevor was the first name of two people in my school class.

Trevor entered the top 100 boys names list in the 1910s, peaked at 30th in the 1950s and fell out in the 1980s. Below is a bar chart of the individual birth registrations from FreeBMD.  What influenced the popularity?

The roots are Welsh. The Trefor surname combines tref, meaning homestead or settlement, and mawr, meaning large. It started to appear as a family surname transfer. Upper-class families used it to preserve a maternal lineage or honour a prominent landowning family, such as the Barons Trevor.

Trevor slowly migrated into England. Over 10% of the Trevors in England in 1921 were born in Wales. The name was part of a broader late-Victorian and Edwardian fashion for adopting Celtic given names. 

Parents are often inspired by notable figures and celebrities such as Queen Victoria, Shirley Temple, Princess Diana, and Kylie Minogue. The mid-20th century is where, on top of an existing increase, Trevor experienced its meteoric rise.  British actor Trevor Howard became a household name following his starring role in the 1945 film Brief Encounter. His career continued through the 50s and 60s. Also, the post-war era saw a shift to two-syllable names that could be easily shortened to a sharp, single-syllable : Trev, Kev (Kevin), Nev (Neville), and Bev (Beverley).

Trevor’s decline was swift, as it was associated with the baby boomers and Gen X. It became dated, a “dad name.”

In Canada, the name trajectory was similar. Perhaps the most famous Canadian was Trevor Linden, drafted 2nd overall by the Vancouver Canucks in 1988, a franchise captain, and a community leader in British Columbia. Trevor Daley was another NHLer. 

I’m planning a couple of follow-on posts on UK first names that are long-lasting, have meteoric rise-and-fall, and show slow-rise and slow-fall trends.

These are essential records, especially before civil registration. The updates are for the other end of the period as they come out of embargo.

London, England, Church of England Births and Baptisms, 1813–1925 now contains over 23.9 million records

London, England, Church of England Marriages and Banns, 1754–1941 has also been updated, with over 14.3 million entries.

Both collections, from records at the London Archives, were updated on 9 June 2026.

For both these collections, on the page showing the hit details, Ancestry usually has a Listen and Explore link, an invitation to “Get the story behind this record for (the person’s name).”Give it a try. It provides the opportunity in the right-hand column to Listen to their story. Compiled by AI, depending on your level of expertise, you may find it expands your understanding, or it’s merely AI slop.

Press coverage of Prime Minister Mark Carney’s latest foreign trip notes that his first stop is Ireland, where he has strong ancestral roots.

According to an article from EPIC, the Irish Emigration Museum, three of Mark Carney’s four grandparents trace their origins to Counties Mayo and Cavan.

On his paternal side, his grandfather Robert Carney, who had served in the IRA during the War of Independence, and his grandmother Nora Moran from County Mayo, emigrated when opportunities in the west of Ireland following independence remained limited.

His grandmother Margaret Frances Gaffney’s journey takes the family from coal prospecting in Cavan during the 1860s and 1870s, to the coalfields of Lanarkshire in the 1880s. Coming to Canada, settlement was in the booming colliery town of Wellington, now part of Nanaimo. There, she married John Anthony ‘Jack’ Kemper, born in Dallas, Texas. Both of his parents were born in Germany.

Mark Carney is eligible for Irish citizenship, and maybe for US citizenship.

 

Choose from these selected free online events. All times are Eastern Time, unless otherwise noted. Registration may be required in advance—please check the links to avoid disappointment. For many more events, mainly in the U.S., visit https://conferencekeeper.org/virtual/

Tuesday, 9 June

2:00 PM: Ottawa Virtual Genealogy Drop-In, for OGS Ottawa Branch. https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86956419387

2:00 PM: ScribeAI: It Was There All Along…You Just Didn’t See It, by Janna Helshtein for Legacy Family Tree Webinars. https://familytreewebinars.com/webinar/scribeai-it-was-there-all-along-you-just-didnt-see-it/

2:30 PM: Catching the Waves: Italian Transatlantic Migrations to
the U.S, by Pamela Vittorio for Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center.
https://acpl.libnet.info/event/16501603

6:30 PM: Census Records in the Virtual Registry of Ireland, by Brian Gurrin for OGS Lambton Branch.
https://lambton.ogs.on.ca/events/census-records-in-the-virtual-registry-of-ireland-with-dr-brian-gurrin/

---

Wednesday, 10 June

8:00 AM: Researching the workhouse: 1945, by Rachel Kidd for the Norfolk Record Office.
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/researching-the-workhouse-1945-in-person-tickets-1982186226362

2:00 PM: Massachusetts Land Records: Tracing Property and Ancestors, by Seema-Jayne Kenney for Legacy Family Tree Webinars. https://familytreewebinars.com/webinar/massachusetts-land-records-tracing-property-and-ancestors/

Thursday, 11 June

---

Friday, 12 June

OGS Virtual Conference Starts.

11:00 AM: Land Records of Upper Canada 1 of 3: Crown Land Petitions, by Janice Nickerson for Legacy Family Tree Webinars. https://familytreewebinars.com/webinar/land-records-of-upper-canada-1-of-3-crown-land-petitions/

12:15 PM: Land Records of Upper Canada 2 of 3: Heir & Devisee Commission Files, by Janice Nickerson for Legacy Family Tree Webinars. https://familytreewebinars.com/webinar/land-records-of-upper-canada-2-of-3-heir-devisee-commission-files/

1:30 PM: Land Records of Upper Canada 3 of 3: Land Registry Office Records, by Janice Nickerson for Legacy Family Tree Webinars. https://familytreewebinars.com/webinar/land-records-of-upper-canada-3-of-3-land-registry-office-records/

Saturday, 13 June

9:00 AM: BIFHSGO AGM
10:00 AM: Great Moments
William Wallace: Family Myth, Brick Wall, Loyalist, by Carolyn Brown
Secrets: The Pullman Family Revisited, by Patty McGregor
Nottingham’s Old General, by Marianne Rasmus
https://www.bifhsgo.ca/events

A note from the OGS Quinte Branch reported that they continue to see an increase in visitors and website visitors, with the majority being US residents. The Bill C-3 legislation has seen an increase in requests across Ontario, as US residents are seeking baptism, marriage, and burial records to support their applications. It is approaching travel season, and many researchers have planned visits to our area and our Centre.

Ādisōke, a landmark co-location of Ottawa’s new Central Library and the main public space for Library and Archives Canada, is months away from opening. It’s one of the most significant developments in the National Capital Region in a generation. What does it mean for researchers?

For family historians, there’s a shared OPL/LAC genealogy space on Level 2 of Adisoke (let’s skip the accents), to be called the Family History Centre, staffed by both organizations and open to all. Both OPL and LAC databases will be accessible. Duplicate genealogy materials are to be weeded out. Whether to send them elsewhere is under review.

The Ottawa Room/Living Ottawa

The Ottawa Room at the current Main Branch has long been a quiet but valuable resource for local researchers. It’s a cramped space, more reminiscent of a storage room than a proper reading room, but it contains material hard to find elsewhere: City corporate records, including those for the OPL itself, dating back fifty years or more. The wide range of items is of genuine historical interest, even if their day-to-day demand is low.

When asked about plans for this material, OPL’s response was measured: the library is “currently reviewing which OPL corporate records will remain with Living Ottawa (a newly imagined Ottawa Room also on Level 2 of Adisoke) and which may be transferred to the City Archives at 100 Tallwood.” Some of what the Ottawa Room holds likely belongs in a proper archival setting rather than a public library. The City Archives is a logical home, but a concern is whether it’s adequately resourced to take on that role.

Worth noting, technology amenities, including a maker space, scanners and recording studios, are planned, so if you want to scan old family photo negatives or digitize an old home movie, the facility will be there.

LAC Research
If you’re concerned about consulting Canada’s vast documentary heritage, LAC’s Research Room, located on levels 3 and 4, is the place to go. It’s described as a bright, modern, and multifunctional space designed for In-depth exploration and study, with panoramic views in an environment that supports quiet work. You won’t get same-day access to archival resources; they will need to be transferred from off-site storage as at present.

The bigger picture

It is worth acknowledging that, with the Adisoke opening date still uncertain, it now looks to be in 2027; some decisions remain. Both organizations will be working through complex transitions.  Whether it be accessing locally significant historical material, the kind of thing you stumble upon in a cramped room at the present Main Branch, or having the space and equipment required for serious research in national records, the facilities look great. It is reasonable to keep asking questions to ensure the Adisoke facilities actually deliver the service we need and expect from these institutions after transitional glitches.

I’ll continue to follow developments and report back as the picture becomes clearer.