Olive Tree Genealogy received this note about the Alberta Homestead Collection which I believe will be of interest to those using the online database:Hi Viewers,
With Ancestry’s recent announcement in launching the Alberta, Canada, Homestead Records, 1870-1930 , the Alberta Genealogical Society would like viewers to seriously compare the scope of the two indexes. Ancestry’s index is has a minimal listing of approximately 207,000 records, whereas the Alberta Genealogical Society has in their combined database over 520,000 entries.
The AGS all name homestead index for 1870 to post-1930, lists those applying for land patents between 1885 and 1897; those who completed the homesteading process and eventually obtained a title; those who applied but abandoned their homesteads; and other individuals whose name appears in the files for a variety of reasons—something the Library and Archives of Canada nor Ancestry has done.
We invite everyone to view the AGS databases which have twice as many records, and twice the knowledge over the record index at http://www.abgenealogy.ca/alberta-homestead-indexes.
Thank you,
Lyn Meehan,
AGS Communications
Image: screenshot from Alberta Genealogical Society
3 comments:
Perhaps. If you made a claim on a section of land, in your file would be documents of others who made claim on that section and abandoned it. Example, Reel 2083 file 674838 is for the land patent of John Stavney and holds a Declaration of Abandonment for Edwin G Monson, which are also on Ancestry and indexed.
Regardless, if you are not sure your ancestor is indexed on the Ancestry records, go to the AGS index and that will tell you the reel and file numbers which make it easy to find on Internet Archive. Also go to the Land Grants of Western Canada at LAC, because there, while you don't get file numbers etc, you do get a map showing the location of the land, which is not in the files. Explore all options!
To add a note ... if a user finds a hit in the AGS index, they can then use the film # given to search the following link at Internet Archive for the microfilm reel. If the reel is found (only 496 of the 686 microfilm are digitized there), scroll through the images looking for the file number.
https://archive.org/details/albertahomestead
Interesting and helpful post. Thank you for sharing it. I wanted to let you know that I have included it in my NoteWorthy Reads post: http://jahcmft.blogspot.com/2016/03/noteworthy-reads-26.html
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