Oxfordshire Records Online?

[Catling121]

Hi All,

Back in June (I think) 2012, a message appeared on the Oxford Archives site saying that a "9-month project" had begun to digitise the counties Parish Records.

Well, it's March 2015 now and nothing seems to have appeared either at the archives, nor online. Does anyone know what's going on, or what to expect?

Many thanks,

Chris

[smudwhisk]

http://boards.ancestry.co.uk/localities.britisles.england.oxf.general/4538/mb.ashx

[Iffley]

Hello Catling121 -

The project was funded and organised by Oxfordshire Family History Society.  I'm happy to chat on the phone in detail if you like - my number's on the Society website at www.ofhs.org.uk

Yes, the project has gone very well so far.  We have achieved the scanning of all deposited registers at the Oxfordshire History Centre bar about half a dozen, mostly for reasons of fragility.  We even did better than that - a campaign of talking to incumbents meant some undeposited registers were lent from the parishes to the History Centre specifically for the scanning.  The registers couldn't be scanned on site, so 180 registers each fortnight were checked into plastic crates and sent off to be scanned.  A fortnight later a batch came back, needing to be checked back, plus a hard drive.

The Society now  holds  scans  of  all  the  pages  of  3,403  registers,  comprising  184,000,  mostly double page, scans.

There were quite a few months' work in checking the scans.  Obviously this whole procedure was a first for us, and so we had to devise various checks for completeness.

Our reasons for carrying out the scanning were twofold.  The first was the preservation of the registers - in line with our Society objectives.  We have now devised a viewer to be used in the Search Room such that the scans of the registers can be browsed (at no charge).  This is now in operation, meaning the registers need not be produced.

The other reason was so that the scans had wide availability.  We have had meetings with potential providers, and our legal advisors have been at work.  A current estimate of the scans appearing on the web, indexed, is a good two years.  It's been a large project for a volunteer body, but a very exciting one!

Wendy Archer
Chairman, Oxfordshire FHS
www.ofhs.org.uk

[CarolA3]

Hi Chris, and thanks for raising this question

Hi again Wendy
Could you just clarify something for me please?  Will OFHS continue to produce CDs of parish registers, and if so will the CDs contain fresh transcriptions derived from your new scans?

All the best,
Carol

[Iffley]

Hi Carol -

Hi Chris, and thanks for raising this question

Hi again Wendy
Could you just clarify something for me please?  Will OFHS continue to produce CDs of parish registers, and if so will the CDs contain fresh transcriptions derived from your new scans?

Your question is a bit ambiguous! 

There's no intent to retranscribe the existing transcripts, and sale of the CDs will continue.

Many of the transcripts are already up to present times because transcribers used registers in the parishes if at that time they weren't deposited. 

But for parishes where what we've scanned gives us registers that haven't been transcribed onto CD, we're certainly doing that with the help of volunteers!  Some if the registers we've scanned won't appear on the internet anyway, as being "too recent", so the CDs will be our only way of publishing such data.  The church, St Lukes in Cowley, which is now the Oxfordshire History Centre, itself has registers from the 1930s.  Our volunteer told me last week he's finished transcribing them from the scans I gave him - though there will be a checking stage before publication.  I've just sent a memory stick of scans of Kidlington registers out for transcription.  We've recently updated the CD WIT01 with a further 100 or so years of both Eynsham and Witney.

If you, or anyone else reading this, would like to help with transcription, do contact me.  If you have a favourite parish or area, I try and match folk to the areas which they will know well.  The writing isn't as challenging as that of previous centuries!

Wendy
Chairman, Oxfordshire FHS
www.ofhs.org.uk

[CarolA3]

Hi Wendy,

Thank you for your detailed and informative reply.  Interesting that you should mention St Luke's; I visited it once, but have no memory of the event as I was only 3 months old at the time!  No doubt your volunteer has transcribed my baptism, as well as my parents' marriage.

If I understand you correctly, the existing range of CDs will continue to be sold, and the newly scanned registers are being transcribed onto new CDs.  I was a little concerned that the new material wouldn't be available (outside of Oxford) for another two years, so thank you for explaining the process.

I am interested in transcribing for OFHS, but it might not be practical as we're travelling around Australia in a caravan.  We don't always have electricity, let alone internet!  However we have stopped for a few weeks, so if you tell me what's involved I'll give you a proper answer.

Keep up the good work!
Carol

[horselydown86]

The other reason was so that the scans had wide availability.  We have had meetings with potential providers, and our legal advisors have been at work.  A current estimate of the scans appearing on the web, indexed, is a good two years.

If you will forgive my impertinence, Wendy, I recommend that you include in any contract with the online Family History providers a commitment on the provider's part to put the records onto their site within a certain period from the time OFHS provides the data.

One of the large providers (name rhymes with MindMyPast) is notorious for making grand announcements in the press and then not producing the records.  Witness MindMyPast's Westminster Collection, announced with great fanfare in March 2012 to be arriving "in the coming months".  Thirty-six months have come and gone since and the Westminster Collection consists of incomplete PRs and one tranche of Rate Books and has been forgotten (no update since December 2013) while MindMyPast pursues the US market and publishes vital Irish Dog Licence records.

[Old Bristolian]

Hear hear ( as an OFHS member)

Steve

[Iffley]

Horsleydown86, and Old Bristolian -

Your comments have been noted, and I will pass them to the OFHS committee.

Wendy