It is hard to remember doing French-Canadian genealogy without using the Drouin images over at Ancestry.com. They were the #1 reason why I forked over the cash for the “world subscription” package. Well, it turns out that the good folks over at Ancestry.com have not lived up to the terms of the contract they signed for the use of the images. The images are gone for now and may not show up again on their site. What to do?
Well, I did genealogy research before having access to those records and I shall continue to do research if I never have online access to them. Since my main focus of research is on tracing ancestral lineages for people, I concentrate on marriages. Because I seek marriage info, I still have a lot of resources at my disposal, both online, and in my own personal collection – a collection I have spent a lot of money to build.
So, while the loss of the Drouin images at Ancestry.com is a bummer, it will serve to separate the wheat from the chaff as far as researchers go. The folks over at familysearch.com have picked up the ball that Ancestry has dropped. I won’t get into those details, but you can search over there for what’s been going on.
Now – back to the olden days of research!
You can use the Family search site below. They have improved the site considerably in the past few months.
http://pilot.familysearch.org/recordsearch/start.html#p=waypoint;s=waypointsOnly;c=1321742;w=0
Yeah, I have used it recently. I didn’t feel like expounding on it in my post at the time I wrote it. It’ll take time to get used to and to find a new groove to work in.
NO WONDER I CAN’T FIND THE DROUIN COLLECTION AT ANCESTRY.COM!!! I just re-subscribed. My mother’s family was French Canadian (Barbeau) and last year I read through many many Drouin images–and loved every second of playing detective and interpreting the French (painstakingly!) I thought I was doing something wrong. That was my favorite thing at Ancestry.com. Well, now I know…
I know exactly how you feel. I just re-upped with Ancestry as well. I still have other resources at my disposal to do research, but now I can’t find birth and death records as easily.
Let me know if I can help out with the Barbeau surname – if you need any. I can research marriages for you using my own materials and other online sources.