St Helens Connect: St Helens Connect

At first it seemed like a good idea - making people think about genealogy, thinking about their ancestors, etc. But now it just seems like a shop front for businesses who want to profit out of peoples interest - driving that curiosity in a typical commercial fashion. I don't like 'the package'. Of course it's always gone on with professional genealogists and some charlatans amongst them - telling people what they want to hear, etc. Should all information be free? Well, maybe not. Maybe that would make things too easy, but this 'corporate' atmosphere lately, with Tony Robinson's face being synonymous with family history, it all kinda spoils things. Maybe you prefer the new regime?

My personal research is mostly done and I'm as sure as hell glad that the churches my ancestors belonged to let people like the LDS film or scan their records instead of waiting for people to come along wanting to compile it into spreadsheets to sell to keep clubs going.

[/rant]

Hi! I've found the assylum in the 1891 census but don't seem to be able to locate it in either 1881 or 1871. I know it was opened in the 1850s(?) so were the patients not included in the early censuses or was it originally located somewhere other than Nutgrove? Any advice gratefully received.
Dave B

Many pubs are up for rent these days,do you think it possible to make a decent living out

of one?

Just came across this helpful site, have fun....

http://churchrecords.../churchrecords/

Is there anyone who can tell me the name of a school that was in New Cross St. My brother was born in Brook St. in 1925 and he said he started at a school in New Cross St. which would have been around 1930 but cannot remember the name of it.
So can anyone help please.

I know that a lot of people have interrogated the St Helens area of the 1881 census to the max and they'll probably yawn or go "huh ", but it was something that was missing from this site and I'm glad that it is finally on. There are still many errors in the data but we can correct them as we find them (if they're transcription errors) or add comments if the actual census page was wrong.

Differences for members with forum posts and those who have none.

If you've posted it's a 'transcription' with address, name, relation to head, married or unmarried, sex, age, approx. birth year calculation, occupation, where born, plus the census place piece and folio refs. There's an icon to the left of each entry that you can click if you want to report that something is wrong with it and on entries that have been changed a little clickable comment bubble appears by the forename. You can search by surname, street/place, occupation and birthplace. The form will most likely want tidying up, because it only allows forename and surname to be used together (as wildcard searches) and it isn't really clear that you shouldn't put a surname in with a street, or a birthplace, or an occupation - but you shouldn't do that because it's programmed to only act on one instruction at a time (except forename and surname). The piece folio section of the form is separate and handy for skipping to the next or previous folio by changing the number.

For members who have never posted in the forums then it is just an 'index' similar to 1871 and 1901, with no address, no occupation and no report buttons or comments. It has a very simple search which only allows for 'surname'. This is very easily changed by just posting on a topic.

On both versions of results pages, surnames and folios are links and they'll - oh this is too obvious, so I'll let you work it out.

There will always be errors and a few things need to be tidied up before we stop calling it 'beta'.

Does anyone remember the name of the mens shop higher up than Jack Barnes on the same side?

Hi folks - a number of my male ancestors are down as 'Occupation - Flint Glass Maker'.

Can anybody tell me what this is and any ideas on which companies in St.Helens - late 1800's - manufactured it?

Hi I was wondering if someone could help me with some information that i need.Im currently researching my family tree and know that my grandfather died down the pit aged 37 in 1938 leaving a wife and young children.I was under the impression that he had an accident but i have been on Ian Winstanleys website and cant find a record.I have been wondering if he actually died of natural causes down the mine and maybe information passed to me years ago wasnt correct about an accident.Is there any way of finding out what he died of? Older family members have since passed on so i cant ask them.Any help or advice would be much appreciated.
I would like to add that he died down a St Helens pit but i dont know which one

When I was a boy in the late thirties I used to walk across the Grange Park Golf Course on my way home from school. Back then the golf course was on the opposite side of Prescot Road to what it is today, it ran from The Grange Park Hotel to the end of Upland Road including the land that is now occupied by Grange Park School. I can't remember when it moved to it's present location. Is there anyone out there who remembers anything about or played the old course and is this the one that bred our amateur champion?

Do you remember when you had your main meal at mid-day and called it dinner? Everyone got at least an hour for their dinner-break. Lunch was something you only ate in restaurants (in which case it was luncheon) or you had on a day out as in "packed lunch". Your evening meal was your tea and was usually just something like egg and bacon on a small plate with loads of bread and butter to fill you up. Supper was a biscuit and a cup of cocoa

Wasnt quite sure where to post this and not everbody might be interested in what I am trying to do but here goes.

Having traced a few of my Ancestors from the 1841/1911 I have the following

2 Bonney's

1 Chorley

and 4 Forber,s

How many other's can we find as long as they were born in St.Helens. Perhaps eventually we would be able to work out who was the oldest person still alive in 1911,

Thanks Margie.