The February 12, 2022 meeting of the Honolulu County Genealogical Society will be held via Zoom at 9 am.
New information will include the 1921 Census for England and Wales by Alan Toft in British Columbia, Canada.
This census was taken on Sunday 19 June 1921, having been postponed from 29 April 121 due to the arrival of economic depression following WW1 and Spanish Flu, and a threat of imminent strike action from miners, transport and railway workers, and dockers.
It gathered information on more than 38million individuals, resulting in 18,235,242 census return images. Most of the data requested was similar to that required in previous censuses but there are some changes and additions. Not only was a person's occupation noted, as before, now the person's employer's name and address was recorded
.
MINUTES FOR THE FEBRUARY 12, 2022
MONTHLY ZOOM MEETING OF THE HONOLULU COUNTY GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY
Present: Janice Choat-Zavaval, Lenore Hansen-Stafford, Kathy Hudson, Karin Jones, Stanley Jones,
Leilani Maguire, Larry Meyers, Sue Miller, Trisha Robertson, Deborah Richards, Isabelle Rivera,
Ellen Schneider, Alan Toft, Susan Victor and Donna Wendt
Meeting began at 9:00 a.m.
OLD & NEW BUSINESS:
Reviewed the Minutes of December 11, 2021
Correction 1: Page 1, in the “Present” paragraph, remove Trisha Robertson. She was not present at the
December meeting.
Zoom meetings will now be administered by Lenore Hansen-Stafford via her Zoom account. Look for the Zoom link on Lenore’s email prior to our next meeting.
Thank you to Trisha Robertson for facilitating all of our past Zoom meetings. We wish her a speedy and complete recovery.
Welcome to Janice Choat-Zavaval. We hope you enjoyed attending today’s meeting and will return.
Every member of the Honolulu County Genealogical Society wishes to send our condolences to member,
Faith Burgwinkel and her family. Donna Wendt shared an obituary notice from the January 7, 2022
Honolulu Star-Advertiser. Faith’s son, Lee Kauila Burgwinkel, had passed away on December 1, 2021.
Our thoughts and prayers are with you, Faith and John.
Karin Jones will update us on her “Writing Your Own Story” session(s) at our March meeting. At our
October 9, 2021 meeting, Karin told us about her 52-week ½ hour sessions she would be introducing at
2 conferences on the mainland. Due to the time differences, it was hoped to offer these sessions to our
HCGS members at the beginning of this new year. Due to various reasons this plan had to be put on
hold.
Our presenter today is Alan Toft. Alan first visited Hawaii, Maui to be exact, in 1983. In 2006 he and his family were living in Hawaii. He worked for a software company with a contract with Hawaiian Electric. When the contract ended in 2009, they left Hawaii. He retired in 2015 and enjoyed travelling, until COVID hit. He has been living very contentedly in Canada and we are glad he reconnected in our Zoom meetings. Alan’s began researching his family history in 1989, the year before his mother passed.
PRESENTATION BY ALAN TOFT – THE 1921 UK CENSUS
Bullet points are taken directly from Alan Toft’s presentation.
Basic Background on the 1921 UK Census:
Taken every 10 years and released after 100 years.
1801 through 1831 – statistical – no personal information
June 7, 1841 – poor addresses, occupant names, ages (adults rounded to nearest 5),
male/female, flags for whether born in this country or whether born outside England, but not
where!
March 30, 1851 – accurate ages and birthplaces, relation to head, marital status, state, flag for
blind/deaf/dumb.
April 7, 1861 – ditto, plus flags for imbecile/idiot/lunatic.
April 2, 1871 – ditto
April 3, 1881 – ditto – I have these on CD’s from pre-internet days.
April 5, 1891 – ditto – the first census in which there are people I remember.
March 31, 1901 – ditto – thinks this is the first census that was available online shortly after
release.
April 2, 1911 – nicer format, 1 page per household, number of children born/living/deceased
(this information is helpful with finding children who were born and died between censuses now
that GRO gives mother’s maiden name on the indexes for dates prior to 1911. Clearer
profession/occupation/occupation location (e.g. Warehouseman in a Soapworks). Nationality,
Infirmity (although this seems to be blanked out in online records).
1939 UK Register – September 29, 1939 – this was not a census, more like the 1901 UK Census
format but no birthplaces. Exact date of birth! People not know to be deceased are banked out
– can submit death certificates on FindMyPast to get the records opened – when it works!
1941 – no census was taken
1951 – I’ll be103 when it is available.
1921 UK Census – taken 19 June 1921
Only on FindMyPast – for now anyway.
Even with an annual membership you pay for each record. I pay $4.41 US for each 1921 Census
image and $3.15 for each 1921 Census transcription.
I think you can sign up and view the indexes for nothing.
I have a US 12-month Ultimate British & Irish subscription. The cost is $171.50 US ($179 US next
year) but I only paid $152.15 US in November 2021 (probably a loyalty discount).
Most censuses I only keeps the census image, but …
In the 1921 Census only, the transcription contains the address!
The images are more important – and transcriptions have errors – I have reported many already.
1921 UK Census – What was my approach?
Direct line ancestors have to be found!
Anyone I actually met has to be found!
Favourite cousins’ ancestors have to be found!
Favourite cousins’ spouses’ ancestors have to be found!
Any ‘special project’ relatives have to be found!
Basically, it’s totally out of control and I need to set up a GofundMe page!!:)
So What Did I Learn, and Receive, From the 1921 UK Census?
You could survive with just the transcription but you need one for every occupant of the house.
There may be more than one image for every house.
You need the transcription for the address but I much prefer the image.
It’s a good idea to do an address search or advanced search on every address!
I got to see a lot of people whom I knew and was very fond of.
I realized why my mother was so close to her aunts and uncles, almost to the exclusion of all
other relatives.
Alan demonstrated a search on FindMyPast, searching for his father, Leonard Toft. We viewed an image of the transcription for Leonard Toft.
Alan showed us photos of his father’s birthplace on 424 Knutsford Rd., Warrington, UK and of other
relatives, including a favorite great-aunt, Ada Lowe Sutcliffe (1891-1982). His Great-Aunt Ada lived with various family members at 26 Thewlis Street. Alan shared pieces of their lives and relationships.
In your search for families you may find that many people worked at the same place. Are there
connections in your family where some worked in the same occupation or the same employer?
In his presentation, Alan showcased a Family Chart. When asked about it, he replied that he used
Legacy Charting. Legacy Charting is a program which comes with Legacy Family Tree. The online
information states that the Standard Legacy Charting download is free, but it only goes up to 4
generations). The deluxe version allows up to 100 generations on most of the charts.
Alan was finally able to read the book, mentioned in the past two HCGS Minutes, The Family Diagram & Family Research by Victoria Harrison. It is a book on trends of families. Alan found it interesting, so if you think that is a topic you would like to learn more about, then it would be a good book for you to
look at.We were reminded to respect wishes of relatives who do not want their names put out on public
records.
There was a brief discussion of scandals and family secrets.
Question from Sue Miller – What does the UK government use the census records for?
In 1939, it was used for distributing rations during WWII. Otherwise, Alan suggested that it may be used for data – area growth, planning tools, perhaps.
Leilani Maguire wanted to know if Alan has written down any of his great stories. He replied that he has written some stories provided by relatives and research notes on Legacy, for himself and his son. He
carries his Legacy Family Tree program in his phone app. Make sure your phone has enough storage. It
is easy to download if you use Legacy Family Tree – go to the Legacy website > go to the Family app.
Donna uses Family Tree maker.
CALABASH BOWL:
In regards to searching FindMyPast census records, Donna Wendt had the following suggestion: If you
obtain an address for a family member, search by the address, not the name. You may be able to get
names, birth years, birthplace and parish information for free!
Donna shared a couple of photos – one was a 2012 photo of herself with Alan’s son, Michael; and the
other, a photo of herself with Lenore enjoying the 2012 Southern California Jamboree.
Donna had an issue of with opening some PDF documents emailed to her. As she would click to open
the PDF file, it would turn into an internet link in the browser on Google Chrome. She uses the Chrome
browser but for some reason she is unable to view the PDF file(s). ANSWER: Karin Jones had the solution: In the top box, change the Type of File. Change the type of file to Google Chrome.
Donna mentioned receiving a DVD gift from a relative in the UK, but it is a limited region play so she has been unable to view it. Alan’s solution: Purchase an inexpensive non-name brand DVD play. Alan has found that these cheap units usually play almost everything.
Karin Jones also shared lovely old photos of her great grandparent’s wedding. They both came from
Sweden. They were married in Chicago, where they settled.
When searching for records remember to check the online files of the Library of Congress and
Newspapers.com, Leilani reminded us.
The National Archives has not sent out documents for the past two years due to COVID and no staff.
Our meeting was adjourned at 11:55 a.m.
(Emailed 03/11/2022 by Isabelle Rivera)
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