British Columbia births from 1904, marriages from 1950, and deaths from 2005 now searchable online

This year’s release of British Columbia’s birth, marriage and death records took place in May, and somehow I missed it, until now.

On May 11, BC Archives announced that the release of births, death and marriage records from the BC Vital Statistics Agency was available and searchable on the provincial archives’ Genealogy database. Included in this release were births registered in 1904, marriages from 1950, and deaths from 2005.

It has been a very long time wait to see new birth registrations made available online. For the last two decades, the most recent birth registrations had been from 1903. In 2004, the British Columbia Vital Statistics Act added an extra 20 years to the release of births, extending it to 120 years.

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Three new videos on International Institute of Genealogical Studies’ YouTube channel

The International Institute of Genealogical Studies has posted more treats for us on their YouTube channel. The three latest video presentations are delivered by the institute’s Mentoring Professor Cheryl Levy, and they are each under 30 minutes long.

Canva for Genealogists

Finding Your United Empire Loyalist Refugee and Resettlement ancestors

Naming Customs in Genealogy

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2027 call for presentations — Legacy Family Tree Webinars

Legacy Family Tree is now accepting proposals for their 2027 webinar series.

The submission deadline is September 1, 2026.

Submission Formats

  1. 60-minute webinars (plus Q&A) — core format
  2. Webinar Shorts — 20 minutes or under
  3. TechZone videos — 10 minutes or under
  4. Language-Specific Webinars — NEW for 2027! Our audience is global, and it’s time our lineup reflected that. Looking for presenters who can teach in French, Spanish, Italian, Swedish, Dutch, or Norwegian — any topic, any format above, delivered in one of these languages.

In Legacy Family Tree blog post, they wrote, “We want your best ideas — the case study you can’t stop telling people about, the record set nobody’s talking about yet, the topic you know deserves a real audience. If there’s one area where we expect the biggest leaps in learning this year, it’s AI — so if you’ve got an angle on it, we especially want to hear from you.”

Learn more in Legacy Family Tree’s blog post about the topics they are seeking and information on how to submit one or more proposals.

And don’t forget there’s an O Canada webinar series to fill.

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This week’s crème de la crème — August 8, 2026

Some of the bijoux I discovered this week.

Crème de la crème of genealogy blogs

Blog posts
Weir(d?) Times at Library and Archives Canada by John Reid on Anglo-Celtic Connections.

“Graveyards of Eastern Newfoundland” Book Pre-Order is live! by Robyn Lacy on Spade & the Grave.

Don’t Let America Lose Its Archives by Lori Samuelson on Genealogy At Heart.

The Record That Names the Father When the Birth Entry Won’t by Chris on Scottish Genealogist.

Research Mistakes – Ignoring the Neighbors by Kenneth R. Marks on The Ancestor Hunt.

Remote access to subscription sites and so much more: the value in genealogy societies by Linda Yip on Past Presence.

Three Free Tools for Finding Historical Newspapers by Marcia Crawford Philbrick on Heartland Genealogy.

Finding New Homes for Old School Stuff by Marion B. Wood on Climbing My Family Tree.

The Casket in the Attic by Misty Hamilton Smith on Appalachian Genealogy & History.

Our Siblings’ Side of the Family Story by Jacqi Stevens on A Family Tapestry.

An Explosion of New Tree Tools by Jonny Perl on DNA Painter Blog.

Articles
Genealogy centre in Interlake ‘hub of history’ searching for new home by Alicia Wang, CBC News, Manitoba.

Portage history goes digital with Manitoba photo archive by Renée Lilley, Winnipeg Sun, Manitoba.

Kayaker on St. John River makes a pair of grim discoveries by Shane Fowler, CBC News, New Brunswick.

For more gems like these throughout the week, join the Genealogy à la carte Facebook group. When you submit your request to join, you will be asked to answer two quick questions about your family history research.

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New police records on Findmypast

Understand the experiences of immigrants with Findmypast’s new Metropolitan police registrations and delve deeper into Scotland’s courts with new database records.

Metropolitan Police, Aliens Registration Office
Spanning 1876 to 1965, this new collection is made up of the registration records of 1,257 immigrants into Britain.

Scotland, Court and Criminal Database
Findmypast also updated their Scottish crime records with 241,229 new additions, covering 1791 to 1937.

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Free OGS webinar – ‘The Top 5 (Irish) Websites You Need to Know About’

The Ontario Genealogical Society will host the free webinar, The Top 5 Websites You Need to Know About, delivered by Natalie Bodle, tonight, August 6, at 7:00 p.m. Eastern time.

Recent years has seen an explosion of Irish records made available online. This webinar is a romp through the top 5 websites where you will find information on your Irish ancestors. Best of all, they are all free! This is ideal if you are at the start of your Irish ancestral research and it will give you a good grounding before delving into the more obscure record sets.

The talk will cover the main content and search tips for the following websites:

      • Irish Genealogy
      • National Archives of Ireland (NAI)
      • Public Records Office Northern Ireland (PRONI)
      • The National Library of Ireland (NLI)
      • The Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland

You must register to watch the webinar.

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More Canadian newspapers available on Newspapers.com

This week, Newspapers.com added seven Canadian newspapers — one from British Columbia and six from Ontario.

24 Hours Vancouver — 2016-2017
Vancouver, British Columbia

Burlington Post — 1993-2004
Burlington, Ontario

Bloor West-Parkdale Neighbourhood Voice — 2012-2020
Toronto, Ontario

24 Hours Toronto — 2015-2017
Toronto, Ontario

The Mirror (Beach edition) — 2012-2018
Toronto, Ontario

The Barrie Examiner — 2016-2017
Barrie, Ontario

Oshawa This Week — 2012-2023
Oshawa, Ontario

Clarington This Week — 2012-2023
Oshawa, Ontario

Whitby This Week — 2012-2023
Whitby, Ontario

You don’t need a subscription to look at which newspapers are available.

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Interactive map of Ontario patent plans now available online

The Archives of Ontario recently partnered with the University of Toronto’s Map and Data Library to create an interactive online map of patent plans. also known as the Ontario Patent Plan Access Index.

On their Facebook page, the provincial archives wrote, “Land patent records are a rich resource for finding out about land in Ontario, and now you can access thousands of these digitized plans online. They’re georeferenced according to latitude and longitude, and they’re discoverable on the map in the spot they depict.”

Less high-resolution copies of the patent plans are available in the Archives of Ontario’s Collection Search.

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OGS Toronto Branch’s list of local newspapers — an essential resource for researchers

Toronto Recorder and General Advertiser, July 30, 1834.

If your relatives lived in Toronto, you should take a look at the excellent and recently updated Newspapers page on the website of the Toronto Branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society. There you will find a long list of digitized newspapers, where to access them, and links.

The list includes large and small Toronto papers, along with ethnic and religious ones.

In their latest e-newsletter, the Toronto Branch wrote, “We are overwhelmed by the sudden online availability of Toronto newspapers. At least it seems sudden, but no doubt there has been lots of activity behind the scenes. The Toronto Public Library, in particular, has been busy adding to its Digital Archive. But it isn’t the only player. For several decades we have relied mainly on the Globe and the Star, but that situation has changed.”

The linked sources on the Newspapers page include the Toronto Public Library, Canadiana, Our Digital World, Google News, and the subscription site, Newspapers.com.

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New Brunswick Archives updates birth, marriage and death registrations, expands historical photo collection, and adds new vital statistics search platform

The Provincial Archives of New Brunswick last week uploaded to its website birth registrations for 1929 and marriage and death registrations for 1975.

More than one million historical vital statistics records are now available online, including birth records more than 95 years old and marriage and death records more than 50 years old.

The provincial archives also added a new vital statistics search platform to its website to make it possible for people to quickly and easily find historical records, track requests and access enhanced self-service tools.

The new search platform will soon allow for online payment options.

Also, in less than a year, access to historical photographs on the site has expanded to more than 150,000 images from about 2,200 images.

Recent amendments to the Citizenship Act have resulted in a significant increase in requests for historical records from people seeking documentation to support citizenship applications. The new search platform helps respond to this increased demand. Due to higher demand, however, the cost of certified copies will soon increase.

The Provincial Archives of New Brunswick was the first archives in North America to make historical vital statistics records available online in 1998, and its has processed more than 44 million searches since 2008.

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