Grenham’s Irish Recordfinder, created by John Grenham, is a unique concept in genealogical software. Grenham brings a wealth of experience as an Irish researcher to this program. He’s the author of a number of publications, including the invaluable Tracing Your Irish Ancestors, Second Edition (Dublin: Gill & Macmillan, 1999).

Because of the nature of Irish research, it is often difficult for the Irish diaspora to determine where in Ireland their ancestors originated. Even knowing a townland or county of origin doesn’t always help the distant researcher to know what records are available for research. That’s where Grenham’s Irish Recordfinder steps in.

The program (designed for Windows 95/98/2000 machines) is simple to install from the CD using “Add/Remove Programs” from within the Control Panel. Once you open it, you’ll be greeted with an “Autoquery” window that requests as much information as you can supply on your ancestor, including surname, religion, description, city or county of origin, placename, left from, emigrated to, and then years of birth, marriage, death (all in Ireland) and year of departure from Ireland. You fill in as much or as little as you want and select OK, and the program puts up a number of windows pertaining to your data and the records available.

In my test, I entered Doherty for the surname, Roman Catholic for the religion, Tipperary for the county, Outeragh for the townland, and then dates of birth and marriage in Ireland and the year of departure from Ireland. When I was done, I selected OK, and Grenham’s returned a number of windows with information, including surname history, church records, census returns and substitutes, gravestone inscriptions, occupations, family histories, local histories, and the Genealogical Office. The windows returned contained varying amounts of useful information, but the information always pointed to records. Whenever possible, the program gave the location of a book, microfilm, or transcribed record, including call numbers.

The surname window gives you an indication of where that surname may have originated and the Gaelic name, if applicable. The church records window will tell you where the church records for the specified denomination and place name are located, and if they’re available for public viewing. The census returns and substitutes window is extremely useful because it will tell you what census substitutes are available for the area you’re interested in, from the earliest date possible to the 1911 government census. In the case of the test above, there is a freeholders list for the area that dates from 1595, as well as other early records that might help prove how early these Dohertys were in the area. The gravestone inscriptions window can be very useful or very useless. In my case, all it listed was a graveyard in Outeragh, but there was no location and no transcript available. Other windows will reference articles published, transcripts known (published or unpublished), and books or microfilm available in Ireland or possibly through the Family History Library.

One item added to Version 4 is the full text and maps of Samuel Lewis’ Topographical Dictionary of Ireland of 1837. This is very useful if you’re not sure of the location of your ancestor’s townland. In the example above, I entered Outeragh, County Tipperary. The topographical dictionary window that came up gave the description for Outeragh, including its physical location in relation to roads and major towns in the county. I then clicked on the button that said “Show Lewis map” to see where the townland was located. The map that appeared in my example was blotchy and somewhat hard to read, but I could get an idea of the townland’s location by following the description in the text. [Lewis’ Topographical Dictionary is also available separately from at least two other manufacturers, Family Tree Maker and Quintin Publications.]

Overall, I have found Grenham’s very useful for the Irish research I am conducting. However, the program is an expensive one for the average researcher. The Irish price for the CD is IR£490, including shipping, which translates to about US$540 with today’s exchange rate. If you’d like to use the features of the CD but can’t afford to purchase it, there is another option. You can visit Irish Ancestors, where you can purchase personalized reports similar to the information provided in this program—at a more moderate price. Another option would be to convince your library to purchase the program. There are a number of institutions in Ireland that have the program available, but according to Grenham’s Web site, the only institution in North America that currently has it is the New Brunswick Genealogical Society.

System requirements: IBM-compatible PC with Pentium processor recommended; 50 MB hard disk space (190 MB for full installation); mouse; recommended VGA display; 12 MB RAM (32 MB recommended); and a double-speed or higher CD-ROM or DVD drive.

An order form for the program is available online. You can print it off and mail it to Grenham’s Irish Recordfinder, 7 Windele Road, Drumcondra, Dublin 9, Ireland, or you can phone 011-353-1-8379290.

Elizabeth Kelley Kerstens, CGRS, is the managing editor of Genealogical Computing (GC), editor of the Board for Certification of Genealogists' newsletter OnBoard, the creator of Clooz—the electronic filing cabinet for genealogical records, and a frequent contributor to Ancestry Magazine. She can be reached via e-mail at liz@ancestordetective.com or at gceditor@ancestry.com.