The arrival of the 21st century more or less coincided with the end of the publication of directories in Canada. For at least 150 years city and regional directories served as a useful source of information about businesses and residents across the country. Several factors combined to bring about their demise including privacy legislation, Internet resources and the expense of production.

Fortunately cessation of publication does not mean directories cease to be available. They will continue to provide useful information about communities and individuals to historians and genealogists alike.

Research Value
Directories place people in a particular place at a particular time, which is the basis of their value for tracking ancestors between census enumerations. If you are able to follow an individual through consecutive directories you may discover clues and valuable genealogical information.

Most directories indicate occupation and sometimes place of employment. Relationship clues turn up as well; a change in the name of a business proprietor can signal the decease of the owner and reveal the successor, sometimes the son or spouse.

Working with maps, addresses in directories can be used to plot the moves of a family; in fact, the directory may provide very specific location information useful in using census returns. Further coordination between directories, maps and census returns tells you something about the social milieu in which your ancestors lived and worked.

Identifying What is Available
The majority of directories are for towns and cities. The first was for Quebec City in 1790 and the second for Montreal in 1819. Provincial directories began later and did not last as long, with the exception of British Columbia which has editions up to the 1950s. Some regions, such as what constituted Canada in the middle 1800s, the Maritime Provinces, western regions and counties in Ontario, also had directories.

There are several ways to identify directories available for research. First, you can check for original volumes in libraries and archives across the country using online catalogs. Large numbers have been reproduced on microfilm or microfiche, some reprinted, and some digitally copied and made available on CD-ROM or via the Internet. Several options for finding those that fit your research are summarized below, beginning with online resources.

• Collections Canada
  The databases at Collections Canada include searchable digitized versions of roughly 100 Canadian directories; Ottawa and Halifax have many listings. The links below take you to the to the directories search page, and to AMICUS, which is a tool for searching the holdings of repositories across Canada.
  
  Directories Search Page
  AMICUS
  
  
• Virtual Reference Library
  This site is funded by the Toronto Public Library and the province of Ontario; it leads to all sorts of information about Canada, Ontario and Toronto including a number of directories.
• Archive CD-Books Canada
  Several directories are among the list of publications available for purchase in Adobe format on CD-ROM.
• Family History Library Catalog
  The Family History Library does not have an extensive collection of Canadian directories but it is always worthwhile to check it.
• Western Canadian Directories (3rd edition 2003) is a guide prepared by Dave Obee to all western directories on microfilm and microfiche. For western Canada there have been seven microfilming programs, some broadly based and some local. This finding aid sets out, by province and place, the year, what has been copied and the reference number. What you cannot find online can be identified and, certainly within Canada, brought to local libraries on inter-library loan. The book can be ordered from Interlink Bookshop.
  

Conclusion: A Few Tips
The smart researcher keeps in mind that not everyone appears in every directory and not in every year. There may be a delay factor because several months could elapse between collecting the information and printing it. It makes sense to search over several years. Individuals can appear at the town, regional and national level. Keep a map handy, especially for knowing the sweep of a city directory -- perhaps it covers adjacent rural communities where your ancestors lived. Name spellings may not be what you expect and may vary between editions. Directories usually have a street section and an alphabetical section so look at both. In addition, check who is residing at former addresses; it could be family connections.

Those researching Canadian ancestors are fortunate in having such a readily available collection of directories to draw upon for genealogical information going back to the early 1800s.

Sherry Irvine, CGRS, FSA Scot is an author, teacher, and lecturer specializing in English, Scottish, and Irish family history. She is the author of Your English Ancestry (2d ed., 1998) and Researching Scottish Ancestry (2003), and she is a contributor to several publications. Since 1996, she has been a study tour leader, course coordinator, and instructor for the Institute of Genealogy and Historical Research at Samford University. She teaches online at MyFamily.com. Recently she served a two-year term as president of the Association of Professional Genealogists.