This week I had a chance to read a brand-new book called One-Place
Genealogy. The term "one-place genealogy" refers to the efforts
of any person or organization that specializes in collecting all available information
for one particular place, such as a town or a county. In this book author David
Hawgood writes, "In most One-Place Studies researchers put together information
about the people in a place from a variety of sources. They then make the information
available to genealogists seeking ancestors in that place. In this book I describe
the ways access is provided, and the types and variety of study."
In One-Place Genealogy, Hawgood gives brief details of
several hundred one-place studies, mainly from England, along with a few from
the Isle of Man, Scotland, and Wales. He describes his own one-place study of
Warminster in Wiltshire and then goes on to list many more such studies. One-Place
Genealogy lists all identified studies alphabetically by county. Typical
entries include the name of a place, the name and e-mail address of the person(s)
conducting the one-place study, a brief description of the types of information
available, along with any Web pages created for the one-place study. A typical
effort can be seen at Jane McHugh’s Northeast Derbyshire Web page at: freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~spire/.
Hawgood’s book lists this site along with hundreds of others.
One-Place Genealogy also has an excellent introduction
to the topic of one-place studies. Hawgood describes e-mail inquiries, old-fashioned
mail inquiries, various books and articles available, plus publicly-available
collections at museums and libraries. He also describes the various types of
one-place studies; some are people-oriented, while others focus on historical
events that transpired at a particular place.
One-Place Genealogy by David Hawgood will be of interest
to anyone researching ancestors in England. This slim, sixty-four-page booklet
will also be of interest to anyone else conducting a one-place study in other
parts of the world so that they can see how the British conduct their studies
and publish the results.
One-Place Genealogy by David Hawgood sells for £3.80, which
is roughly $5.50 in U.S. funds. The book may be purchased from a number of sources,
including ABM Publishing Ltd at www.family-tree.co.uk,
the Society of Genealogists at www.sog.org.uk/
and the Federation of Family History Societies at www.ffhs.co.uk.
This is a brand-new book that is not yet listed on these Web sites. I suspect
these sites will be adding One-Place Genealogy to their online catalogs
shortly.
David Hawgood, author of One-Place Genealogy, may be reached
at: david@hawgood.com
Dick Eastman Online
