Blogs

Re-indexing complete

Sorry to all for the downtime over the last few days, the Directory re-indexing process is now complete and the system should once again be working as normal.

Please Excuse Us

Between 12 and 14 March we will be re-indexing the Directories database and anomalous results will occur if searches are conducted. Please bear with us while we take care of some basic housekeeping.

All tidied up

Well, like any large project there's a few loose ends to tidy when you finish. We have now completed replacing the odd images that contained illegible text and tagging these, so that all 49,625 pages are readable and report as tagged. What a great moment it was to be done - to look at the page report 'Search found 49625 items' and also see, 'Tagged (49625)'.

Many thanks again to all who have contributed the time to complete the tagging process.

What's next?

As we near the end of tidying up the Street Directory material, it's becoming time to focus on what might be our next activity. We have been planning on processing census documents in 2013 but have recently discovered several thousand more pages of Directory information that could be added to the 49,625 we have already uploaded.

We have also been approached by a collector who is offering us access to local Directory volumes not held in Brighton History Centre.

So, here's a request. If you have any copies of local Directories not currently published on the MHMS website and you would be prepared to let us add them to those already digitized, do please get in contact with us.

We will decide whether Directory or Census material gets our attentions next when we can better understand the scope of each activity.

A Christmas present to all

In the days leading up to Christmas eve, we will be completing the task of tagging (cataloguing) the 49,626 graphics we hold in the Directory pages section of the Resources area. As most of these graphics are double page spreads, that's some 99,200 pages we will have processed.

Now this work is coming to an end, you can enter the name of any local street into the MHMS search box and get back in the results field a series of links that will navigate you to the specific page in each directory where the requested street is listed. In this way, you can systematically explore the people to have previously lived in your home and on your street. We recommend starting with the earliest record and then looking at each year's result through to the most recent.

Many of you will discover that your home was once occupied by a single family and more recently was converted to multi-occupancy, this is fairly common in the city's larger houses. Some, however, will see that in the past many families once lived in a home that today is considered appropriate for a small family, this is typical of the properties in the North Laine area, for example.

We hope you have fun exploring and would very much like to hear about your discoveries, do think about sending us a message.

 

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