Yesterday (Friday) I attended the latest stakeholder forum meeting for PRONI (www.nidirect.gov.uk/proni), again held via Zoom due to the current coronavirus restrictions. The following is a brief update on developments.
The plans to reopen PRONI to the public again are currently fluid, with the situation changing almost daily in Northern Ireland. It is hoped that the archive will be able to re-open in some format very soon, but if so, it will almost certainly be with access for digital resources only, at least this side of Christmas. One change that was due to happen prior to the current closure was an update to the booking request form. Previously you had to book a slot, and then request documents on a separate form – this will change so that everything is done on one form only. When productions become accessible again, you can order up to ten items, and three items in reserve (i.e. in case there has been any problems with retrieving any of the ten you've asked for). Up to five of these ten items can be microfilms, and each desk available to researchers now has a microfilm reader. New guidance will be going online shortly.
If you are new to PRONI you will be allocated a temporary visitor number upon making a request to visit, but you will need to complete your registration upon arrival, something that was not possible until now. If you need to renew your card, you will need to request your replacement before visiting, but can still provisionally book items with a temporary visitor number. I asked about the previous system where if you turned up without your card, you could obtain a temporary visitors pass. For now, that isn't happening – so don't forget your pass! (I've previously done this getting off the ferry – you only end up feeling stupid!).
One other major change – face coverings are to become mandatory within the building when it re-opens.
On the cataloguing front, the following is being worked on:
D4779
Papers of P. A. McLaughlin, former president of the Northern Ireland Gay Rights Association and founder of Belfast Pride, dating from 1991 onwards.
D4787
Family and political papers of the Laird family.
D4777
Cards and letters from Fred Irwin of Dublin to his sister in Belfast. Irwin was serving in the Royal Dublin Fusiliers during the First World War.
D4783
Papers of William Delap, a Navy cadet who was captured as a POW and imprisoned in Brandenburg. Includes photographs of daily POW camp life.
D4780
A massive collection of materials relating to The Troubles used to produce the book 'Lost Lives'.
D4768
Papers concerning the Enniskillen bombing of 1987, including its impact on pupils at Enniskillen High School.
There was a brief update from Tim Murtagh of the Beyond 2022 project (see my previous post at http://scottishgenes.blogspot.com/2020/09/getting-closer-to-beyond-2022.html). He's been busy over the summer ploughing through PRONI's extensive catalogue for materials that can be used to replenish sources lost during the PRO explosion in Dublin in 1922. He mentioned that of equal note was the fact that the Custom House in Dublin was lost on 25 MAY 1921, with a great deal of resources destroyed also, it was not just the Four Courts Fire the following year that was such a disaster in terms of the loss of Ireland's historic record. A Beyond 2022 virtual exhibition will be set up in 2021, and an event is planned to be hosted in London concerning the project.
Several recordings of Zoom based lectures will be going online in the near future on PRONI's YouTube channel. Attendance figures have superseded the normal attendance at on site events, and so it is likely PRONI will adopt a blended approach to hosting events post-Covid, both online and at the archive.
I asked about the centenary of Northern Ireland's creation next year. There are a few things that PRONI is involved in, but it looks like the media will be focussing on the opening of the Northern Ireland parliament by the then king in June 1921, although there are other centenaries along the way – the Government of Ireland Act (100 years ago this month) that led to Partition, and the Partition of Ireland itself on 2 MAY 1921.
Ann Robinson from the North of Ireland FHS (www.nifhs.org) has advised us that the society's street directories for Northern Ireland are due imminently on FindmyPast, covering the period from 1900-1947. This could well be in next week's FindmyPast update. Ann also flagged up that she has found evidence of some Northern Irish wills, pre-1858, included in FMP's "Diocesan and Prerogative wills and administration indexes 1595-1858" collection, with 904 records indexed for Connor, and 962 for Down.
A huge thanks to all at PRONI. Despite the coronavirus pandemic, and the challenges that have been presented by that, they've had a good year. Sadly this is the first year in a long time that I haven't been able to hop over and to visit the Christmas markets at City Hall, so here's a pic from a previous visit, and a Merry Christmas to all in Belfast!
Chris
Pre-order my next book, Sharing Your Family History Online, at https://bit.ly/SharingFamHist. My book Tracing Your Scottish Family History on the Internet, at http://bit.ly/ChrisPaton-Scottish2 is also out, as are Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet (2nd ed) at http://bit.ly/ChrisPaton-Irish1 and Tracing Your Scottish Ancestry Through Church and State Records at http://bit.ly/ChrisPaton-Scotland1. Further news published daily on The Scottish GENES Facebook page, and on Twitter @genesblog.
No comments:
Post a Comment