Hello List,

In the Capital district, there is an small growing army of people who
are entering local Catholic church records into databases for a huge
project that the American-Canadian Genealogical Society of Manchester,
NH has started. Many records are in Latin and some can handle that
but a most immediate need is someone who can translate Polish
church records. As many of you are aware, Catholic churches have
not been available to anyone but that is changing rapidly. Churches
in the area are hearing from their other Catholic churches and now
requesting that their records are copied and computerized. The
church receives a competed copy after publication which makes
their job much easier but most of all their records have been
preserved.

You may view all that are completed on the ACGS website
www.acgs.org/
Scroll down to the lower left of the tree and click on
"Publications for sale" and you will see those for NH, MA, VT
and in the Capital district are:

Sacred Heart, Schenectady
St. Columbia, Schenectady
St. Joseph, Schenectady
St. Patrick, Troy
St. Jean Baptiste, Troy
St. Joseph, Cohoes
St. George, Albany
Our Lady of Grace, Ballston Lake
Vistation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Schuylerville

Others in the works are from Schuylerville, Waterford, Glens Falls,
Hudson Falls, Schenectady, Albany, and Troy.  There is a waiting
list of requests now and the project leader, David L Bonitatibus,
is out copying them at churches now. Requests are coming
in for other churches and the need for people who can read Latin,
French and Polish is growing. If anyone is interested in helping
with this project, which you transcribe in your home, please
contact David Bonitatibus at   <[log in to unmask]>

For years it was almost impossible to obtain any information
from the Catholic churches, especially in this area, but once
they have heard of this project from other local churches, they
now realize the value of having their records preserved and the
requests are coming in more frequently. We have people as
far away as Texas who are doing these. David sends them
a disk with the format and instructions and they can start right
out. Thanks to volunteers, this is a project that is helping to
preserve another source of record before they are lost.

God Bless
Ruth Ann Messick
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