Family Histories and Index on a Variety of Personal sites

In my early internet days I had the opportunity to meet a great many interesting people thanks to the Belgium-Roots mailing list that Georges Picavet created.
http://lists.rootsweb.ancestry.com/index/intl/BEL/BELGIUM-ROOTS.html
One such person was Jozef Smits.  He was a scientist besides having a great interest in history and genealogy and we more or less locked horns on a technical word I had used in a post on Belgium Roots. http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/read/belgium-roots/1998-10/0909229315
Luckily we made it past this silliness and were able to forge a good relationship.

Jos had a "sidekick" with a real knack for getting into trouble with his English translation: Jose Schoovaert, a comic book artist, painter, historian.
Jos Smits left us suddenly in 2007 but his son recently reopened his webpage, translated into English for the most part: http://www.drsmits.be/translation.html
Jos wrote several histories on his family:
* - "De Familie SMITS in 't Land van Rijen", Edegem 1977.
* - "De Familie FAES uit 't Land van Rijen", I, Berchem-Edegem 1983.
* - "De Familie FAES uit 't Land van Rijen", II, Berchem-Edegem 1984.
* - "De Familie VAN DER KE(I)LEN", I, Edegem 1992.
* - "De Familie VAN DER KE(I)LEN", II, Edegem 1997.
* - "De Familie OLIVIERS, Edegem 2001.
* - “De Familie LIPPENS, Edegem 2006.* - "De aloude Heerlijkheid Wommelgem", Wommelgem 1989.
They are all made available at his web site - under "Boeken" - in Dutch for the most part but these are being translated into English.

Guy just created a new page on our site to accommodate the upload of such histories.
http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~inbr/servicesAmVar.htm
On the right side, just click on Family Histories.
We have just uploaded the first one:
The story of Fons DeRoeck and Josephine Debot (Letters from Wausaukee to Antwerp 1887 - 1937) :
written for the Gazette van Detroit by Dominique Van Rentergem, Antwerp, Belgium

I hope we can also link Andre Bodart's site (in French) shortly.
http://delacharlerie.monrezo.be/index.htm
His tree can be found on Geneanet at http://gw5.geneanet.org/index.php3?b=socrate5

If you too want to share your stories, please contact us and we will make room for your text or a link to your personal page, whichever is most agreeable with you.

Jose Schoovaert built some sites where to share his knowledge, his art and his love for the Walloon language, which was still spoken fluently by our friends in Wisconsin and in Pennsylvania.
http://belgium.rootsweb.ancestry.com/bel/0wl/jose/map.htm

We partner with several genealogical associations in Belgium, and this one, the Association Genealogique du Hainaut Belge, also provides links to its members' personal pages or to their online genealogies:http://www.aghb.org/index.php?page=memblinks
- You can email the members if you click in the first box.
- You can be redirected to private pages by chosing a name from the second pull-down menu, like "Debaudrenghien", where you will find an extensive history of the Hainaut Province and 8 centuries of the family's history, with coats of arms etc. - Only drawback is that it's not in English but don't let this deter you.  Just make use of the online translation software.  even though you won't get a perfect translation, it will at least give you the main idea.

- Or you can click on a name from the third pull-down box to access genealogies.
Don't dismiss the "News" section on that site either as they give you links to their new projects. One such project is Philippe Capron's, on Paturages: //sites.google.com/site/paturagesenborinage/Home
This site not only contains local history information but also genealogical data about famous people who have lived in Paturages as well as many other families for whom research data is available: Abrassart, Attenelle, Audin, Ballez, Bertiaux, Blairon, Bouillon, Capiau, Dangre, Delattre, Delhaye, Demarez, Demoustier, Denis, Ducobu, Francois, Gerot, Grandmont, Juste, Lan, Lenglois, Louis, Masse, Maton, Prouveur, Robert, Simon, Tillier, Warenghien.

There are comments on how some names change from one town to another although the families are the same.  Good insight to have into the research.

This is also where I found Daniel Duprez' "Ancestralement Votre" site
http://dduprez.be/dour.php
with further information on the Berlemont, Capron, Duprez, Grumiaux families as well as a Search option through indexes for the towns of Dour, Quaregnon and Wasmuel.

Total of indexed records -combined births, marriages and deaths:
Dour: 11,982; Quaregnon: 9,038; Wasmuel: 10,495
and a call to help there as well.

Clicking on the links I also found a searchable index of 262, 353 17th and 18th Liege Province marriages and 70,720 Luxemburg Province marriages. The actual content of this site requires membership in the society that offers it: The Service de Centralisation des Etudes Genealogiques de Demographiques de Belgique http://www.scgd.net/index.php

I never tire of finding new sites but find the process tedious when confronted with languages I don't speak or understand inadequately.  Wouldn't it be nice to gather them all in one place?

I'm sure I have barely scratched the surface, please feel free to contact us to add more such wonderful places.

Finding Your Ancestors Using Netradyle

Netradyle began in 1993. Its name comes from the combination of the names of three local streams: Nethen, Train and Dyle.

Some similar sites (like GeneaDinant - http://www.genedinant.be/actes/index.php/A) require that you become a member of their organization and that you index 20 to 30 pages before giving access to the records but this is NOT the case with NetraDyle.

If you speak French you should have no trouble finding your way using the site. If you don't speak French, you can download basic word lists from http://www.familysearch.org/eng/search/RG/frameset_rhelps.asp?Page=./research/type/form.asp&ActiveTab=Type
At the top of the page, last line under Document Types, you will see Word List. Some of these are dowloadable in pdf format but it's not the case for French. Just click on the link and you will be redirected to the online version. You can either scroll down the page to the word you want to translate or just click on the alphabet on the top to be taken directly to the first letter of that word.

Once you are familiar with basic words, it will be a piece of cake. If you wish to access the records, you should send an email to netradyle@brutele.be, keeping in mind to limit your request to no more than 5 per person, per week.
At http://netradyle.be/actes/, you will be able to search through

• 598,513 birth/christening records
  
• 148, 167 marriage records
  
• 303,485 death/burial records
  

from Liege, Namur, Hainaut, Walloon Brabant and Vlaams Brabant.

You can also narrow your search to a specific locality in the alphabetical listing.

this is not a complete listing)
Once you have clicked on the town of your choice, you will be able to narrow your choice incrementally in the surnames' alphabetical listing until you find the last name you are looking for and choose the person you want to look at.

This is the birth / christening record of Francois Joseph GENICOT, born in Acosse, province of Liege, on 11 October 1698, son of Dieudonne GENICOT and Catherine FRIZON. Note that the date is not laid out the way it is in the US. The first number represents the day, then the month and the year.
Of course if you have no idea where about the person you are seeking was born, got married or died, Why not try a basic search or even an advanced one:

You can choose whether you are looking for the person or anyone else listed on the record AND you should pick a document type:

Naissances = Births

Mariages = Marriages

Deces= Deaths

Type in a name and see the results.

The Advanced research feature helps you filter out many things more.

The top part notes that you are looking for a first person concerned by this record

The second row asks the same question about a second person interested in this record.

And the third category offers to look for text.

You can truncate the surname you are looking for simply by picking between:

• Exact spelling
  
• Letters found at the beginning
  
• Letters found at the end
  
• Letters contained within the surname
  
• Or Soundex.
  
• The fourth category
  

And you can even narrow the time frame by time in from when to when the program should look.

You can also pick a locality or leave it "Toutes" (ALL) – same with the record type "Tous"

There are many other sites that offer free indexes. I will try and let you know where to find them next time.

Thank You Netradyle for making these records available to all, without asking for anything in return.