We nosy genealogists have long known the magic of FOIA requests, but a website called Get Grandpa's FBI File is bringing the method to the nongenealogical masses. Fill in the fields and they'll produce form letters for you to send off to the G-men in Washington and at field offices. Of course, RootsWeb SSDI does the same sort of thing for SS-5 requests.
Just understand that it might take time.
A story made the rounds in Scotland that some dim-witted couple named their baby "Pocahontas" after seeing the 1995 Disney movie. Joel Conn of the International Society for Contemporary Legend Research has established that this is a myth.
Using the Freedom of Information Act, he confirmed that no-one named Pocahontas has been recorded by the General Register Office for Scotland since at least 1974. The Office for National Statistics also revealed no record of anyone with the Native American name in England or Wales since at least 1944.Conn's next job: disproving the existence of the International Society for Contemporary Legend Research.
Mr Conn, a 31-year-old Glasgow-based solicitor, said: "I am not ashamed to say that I believed it was possible at first. [Link]
One genealogist has brought the British government to its knees. Guy Etchells requested access to a single 1911 census record for Bottesford in Leicestershire through a Freedom of Information request. His request was granted, and when Your Family Tree contacted The National Archives (TNA) with the news, they agreed to crack open the entire census ahead of the official 2012 release date.
Starting in January, TNA will offer a limited research service where the address of an individual in the 1911 Census is already known. There will be a non-refundable search charge of £45 (see www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/1911census).And Mr. Etchells isn't done yet.
Meanwhile, TNA said it hopes to offer a searchable online service in early 2009, with key sensitive information withheld until 2012.
Guy told us: “As you may imagine, I was elated with the decision. I now also have questions about the legality of restricting information of any census up to 1981...” [Link]
If you felt your ears burning on Thursday, there's a simple explanation. A panel of news executives were griping at a conference in Seattle about diminished access to public records when someone brought up genealogy.
Kathleen Carroll, senior vice president and executive editor of The Associated Press, suggested partnering with genealogy experts, who rely heavily on public records laws to mine historical data.So, if in the next few weeks an AP reporter starts throwing you "come hither" glances, you'll know why.
"We don't talk to that group of people very well, and they could be very powerful allies," said Carroll, one of four executives who spoke on a freedom-of-information panel at the ASNE annual meeting. [Link]
Freedom of Information Act requests are the genealogist's not-so-secret weapon: a way to shake loose documents that otherwise would gather dust in government storehouses for eternity (think back to the closing scene of Raiders of the Lost Ark). But with large increases in federal FOIA requests—and few incentives to expedite the process—the wait for documents has grown longer and longer. In the words of Charles Davis, head of the National FOI Coalition, "Federal FOIA is the water torture. It's just drip, drip, drip. You wait and you wait and you wait."
Many backlogs are lengthy. The most recent reports available from the 50 worst laggards show the median wait for a request to be handled ranges from about three months to more than four years, depending on the agency. The slowest federal agency is the National Archives, where officers explained most of their requests, pending for an average of 1,631 days, have to be reviewed by the originating agency for declassification before they can be released. [Link]And if you're wondering how the Social Security Administration is doing processing your SS-5 request . . . keep wondering. The SSA was late turning in its FOIA report.
From Silicon.com:
Nazi gold to UFOs - National Archives frees information
Case study: The National Archives invests £150,000 to prepare for FOI requests
By Dan Ilett
Published: Wednesday 14 September 2005
[snip]
The Freedom of Information Act 2000 came into force on 1 January this year. Under the law, public sector organisations including central government, local councils, emergency services and health authorities are obliged to make most of their information available within 20 working days of receiving a request.
This meant the [U.K. National Archives] needed to have systems that could handle requests for information from the public.
[snip]
[Dr Chris Owens, head of e-access development services] added: "We were on a very tight timescale - we finished testing in October or November. We had the system in one or two weeks later. We didn't go live until a week before January."
But after the rush to prepare, and although it has seen more requests than any other government department, the NA received fewer enquiries than expected.
"We get enquiries on Nazi gold, and on UFOs but most of the information we're asked for is about family history," he said.
[snip]
[Read the whole story]
