At the May 6 #genchat, Brooke Schreier Ganz from Reclaim the Records (“RTR”) was our guest expert and helped us catch up with what RTR has been up to since we last chatted. Again, the discussion was so informative, another blog post was in order! I will feature our questions, Brooke’s answers (with permission), and other useful information that was shared.
ICEBREAKER Was any of your research facilitated by Reclaim the Records (RTR) efforts?
Brooke: Every time we reclaim new data (whether they’re images or occasionally databases/spreadsheets) from a government agency, we upload them to @internetarchive, as our giant free hard drive in the sky. Then we link the collection from our website.
- @MarianBWood: So grateful for the many NYC records made public by @ReclaimTheRecs because my immigrant grandparents all settled in Big Apple.
- @_genchat: Personally…yes! I’ve found numerous marriage & death dates (a few births) & later some certificates! ^cm [That’s me, by the way!]
- @TreeBra44061473: Probably. They’ve done a lot.
- @packrat74: The NYC vital records indexes have helped with finding my husband’s people who moved there. Especially since the NYC Historical Vital Records site launched.
- @MyFamilyGenie: NYC Records (when they comply at least) have been a blessing.
- @DawnCarlile: Not yet, but someday. I do appreciate RTR’s efforts.
- @MiningthePast: Not that I’m aware of. I have no US ancestry and only use US records when I’m pursuing a DNA match. [MiningthePast is from Australia.] I probably don’t have enough awareness of which jurisdictions have been recalcitrant. I am a bit of an activist though and love seeing when RTR have had a big win.
- @kwolchak: Them getting NYC to release records may help me find out when/if my grandmother’s sister was married in NYC. She lived there, just don’t know if that’s where she got married.
- @TLKoehnline: …I’ve found RTR records for my cousins in Wyoming; the death & marriage indexes have been helpful. Aside from my own family, the NYC records have been invaluable for a great deal of NY Jewish research I’ve done lately, of course.
- @Cferra1227: I guess I have them to thank for some NY records regarding some of my great-grandmother’s sisters and brother who moved to NY.
- @Free2BFreSpirit: Yes! All of my research started with New York, tracing back to Italy.
- @laurabmack: The NYC vitals have helped me a lot! Thank you!
Q1 What are some of the places you can look to find the records that have been reclaimed?
Brooke: If we do reclaim a textural data set, rather than just images, then we often build “single serving” standalone searchable websites with that data. For example, we have ones like NewJerseyDeathIndex.com … or MissouriBirthIndex.com … or NYCMarriageIndex.com … or NebraskaDeathIndex.com … and several others. And we’re working on a few more right now!
- @MarianBWood: I can start on the @ReclaimTheRecs site Reclaimtherecords.org
- @packrat74: Reclaim the Records on the Internet Archive: https://archive.org/details/reclaimtherecords
- @_genchat: Also, I believe that Ancestry and FamilySearch may have some links to the indexes?
Q2 Do you know of any agencies that have worked with RTR to make their records publicly accessible?
Brooke: Yes! Some State Archives have been fantastic to work with. They know their state Freedom of Information laws, and they follow them.
Some stand-outs who get <trophy emoji> include the Washington State Archives, the Wyoming State Archives, New Jersey, and another state archive that we haven’t announced publicly yet, but which I think will surprise people to hear.
And it will especially surprise a certain genealogy company who thought they had some kind of exclusive access rights to that archive’s digitized files.
Q3 How can we distinguish what can/should go behind a paywall & what should not?
Brooke: None of it should go behind a paywall.
Public data should be free. All of it. And we’re working to make that happen.
Next question.
- There was much discussion on this, but some pointed out to keep legislation and personal privacy in mind (such as Social Security Numbers), as well as the costs agencies incur to send out or even host a data repository.
Q4 How has the pandemic impacted ease of record access?
Brooke: It’s helped us at RTR make the argument in our court briefs that it’s inexcusable for certain archives to have digitized files and then NOT put them online, thereby limiting public access to records while the archive buildings were closed.
Looking at you guys, as usual. @nycrecords Hiiii, our latest Memorandum of Law and our latest Sworn Affidavit in our latest lawsuit against you guys got filed with the court late this afternoon, lol.
Yes, actually. It has driven home the issues of fair and equitable public access, about the ridiculous requirements of traven and even physical mobility for records, which could just as easily be open to everyone on a computer screen, from their homes. As they should be.
- @packrat74: You win some, you lose some. Records that need to be accessed in-person in an archive? The pandemic really messed with that. But some archives used the downtime to get more records online, so win-win.
Q5 What are some ways we can stay apprised of records access issues?
Brooke: The Records Public Access Committee (RPAC) is one way to hear about goings-on in the US and to some extent other countries. They have an e-mail list to which you can subscribe to get updates on records access issues. They also write terrific angry letters to government bodies that might be trying to stifle or restrict public access to genealogical materials. And we’ve cited those letters in many of our lawsuits! Because they prove that the gov’t knew about those issues, but ignored them. Here’s the link to their website, so you can sign up: ngsgenealogy.org/rpac/
- @FamilySleuther: Follow @ReclaimTheRecs on Twitter and Facebook!
- @_genchat: I remember last time, Brooke made us aware of RPAC … that also led me to this site: recordsadvocate.org
- @MiningthePast: Following archives accounts and interacting with people who work with them through tweetchats.
- @packrat74: For records access issues, I follow Judy G. Russell. I also keep an eye on MuckRock. muckrock.com
Q6 Do you have any questions for Brooke?
- @MiningthePast: How many of you are there? Is it your day job or do you volunteer? Are you all located together or dispersed across the US. How did you find each [other] and get started?
Brooke: RTR started with one frustrated genealogist. We filed our first FOIL request on January 2015, as our New Year’s Resolution that year!
That turned into our first lawsuit in late 2015. We won a settlement and all records. And we got hooked.
RTR then morphed from “this would be cool to try” into a real 501(c)3 non-profit organization in early 2017 (and the by-laws were filed in late 2016). By that time, we had multiple lawsuits under our belt. We’re now one of the largest open records orgs in the United States.
The money we raise goes almost entirely to our awesome lawyers — who are amazing, but not exactly inexpensive, because lawyers, you know — with a little left over for things like web servers, mailing list software, etc.
Not paid staff…yet. But that’s coming soon!
And sometimes we win attorneys fees in our lawsuits, which means the entire suit ends up being free! But only after we’ve worked on it for a year or more (and paid the attorneys in that timeframe).
Our board members live spread out all across the US. We’ve got everyone from a college student (who helped us win a copy of the Mississippi death index a while back) to professional genealogists to a Citizen Archivist who does military work to a housewife/mom (hi).
As stated in the chat, you can take RTR’s records survey for records they can potentially uncover: https://www.reclaimtherecords.org/records-survey/. Also, you can donate to RTR here: https://www.reclaimtherecords.org/donate/donate-to-reclaim-the-records/