Internet Links

Andy Alston's Repository

This page holds links to websites of people and organisations whose services I have found useful to me personally.
I do not put up links on a "tit-for-tat" basis, or just because I received an email from someone asking for me to add their site to my list.

Motoring Links

Daimler & Lanchester Owners' Club
The Daimler and Lanchester Owners' Club is a group for owners of all the vehicles made by the british companies Daimler, Lanchester and BSA (and for people who just like them). The monthly club magazine is named "The Driving Member".
Horsfields of Halifax
Horsfields are a family business specialising in restoring quality cars and building bespoke car bodies. They also run a fleet of vintage Rolls-Royce wedding cars.
Paul Beck
Provides many essential parts for those restoring vintage and classic vehicles.
Frost Automotive
Restoration Tools & Equipment for the classic car. We got our tank sealant from them.
Coverdales
These clever people made the carpets for our Daimler. I would not have liked to even cut out the intricate shapes, but they did it, then sewed edging on them. And they fitted first time.
Wigan Car Paints
These nice people mixed the paint for our car. We spent ages going through shade cards to decide on what we wanted, then these people mixed it for us in a few minutes.
Longstone Tyres
Whatever sort of tyres you might need for a veteran, vintage or classic car, Longstone can supply them. The main man there even drives a Ford Model A as his main transport, and his wife has a Daimler V8 250. My dad rang up late one afternoon to order two tyres for our Daimler. "No problem." At eight o'clock the following morning there was a knock at the door, as a courier was delivering them.

Genealogical Links

Guild of One-Name Studies
The Guild of One-Name Studies is an organisation set up to promote the interests of both individuals and groups who are engaged in one-name studies. Such a study is defined as research into the genealogy and family history of all persons with the same surname and its variants. My Dunbabin/Donbavand research falls into this category, and I am proud to be a member of the organisation.
Ancestry
Holds a great deal of information including censuses, BMD indexes, and other useful things. Subscription needed for most things. Libraries may provide access for free.
FindMyPast
A competitor to Ancestry, FindMyPast has its own transcriptions of censuses, being the first to give access to the 1911 census. Subscription or pay-per-view needed for many things. Unfortunately in 2014 the site was redesigned and the formerly excellent search was lost. The British Newspaper Archive is included for FMP subscribers.
The Genealogist
Besides having censuses available, The Genealogist is excellent at providing access to non-conformist church registers.
FreeBMD
A volunteer-provided database of the General Register Office's Birth, Marriage and Death indexes. Coverage pretty much complete for the 19th century, and most of the 20th century. The effort also has a couple of sister projects. FreeCEN has transcriptions of censuses, and FreeREG has parish register transcriptions from a huge number of parishes around the country.
Lancashire Births Marriages & Deaths
Volunteer provided database of the Register Office indexes for Births, Marriages and Deaths. Local indexes may contain extra information such as the church for a marriage, and age at death before that appeared in GRO indexes. There are similar sites for other counties, such as Cheshire, and they use the same website software.
Lancashire Online Parish Clerks
The Online Parish Clerks transcribe registers and other information about various parishes. It's a huge task, but the information is hugely useful. Lan-OPC contains data about millions of individuals.
FamilySearch
The Latter Day Saints provide this free database of genealogical records from around the world. The church encourages its members to trace their ancestors, and this is part of the support for that aim. There also provide many Family History Centres around the world. Includes images of some original records, and links to external sites (a subscription may be needed) for some others. They have transcriptions of many censuses for free, though images may need a subscription to an external site.
RootsChat
A message board where people help each other with genealogical queries. Friendly, and, most important, free.
Lancashire Family History and Heraldry Society
My local Family History society, with branches all over Lancashire. Most branches have meetings each month, with guest speakers. There are two research centres, at Oswaldtwistle and Chorley.
GENUKI Churches Database
GENUKI is a source of much information about genealogy in general, including geographical information on parishes and registration districts. However this is the part I use most.
Historical Directories
A project by the University of Leicester, holds many digitised directories of commercial and residential addresses in Britain. Not as easy to use as it used to be, but the data is still available to all.
Old Maps
A commercial site holding digitised maps of the UK from various dates. Although aimed at selling printed copies, they can be viewed online for free.
National Library of Scotland Maps
The National Library of Scotland put on line a large number of historic maps, and not just of Scotland. All for free, too.
Mario
Lancashire County Council provide mapping for their area. It includes some historical maps, which can be overlaid with current maps.
BMD Certificate tutorial
The best tutorial on how to interpret the contents of Birth, Marriage and Death certificates. It explains each field on the form, and what gets written in there.
The GRO
The General Register Office issue copies birth, marriage and death certificates for the whole of England and Wales. They ship anywhere in the world for a fixed price. Some other sites also offer a certificate ordering service, but they just order from the GRO and pocket a large margin. In 2016, the GRO put their own indexes of births and deaths online. These new indexes include fields that the old, printed indexes do not.