Glasnevin Cemetery Records

49949980

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121108845#Comment_121108845

I have 3 spreadsheets remaining which should bring the total to about 755k. My "combined" spreadsheet has 815k listings but Find a Grave's duplicate checker isn't very good and detected many false positives. I will try add those in the future.

I find it interesting that the cemetery trust claims Glasnevin has 1.5 million burials but it seems they only have records for about 815,000. I spoke with a user on Find a Grave who said that some records they paid for on the old Glasnevin website no longer show up in a search on the new website.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121108960#Comment_121108960

The records I've added don't contain all the information you can find when paying for a record on their website. It may have a small impact on their revenue and I imagine they will contact Find a Grave about the information I've added and attempt to have it taken down. In my opinion it's odd that a not-for-profit is charging 3 euros per basic record.

Glasnevin's data isn't very clean and it took about 1 week to clean up. Here are some terms I found in the last name field of some listings:

"Xiao Ma National Maternity", "Berkley Library Bones", "No Embryo", "Museum Specimens", "With 347", "Right Leg", "Historical"

Also many listings without a date would instead use 1-1-1970 (unix epoch) as a placeholder.

cobham

I thought the register books were a great resource, beautifully written out with extra details such as rank/occupation. I attended a lecture once by the late Shane MacThomas who said the records were complete even the newborns that would arrive on back of a bicycle. He brought one of the register books along to show us. They prided themselves down the years for burying the rich and the poor. Is it the transcription into digital that is at fault? Yes I did a lot of research and paid for full records c 2010 and could always revisit the scans of the registers but not since new website. There was some confusion over some grave that I had taken up incorrectly and said no gravestone only to find someone had put up a photo. When I took it up with cemetery staff they gave me credits for the money I had spent but would have to redo the research. I had kept a record of basic info but always interesting to revisit original source. Revenue for the cemetery is a problem now that cremation is popular and space running out. Hence they now have the museum/shop/cafe and parking charges. They got a nice amount from State around the time of the millenium and a lot of restoration work was carried out at that time

49949980

Yes I believe the issue is with the transcription into digital. I imagine it's because many name fields on the physical register would have contained titles, prefixes, suffixes and sometimes other notes such as "Child of".

Have some of the records you paid for on the old site disappeared from the database search on the new site?

Hermy

In my opinion it's odd that a not-for-profit is charging 3 euros per basic record.

Why so?

cobham

I can get back to the original scan of register the same way with the new website but all my old 'saved' records are gone. I should have kept a copy on computer or printed off. Yes I think it is value for money and lovely to see the original book tho that is extra also for full list of other interments in same plot. It is such a massive site, it is hard to see how they can maintain it in the present day. I was told that they had hoped for better result from putting the records up online. They do cremations also so another income stream. Goldenbridge had been much neglected also but I think it is in better shape now? anyone know? is it 'open'? Ten years ago you had to make an appointment with a caretaker to open it up. He has since died and his house at the gate had a fire. Earlier generations of family are there but no gravestones.

pinkypinky

I know that records I bought with an old email address are inaccessible since the new website, but my current address carried over the records I had. I got them to send me a spreadsheet at the time - when Lynn was still working there.

Always do a pdf print of the full grave record and screenshot any of the images of the old books. You never know what will change!

BowWow

This morning I heard from the individual who put the recent additional records up on FindaGrave to say, that following pressure from Dublin Cemeteries Trust, Ancestry.com will be taking those records down from their FindaGrave site.

pinkypinky

Claire Santry has a post up about it now.

https://www.irishgenealogynews.com/2023/10/bad-news-700000-glasnevin-burials-on.html

I'm not a bit surprised.

Comsewogue

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121227122#Comment_121227122

I reached out to the uploader of the Glasnevin plots last week and was given ownership of a large amount of my family graves that were uploaded. I've since added a lot of extra information and images for these graves, some are still a work in progress. I've paid for the records of these previously from Glasnevin too. I'm curious (and worried) if these will be affected.

EDIT: I started checking - they've already been removed, along with all the content I added.

euro_girl21

Likewise various plots I had added information to are gone. It is quite disappointing. Does anyone know what the origin of the uploaded records was? And does Dublin Cemetries Trust really earn that much from their own database to want the records removed? I found a lot of graves (sadly especially for infants and children) on findagrave which I did not find on the DCT site (which has a terrible search function).

DCT accounts are here on the charity regulator website but the income from the records is not clear:

Charity Detail | Charities Regulator

ath262

As far as I know the Latter Day Saints filmed the registers around the 1970s, think copies of these films might be (or were) available in Dublin City Library, I suspect these FS films are where these transcripts or OCR records came from. There were probably some agreement on what could be done with the films at the time. You see restrictions on access to various record-sets on the FamilySearch website, probably as a result or similar agreements, some only available in FamilySearch centres.

Zoney

If you move fast, Google has indexed the non-English versions of these memorials, and there are cached versions available (you may need to switch to text to get the bios etc). I got hold of some of what I'd added in terms of bios (just missing the most recent). Beside the result you need to click ... / more to get the Cached link option.

Search Firstname Middlename Lastname findagrave to get the results.

pinkypinky

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121229862#Comment_121229862

Having spoken to the individual, FamilySearch was not the origin of the data. I don't want to get anyone in trouble by detailing further.

ath262

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121232384#Comment_121232384

Interesting - trying to think of possible alternate source for these other than screenscraping or similar automatic processes - will keep further thoughts on this to myself

Mick Tator

So they’re back in the news - again, and for the wrong reasons, - again. When their IT system was down for months and they were completely overdue in meeting their corporate governance obligations on annual return filing, ESG, etc., I pointed out the disgraceful situation.

Quote (<<Glasnevin Trust has a board of about a dozen people but only two female directors. Why? The annual report is very opaque on financials and shows little on corporate governance, not even how long the directors have served. Why? The available accounts are from 2018. Why? Where is the accountability? The directors probably are nice people but none should be allowed in office for more than 5 years and they should be paid for their work. It seems they are not at the moment for a ridiculous number of meetings.>> See https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/116187877#Comment_116187877 )

A few months after that they got their act somewhat together, appointed some suitable directors and brought their regulatory filings up to date.

Latest report and accounts on file are for y/e 2021. They contain some appropriate (good) comment on governance and changes (positive) but a lot of waffle on the tough times and ‘challenges’ of Covid. (Emmm, if one is in the burial/cremation business is Covid not a bonus/business opportunity?) That year total Group income was €9,943,731 (2020: €8,771,842). Total Group expenditure was €8,274,592 (2020: €7,916,980) so consolidated net income for the year was €1,669,139 (2020: €854,862) and the total consolidated reserves were €21,207,401

What that basically means is that they’re very profitable and sitting on cash assets of €20+ million (considerably undervalued).

Following the fuss over FindAGrave there are three business questions

(i)              The Trust’s customer base / population of the Greater Dublin is increasing dramatically. The number of people over 65 years of age will almost treble by 2030. Should that not be the core business, not hawking a dodgy database?

(ii)             The income from the sale of records is not given but it must be tiny in the overall context. Having a website open via a sales portal hugely increases exposure/risk of a cyber attack. Do sales figures merit the ongoing cost of data protection/cyber security?

(iii)           Is it a correct strategy for the Trust to concentrate on selling access to records in a cumbersome way when instead it could outsource the process (and profit-share) to a business partner that has a record of efficiency in the area?

pinkypinky

All excellent questions, Mick.

I remember my grandmother telling me that the cost of a grave in Glasnevin was €16000 about 16 years ago, so clearly they're making plenty of money from their main business.

Discussing this on other forums, people think Glasnevin charges a fortune for what they provide. In the past, I've been very grateful to have their database even at a price.

There's been a noticeable downturn in outreach and accessibility since Lynn left the job. I emailed a query to her replacement and it took well over a week for a response to a simple query - he did give it.

Mick Tator

Interesting that Lynn moved, I didn’t know, I've seen a few of her pitches (e.g. at IGRS). It’s an interesting sign of events when people of her calibre depart.

Understanding the Trust’s burial options and pricing policy is similar to trying to figure out a suitable health insurance plan. A few years ago Alan Shatter TD tried to stop funeral ‘racketeering’ but got nowhere, they just wore him down.

Frankly, management of the Trust is part of a bigger and very nasty picture of that industry and the Trust seems quite happy to maintain the status quo and cream off its share of the profits. Genealogy and ‘Heritage’ are a sideshow, a nice distraction to take the focus off the main money-grab, which is inflated burial costs and ignoring cost-cutting measures. Even at a genealogy product level, why bother with 700k plus records when you can try to milk flogging just 70k? Only the OPW could comprehend that logic! (In fairness to some of the new appointees to the Trust, they must be uneasy - time will tell!)

BowWow

Glasnevin has received significant public funding, particularly during the decade of commemoration. This was based on their oft quoted position as the "National Cemetery" and having over 1.5 million burials.

But what if they don't actually have that many burials? Maybe they only have 800k odd as indicated by Post 32 above. Would explain why they wouldn't want records in the public domain...

cobham

I think the records for Glasnevin are right? The records seem so scrupulously kept way back then. The problem for them nowadays is the trend to cremation. The setting up of the museum/shop/cafe and charging for carparking within the precincts were other money stream initiatives. I was told that the return on the digital records was less than hoped. Yes they got a lot of 'millenium' or Lottery money at one stage... and my forebears gravestone was given some attention but I thought it was already in good order.

Oh I could not sit and enjoy a coffee sitting outside right up against the burial plots! Better to come through the gate from Botanic Gardens!

49949980

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121243728#Comment_121243728

I think the third point you made is exactly why Ancestry gave in to DCTrust's demands. I believe Ancestry wants to remain friendly with DCTrust so that in the future Ancestry will be considered if the cemetery decides to outsource. When I was in a zoom call with a representative from Ancestry they had said something like "The legal team doesn't think that this is a legal issue as the data you added is likely not protected by copyright"

Mick Tator

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121249794#Comment_121249794

I agree with your comments on Ancestry backing down. When I last looked about 2 ½ years ago I wrote-

<<Glasnevin Trust is in receipt of major public funding, Board Failte grants, etc. – we the taxpayers pay! Glasnevin was allocated €25 million under a 10 year programme as part of the National Development Plan in 2006. On this project to date they have spent and received funding back through OPW of €12.5m>> see here https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/116184751/#Comment_116184751

What really annoys me is the ‘silo’ approach by government departments to projects (basically empire building by civil servants) and a total unwillingness to partner with the interested public or even experts (unlike TROVE, etc.)  Time after time the civil service entities have shown their zero competence with IT management. The HSE system was wide open to a hack (see what I wrote in the above link) and guess what happened three months later! (That ransomware attack has cost the HSE €50+ million to date).

The Trust’s board should lay down some targets, which, if not achieved, should pave the way for a more professional IT partnership approach to the records. An obstacle is a fear by the Trust that they might lose out on ‘free money’ when the partnership works. It's much easier for them to do nothing (i.e. keep it in-house) than get off their collective ar$e$ and MANAGE .

Nil desperandum!

dubred

Is anyone else having problems with the DC Trust search, I had previously (3 or 4 months ago) found 6 or 7 family members buried in Glasnevin, but they are no longer being found in the search. I have tried on a number of different computers with no success.

dubred

An update on my search issue above - I eventually figured out that the search was remembering filter options that I had made and that was limiting my results, it was happening across computers because I was logged into Google Chrome on them and was reusing the same url from the shared browsing history which also includes the filter options. (p.s. it hasn't taken me 3 months to figure out!!)

Hermy

Thanks for the update dubred.

Every day's a school day as they say!

dubred

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121681118#Comment_121681118

Indeed, even after all these years working in the IT sector.

One more question, hopefully this is an appropriate place for it:

I have just purchased my first Glasnevin burial record from DC Trust and there are 7 people in a plot, 4 of whom I can identify, but the other 3 are apparently random. Is it to be expected that not everyone in a plot is related in some way? They cover the time period from 1847 to 1944.

ath262

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121681224#Comment_121681224

not necessarily, it depends on the type of burial and payment made st the time. Sounds to me that in this case the plot was not purchased outright, so burial rights expired and the plot was reused

dubred

Looking at the burial dates again, the 3 I am not familiar with were all buried before the 4 members of my family, so it may well be that the rights were purchased when the first of my family died in 1889.

cobham

I think one of options was for a 20 yr right of burial. Perhaps it was in a decent location or near to other family so it was chosen as a more long term option for your family rather than in a 'new' part of cemetery.