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156 Missing Images


By Stuart Armstrong - Posted on 04 April 2014

At the end of FHL microfilm 635747, after 30 feet or so of blank film, at the extreme end of the roll, are 156 images that have never been digitized. They cover baptisms in San José de Gracia for the years 1790 through 1797. They represent at least 1000 people (I haven't counted them, but they average about 8 records per page). The first 15 of these images are repeats of the previous images on the roll. The rest are unique: they aren't duplicated anywhere else.

For at least five years I have been trying to get someone to digitize these images, but without success. All I've gotten were blank stares, run-arounds, and referals. I even tried to bypass the usual channels and get to people who could make things happen - but all in vain. (Is there a hint of frustration here?) So I went to the library myself and loaded them onto a thumb drive. I didn't set the resolution as high as I should have, and the exposure isn't perfect, but all of the records are readable!

A search on FamilySearch for San José de Gracia from 1790-1797, filtered for the batch number of these images, reveals a strange result: the females have been indexed - the males have not! That's about 500 or 600 males you won't find in your research unless you physically go to the library. My (wife's) direct line ancestors go through SJG between 1790 and 1797, so some of them are found among those missing images.

I've been wondering what I ought to do with these images. Anybody got any ideas? ... ! ... ? ... ?