Free UK Genealogy is a

charitable incorporated organisation A Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO) is a corporate form of business designed for (and only available to) charitable organisations in England and Wales, similar to (but with important differences from) a Scottish Charitable Incorporat ...

(CIO) acting as an umbrella organisation for

FreeBMD FreeBMD is a UK-based charitable organisation and website founded in 1998, and established as charity in 2003 to create a free transcription of the indexes to Births, Marriages and Deaths (BMD) for England and Wales from 1837 to 1983. It also pr ...

, FreeREG and FreeCEN. The charity was formerly known as FreeBMD. Free UK Genealogy works with volunteers to make transcriptions of family history records. Current projects include transcribing the England and Wales index of Births Marriages and Deaths, historic Parish Registers and 19th Century Censuses. The resulting databases FreeBMD, FreeCEN and FreeREG and transcripts are free to access.

Formation of Free UK Genealogy from FreeBMD

FreeBMD was founded in 1998 by

Ben Laurie Ben Laurie is an English software engineer. He is currently the Director of Security at The Bunker Secure Hosting. Laurie wrote Apache-SSL, the basis of most SSL-enabled versions of the Apache HTTP Server. He developed the MUD ''Gods'', which was ...

, Graham Hart and Camilla Gemmingen von Massenbach after they realised the potential that the online genealogy community had to make records accessible to support research. Volunteers came together online to transcribe the

General Register Office General Register Office or General Registry Office (GRO) is the name given to the civil registry in the United Kingdom, many other Commonwealth nations and Ireland. The GRO is the government agency responsible for the recording of vital record ...

(GRO) indexes of Births, Marriages and Deaths for England and Wales. Work continues to complete a transcription database covering the indexes from 1837 to 1983. All three founders are still actively involved with supporting and managing the organisation. * In 2003 the organisation registered as a charity under the name FreeBMD * In 2014 the name was changed to Free UK Genealogy which better reflected the organisation * In 2016 Free UK Genealogy became a CIO (Charitable Incorporated Organisation)

Governance

In 2013 Darren Wright was appointed executive director, in succession to

Nick Barratt Nicholas David Barratt (born 16 May 1970) is an English genealogist and Director of Senate House Library at the University of London. He is best known as genealogical consultant for series 1 to 4 of the BBC show '' Who Do You Think You Are?''. ...

. Pat Reynolds is the current executive director, in post since June 2015.

Ethos and mission

Free UK Genealogy is a supporter of

Open Data Open data is data that is openly accessible, exploitable, editable and shared by anyone for any purpose. Open data is licensed under an open license. The goals of the open data movement are similar to those of other "open(-source)" movements ...

and Open Source as key to making and keeping public records accessible to all. In 2011 FreeBMD partnered with the

Open Rights Group The Open Rights Group (ORG) is a UK-based organisation that works to preserve digital rights and freedoms by campaigning on digital rights issues and by fostering a community of grassroots activists. It campaigns on numerous issues including ma ...

and

Open Knowledge Foundation Open Knowledge Foundation (OKF) is a global, non-profit network that promotes and shares information at no charge, including both content and data. It was founded by Rufus Pollock on 20 May 2004 in Cambridge, UK. It is incorporated in England an ...

to launch the

Open Genealogy Alliance The Open Genealogy Alliance (OGA) is a UK-based project launched by three partners: the Open Rights Group, Open Knowledge Foundation and FreeBMD. OGA is currently researching the genealogy sector and the copyright status of digitized public do ...

(OGA). The OGA researches the

genealogy Genealogy () is the study of families, family history, and the tracing of their lineages. Genealogists use oral interviews, historical records, genetic analysis, and other records to obtain information about a family and to demonstrate kins ...

sector and the

copyright A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, education ...

status of digitised

public domain The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work A creative work is a manifestation of creative effort including fine artwork (sculpture, paintings, drawing, sketching, performance art), dance, writing (literature), filmmaking, ...

documents. Free UK Genealogy work is generally licensed under the

Creative Commons Creative Commons (CC) is an American non-profit organization and international network devoted to educational access and expanding the range of creative works available for others to build upon legally and to share. The organization has release ...

CC0 A Creative Commons (CC) license is one of several public copyright licenses that enable the free distribution of an otherwise copyrighted "work".A "work" is any creative material made by a person. A painting, a graphic, a book, a song/lyric ...

Public Domain Dedication, as described in the footer of the website.

Awards and recognition

In 2007, FreeBMD was awarded the

Prince Michael of Kent Prince Michael of Kent, (Michael George Charles Franklin; born 4 July 1942) is a member of the British royal family, who is 51st in the line of succession to the British throne as of September 2022. Queen Elizabeth II and Michael were firs ...

Award by the

Society of Genealogists The Society of Genealogists (SoG) is a UK-based educational charity, founded in 1911Fowler, S School of Advanced Study, University of London. Date unknown. Retrieved 2011-10-30. to "promote, encourage and foster the study, science and knowledge ...

. The same year, ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' selected FreeBMD as one of the 50 best family history websites. '' Family Tree Magazine'' named Free UK Genealogy among the 101 Best websites for British & Irish Genealogy in 2016. In June 2017, Free BMD was selected as one of UK ''Family Tree'' magazine's 50 best websites for family history. Free UK Genealogy's projects are often recommended as a good place to begin researching family history.

Volunteers

The majority of the work of Free UK Genealogy is carried out by volunteers; from transcribing records to managing the databases. As of March 2016 the organisation had 6,500 active volunteers. Volunteers are trained and supported in their work.

References

{{reflist

External links

* http://www.freeukgenealogy.org.uk/ - Website Charities based in the United Kingdom Family history societies in the United Kingdom