Saskatchewan homestead records going online

[Hannia]

Sask. homestead records going online
Last Updated Oct 20 2005 11:12 AM CDT
CBC News

It will soon get a whole lot easier to research one's family history in Saskatchewan.

The provincial archives board is putting its homestead information on line.

The Saskatchewan Homestead Index database contains 360,000 references to the men and women who, under the terms of The Dominion Lands Act, took part in the homestead process in the area now known as Saskatchewan from 1872 to 1930.

It includes those who sold or bought North West MИtis or South African veteran scrip or received soldier grants following service in the First World War.

The digital upgrade is great news for people like Laura Hanowski, a researcher with the Saskatchewan Genealogical Society who has spent many hours looking for these records manually through card indexes and on microfilm.

Now she'll be able to do it from her own computer.

"Being able to do this at home, at my time, not having to fit in to the time that the archives is open is absolutely fantastic," she said.

The Saskatchewan Archives Board spent about three years getting the information online.

Chief archivist Chris Gebhard says having it all in one place allows people to do a lot more with it.

"For example, if you're doing ethnic history and you're studying the block settlements √ Ukrainian block settlements, say, in the Yorkton area √ you can simply pull out all the names of the individuals that homesteaded in a particular township."

In this first phase of the project, after people find the names of the files they want online, they still need to come down to the archives to get the actual files.

However, the archives board eventually hopes to put more information about homesteaders online, including the full files, letters, diaries and photographs.

The website for the homestead information, which doesn't become active until Oct. 21, is http://www.saskhomesteads.com.

[mpich]

looking for manitoba homestead.
can you advise if you know of such a thing?
Melissa

[Hannia]

http://data4.collectionscanada.ca/ne...e.html&r=0&f=S

[MbUke]

Or try
http://www.collectionscanada.ca/arch...1/index-e.html

and

http://www.gov.mb.ca/ia/programs/pro...ip_range.html?
The second one will help you find 'where' the homesteads are/were.