I'm fairly new to Genealogy and as a member of the Isle of Man FHS, I feel that I should get to know the ins and outs of the Museum's many informational areas, but where do you start?
I could well imagine new researchers coming into the museum and feeling a little overwhelmed with the numerous cabinets, folders, books etc and if it wasn't for the amazing assistance of the staff, I would have easily lost out on the information available.
So I thought, how could I describe the area?
I would probably describe the area, as resembling a cross.
If you walked to the middle of the room, you have the 4 directions, North, South, East and West. Now I'm not sure the correct position of the building as regards to positional compass heading, so I'll make my own up.
If you take South as being the entrance to the area. East is where the igi monitors are, North is where the newspaper data is held in the cabinets and West shows a doorway and counter.
North East would probably describe a row of cabinets with books and the rolls of igi film etc.
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So here's the idea, I would like staff or experienced researchers to describe the room layout and where new people can find the information. (Better still if there was a picture of the room)
Secondly, If you were new to researching and had 'lets say' you were told that your Manx born great grandparent was (first name William and Surname Wade and born about 1880 for example), how and where would you suggest they start?
Obviously, the first choice would be the staff at the counter at the South West position, but where next?
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ps, If you can think of describing the room better than compass positions, maybe a clock for example, then please do.
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pps, I have this information already, but thought I'd use William as an example