Addressing history: a new searchable historical database

[William Douglas]

AddressingHistory is asking history enthusiasts to explore their ancestors and local historical connections by finding and placing historical Scottish Post Office Directory listings on the map. 
 
Funded by JISC, the AddressingHistory website combines the listings from the Directories, historical forerunners of Yellow Pages, with maps from the same years. The site, which is free to use, allows users to search for historical people, places and professions and presents results both on a map and as an editable listing that links to the full digitised Directory page.

AddressingHistory, developed by the JISC-funded data centre EDINA at the University of Edinburgh in partnership with the National Library of Scotland, launches with three Edinburgh Post Office Directories from 1784-5, 1865 and 1905-6. They cover the period from the end of the Scottish Enlightenment to the running of the city’s first electric trams although, as Stuart Macdonald of the project team notes: “The online tool has been designed to be scalable to accommodate the wider range of Post Office Directories for the whole of Scotland.” I found 174 Douglases in the Edinburgh listings.
 
Read more at: http://www.jisc.ac.uk/news/stories/2010/11/addressinghistory.aspx

Presumably more cities and locations will follow.