Both of the above personal web sites along
with the information contained on this site from the Sparks Quarterlies,
compliment each other to build a powerful trio of tools for the serious
Sparks Genealogy Researcher.
THE PROJECT
It took over two and one half years of work
to place the contents of this site on the internet. In November or
December of 1999 the authors of this Web Site undertook the tremendous
task of scanning 5600+ pages of the Sparks Quarterly to
be placed on the Internet. The work included not only the scanning,
but also running each page through an OCR (Optical Character Recognition)
program to prepare it for editing. After that, each page had to be
converted to HTML language for the Internet, followed by re-formatting
the page (original formatting was lost in the OCR step). This included
correcting errors introduced by the OCR program such as incorrectly recognized
characters, mis-spelled words, paragraph and line spacing, indentation
etc. It was necessary to completely re-type every one of the many
hundreds of census records in the process.
All photographs were scanned separately and linked
to the HTML pages to allow the pages to download from the internet faster.
A final edit was done to assure that all issues conformed to a set of standards
set up by the Editor. This included attempting to be as true to the
original printed issues as possible.
With only two exceptions all scanning was done
by the two of us, and we re-formatted and edited those two issues.
The reader will recognize that we put many hours into this project, but
both Jim and I agree that it was a "Labor of Love", and had we not both
been retired it would not have been feasible to undertake the task.
The Project was finally completed, with the exception of a few pictures,
on June 12, 2002.
ABOUT THE ASSOCIATION
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THE SPARKS QUARTERLY, published by the Sparks Family Association
The Sparks Family Association was founded in
March 1953 as a non-profit organization devoted to assembling and preserving
genealogical and historical materials pertaining to the Sparks Family
In America. It was exempt from federal tax under the provisions of
the Internal Revenue Code, Section 503(c)(7). The first issue of the Quarterly was published in March
1953.
The fifty years of the Quarterly (1953-2003) comprise
a total of 5780 pages of Sparks Family history.
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THE FOUNDERS OF THE ASSOCIATION
SEARCH THE SITE
Try a sample search of the Sparks Quarterly Archives. The Site
search engine may find some of your ancestors who are in the Sparks Quarterly.
You will find that the "hit" links from the search will bring up an applet
asking for an ID and Password to the archive. This is a restricted
"members only" site and may only be accessed by members of the Sparks Family
Association, who have been issued a password. (See the section
above on applying for membership. )
Click Here for a brief tutorial
on how to use the search engine. A more detailed search tutorial
is to be found on the "Members Only" archive section of the site.
The main thing to remember is: (a) no spaces are allowed.
(b) Replace spaces with the "+" sign.
[i.e. John+Mary or Matthew+Sparks+Sarah].
At times including quotation marks around parts or all of the search item
may help to narrow the search.
Definitely use the quotation marks when searching
for one person only, such as "John Sparks" or "Mary Curnutte".
Link To "Members
only" Quarterly Archives
(Password Protected)
Hosted at JustHost.com
