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--- start [2022/03/23 11:15] – created Project Administrator
+++ start [2022/04/13 15:18] (current) – [Using the Site] Project Administrator
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 ====== Project Home ======
 ===== Introduction =====
 The Women of The Illawarra: from Settlement to Suffrage Project is being run by a small group of volunteers. The aim is to acknowledge women as pioneers in the Illawarra and show how they have been important in the development of the Illawarra. The project is to study the role that women played in the period from settlement to 1902 when women were granted the right to vote.
 [[iw:project|Read more]]
+===== Site Content =====
-===== Contacts =====
+The site is a consolidation of publicly available information gleaned from a multitude of sources including:
+  * Newspapers, primarily the SMH and Illawarra Mercury but also others which no longer exist.
+  * Genealogy sites such as Ancestry and RootsWeb.
+  * NSW births, deaths and marriages registry.
+  * Church and cemetery records.
-You can contact us via our contact form, by email, by mail or in person.
+The site is organised into surname pages with a page for each letter of the alphabet. (These are visible in the site menu on the left.) Within these pages are entries for the women who have been identified as living in the Illawarra during the period covered (settlement to 1902). The information available for a person varies significantly and is solely dependent on the surviving records related to them. For some people we only have a name and for others a significant amount of their life history.
+While the site concentrates primarily on the women their relationships with the men in their lives has also been captured where possible. Fathers, husbands and sons are included.
+==== Using the Site ====
+How you use the site will depend on what you are trying to achieve. The most common use cases are:
+  * Researching a family by surname.
+  * Seeking details on an individual.
+When searching don't forget alternative spellings as many historical records are fluid with names.
+Women with an Asterisk (*) after their name will in have their own entry in the appropriate surname page.
+=== By Surname ===
+Finding all individuals with a given surname is a two step process:
+  - Start with the surname page for that letter of the alphabet. Use the table of contents on the page to navigate to the people with the surname of interest. This will find the primary entries including most of the women.
+  - Use the search box in the top right corner to find entries for the surname. This will list all of the surname pages which include that name. Click on each page in turn and search in each using the browser search (accessible via //Ctrl-F// or the //Find// menu item). This will walk you through each occurrence of the name in the page.
+=== An Individual ===
+Enter the name you're looking for in the search box  in the top right corner to find surname pages with matching entries. Click on each page in turn and search in each using the browser search (accessible via //Ctrl-F// or the //Find// menu item). This will walk you through each occurrence of the name in the page.
+If nothing is found then try using the //by surname// method above.
+=== Site Statistics ===
+Number of:
+  - Primary entries: 15,300+
+  - Named children: 60,000+
+  - Fathers: 8,500+
+  - Husbands: 13,000+
+Total number of identified individuals: 100,000+ (once the spouses of children and people in stories are factored in)
-[[iw:contacts|Read more]]
 ===== Some Stories =====
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 [[iw:stories|Read more]]
+===== Contacts =====
+You can contact us via our contact form, by email, by mail or in person.
+[[iw:contacts|Read more]]
 ===== Get Involved =====