Can a person access the Philippines records in Salt Lake city and how much does it cost?
I need some advise, as far as I know the records I need to search are in Salt Lake City or their country of origin the Philippines. I have searched the UK Military Overseas records for marriage records but found nothing. Which is not surprising because i do not think the person got married. The person was born in London UK and lived first in Singapore then the Philippines, then back to Singapore where he died in 1932. Now the Singapore Papers are on line we have found his life is far more interesting than we ever imagined. Our family looked for him after the 2nd World war and he was made officially missing after the fall of Singapore. Two weeks ago I found his correct death date and his very interesting life story. His letters were far and few between, always asking for money. The last in 1938 (could this have been 1928 because if it was 1938 I have no idea who it was from). I have an Ancestry tree where I have loaded many many records into the Gallery DGOMJS.
Thomas Powell Robinson was born 30 Nov 1873 St Pancras London England, His birth registration was 1st Qtr 1974 mother's maiden name Sutherland. His father, also Thomas Powell Robinson was a butcher & expected all his children to work in his butchers shop. Thomas was the oldest and flatly refused to & went to live with his grandmother and Uncle. He was apprenticed to his uncle and qualified as a tailor. On 2nd March 1894 he arrived in Singapore. From hence on he was known as T. Powell Robinson. First he was employed by Katz Brothers before by 1900 owning his own shop. He loved acting and in the newspapers there are many many reports of different plays he was in. Through acting he learnt to write and was soon starting up a local newspaper called Straits Weekly (sadly not on line or no longer exits.
Being a tailor no longer satisfied him and he took off to the Philippines in mid 1907 because I can find no more reference to him in the newspapers. I think it could be him 2 Jul 1907 sailing from Salanger Malaya. The death records in 1932 tell us he worked for the Manila Electric Railway & Light Company (although my mother recorded it as 'Radio' which he could well have taken an interest in.) and its American owners. We believe he was their Advertising manager but cannot confirm it either way. My Great Uncle Mont met Thomas Powell Robinson in Singapore where Tom had just returned to, in 1914. Uncle Mont was on his way to New Zealand. So his ship would have arrived about July 1914. So I believe he returned to Singapore 1913 or early 1914. I have found no shipping records as yet to confirm this.
T.Powell Robinson became Advertising manager for the Malaya Tribune and Editor for The Sunday Post (no records for this paper) From 1922 there is so much information in the papers till his death. Every year has several stories. Plus quite a few after his death.
I was wondering if there was any way the records in Salt Lake City for the Philippines might be able to be searched so we can verify his location or do I have to come to Salt Lake City in person to do this? Which is not possible at the moment anyway. Can you please reply to me by E mail don.stanton@actrix.co.nz My name is Mary Stanton. Thank you very much
Answers
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There was publication called The Directory & Chronicle for China, Japan, Corea, Indo-China, Straits Settlements, Malay States, Siam, Netherlands India, Borneo, the Philippines, &c
There are some online editions for your period of interest which it would be worth checking out, although he may not have been senior enough to appear. The online editions are linked from the FIBIS Fibiwiki page China https://wiki.fibis.org/w/China#Directories_etc
What type of records are you hoping to find at Salt Lake City? Do you have a catalogue reference? I would think Philippines newspapers would be the most likely "records" to provide some information, but I do not know of a source for historical editions, either online or in a Library. Perhaps you could enquire from the National Library of New Zealand.
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Some films from the FamilySearch Catalog are only viewable from the FHL in Salt Lake City. For those films, once you are signed into FamilySearch, you will see a microfilm reel symbol beside the record.
FS is currently offering a lookup service: https://www.familysearch.org/blog/en/library-lookup-service-fhl/ However this service is designed for instances when you have a name and date from an index. They may not have time to help with requests requiring browsing through hundreds of pages, due to the popularity of the service.
I highly suggest trying to find alternative ways to get access to these records, because if you are unable to go to Salt Lake City yourself and know no-one there who can search for you, you'll have to pay a professional genealogist.
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