Discovering Irish Ancestors with the Townland Valuation Translator

Did you know that the numbers in Griffith’s Valuation can tell you how many cows your ancestor owned, what material he built his home from, and why his brother might have immigrated to America? For our rural ancestors, every aspect of life was determined by the land they farmed. Land valuation books shed light on the latent capabilities of their soil, and thus provide insight on what our ancestors did to survive. John Schnelle shows you how you can use the Irish Valuation Office Field Books to paint a detailed picture of the lives of your ancestors, including the limitations, possibilities, and hard realities they faced.

John Schnelle created the Townland Valuation Translator to help researchers mine important data from the Valuation Books. He is a graduate of Holy Cross and Temple University. He has conducted extensive research into land valuation, early agricultural science, and mid-nineteenth century farming to breathe life into the numerical evidence our ancestors left behind.