Tanguay Collection, Genealogical Dictionary of Canadian families, 1608-1890

This post explains how to use the Tanguay Collection on Ancestry.ca

This is one of the most important databases you will want to use in your Quebec research found at:

Source: www.ancestry.ca/search/collections/tanguayfamilies/
Description of this site: ifamilyhistory.blogspot.com/2019/10/french-canadian-records-on-ancestryca.html

Result page
Enter the information you know in the search page.

Click Search

A result page appears as shown on the right.


This gives you some information but in this database always click on View images. I have listed three reasons why to view the image and how to understand what you are seeing.

• More information is given.
  View image gives you the whole page that the record appears on.
  Find your family. The whole family is listed chronologically with baptism/christening, marriage and death dates and location for easy entry into your software. The couple's father's names are listed. 

This is one of my families. This is a scanned copy of a photocopy I made from the book in the 1980s. This is how the record appears when you view a record. I have added explanations for each item.
At the top is the marriage date and location.

• Footnotes
  Beside the wife's name in the above example is (1). This is indicating that there is a footnote at the bottom of the page. They do not appear on the results page. A footnote for Louis Hebert told me he was the first European landowner of Canada. A footnote beside one of Louis' children told me they were the first marriage in Canada. 

• Missing Records
  I searched for Louis Hebert in the Ancestry search page for this database. Louis died in 1649 Quebec. There were no results.
  
  I knew he was in the book because I have a hardcopy of his entry. I searched for his son. [A daughter would have worked as well.] When the son's record appeared, I clicked on View image. I scrolled up and found Louis.
  
  Instead of searching for a child I could have searched using just the surname. Then click on view a record for any of the results given. You will then be able to see that actual page. Review the names on that page. If not on that page use the arrows to go to the previous page or the next page. Arrows are located in the middle of the right and left sides.
  
  Why didn't he show up? Louis' record is very light. This is a different publishing of the copy I used because Louis and Guillaume are not on the same page in my publication. They might not have been able to recognize this when indexing the record. 

If I didn't know he was there I might have given up. Go to the surname page and look at all the entries for the family. Follow the line back each generation. 

Always view the document.