RE: ITALIAN PROVINCES DIGITIZED ON CDROM

[mezzogiorno62]

IS ANYONE OUT THERE AWARE OF ANY FILMED ITALIAN CIVIL RECORDS AVAILABLE COMERCIALLY ON CD? I NEVER SEE ANY COLLECTIONS LIKE THESE AVAILABLE. I DO BOTH MY PATERNAL ITALIAN GENEALOGY AND MY MATERNAL FRENCH CANADIAN GENEALOGY. FRENCH CANADIAN GENEALOGISTS HAVE THE TANGUAY COLLECTION ON CD (ALSO AVAILABLE ONLINE) WHICH COVERS MOST BIRTHS,MARRIAGES,AND DEATHS IN QUEBEC FROM THE FOUNDING OF THE COLONY IN 1608 TO THE BRITISH CONQUEST IN 1760. THERES ALSO THE DROUIN MARRIAGES ON CD WHICH ONLY COVER MARRIAGES IN QUEBEC FROM 1608 TO 1760. GREAT COLLECTIONS AND JUST TWO OF MANY ONLINE SITES AVAILABLE FOR RESEARCH THE PRDH IS ANOTHER DATABASE WHICH COVERS ALL VITAL RECORDS FROM 1621 UP TO 1849. AVAILABLE BOTH ONLINE AND IN PRINT. NO EQUIVALENT FOR ITALIAN RECORDS OF BIRTH,MARRIAGE,AND DEATHS. MOST INTERESTED IN CIVIL RECORDS DIGITIZED ON CD FOR THE PROVINCES OF AVELLINO AND MESSINA. HOW COME THE FRENCH CANADIANS,A MUCH SMALLER ETHNIC GROUP,HAVE ALL THESE RECORDS BOTH ONLINE AND IN CD FORMAT,YET THE ITALIANS,A MUCH LARGER ETHNIC GROUP,ONLY HAVE FAMILY SEARCH AND THE ANTENATI WEBSITE?

[saccolicious]

I feel like we should be extraordinarily grateful that we have FamilySearch and Antenati at all and the fact that Italian civil records exist and with the level of detail they have in the first place. FamilySearch and the Italian Archives did not have to make these records available online for free to the public, but they did and we should stop and think how lucky we are that we have even those records available. One of my grandparents was the child of Armenian immigrants who escaped the Armenian genocide in the early 1900s, and all records of their ancestors in Turkey are absolutely destroyed. There are plenty of nationalities/ethnicities/races who will never be able to trace their families back before even the 1900s, or even the 1950s. We should be super grateful for all the resources we have as Italian descendants.