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Among the many miscellaneous records used to piece together information on people living in Ireland in the 18th century, few are more important than the Flax Growers List of 1796, known officially as the Spinning Wheel Premium Entitlement List, or more commonly the Flax Growers Bounty List. During the 18th century, Ireland, and Ulster in particular, established a reputation as a producer of fine linen (made from flax). At various times the government introduced special incentives to encourage the production of linen, usually giving away spinning wheels and looms.

In 1796 the Irish Linen Board published a list of almost 60,000 individuals who had received awards for planting a specified acreage of flax. Those who had planted one acre were awarded four spinning wheels, and those planting five acres were awarded a loom. Arranged by civil parish in each county (except Dublin and Wicklow, which were not included), the Flax Growers List contains the names of those individuals recognized by the Irish Linen Board as having planted specific acreages of flax.

This Family Archive CD, based on data compiled by Heritage World Family History Services of County Tyrone and licensed by the Genealogical Publishing Company, contains an electronic index to the Flax Growers List of 1796, providing the researcher with instant access to the name of the flax grower and the civil parish and county in which the flax was grown. Considering the scarcity of 18th-century Irish records (almost non-existent in many parts of the country), this new CD stands as an almost unique contribution to Irish genealogical research, one of the very few resources that carry the researcher back to the 1800s.

System Requirements: You must have a CD-ROM drive, and in order to read the CD you must use either the Family Archive Viewer (version 4.0 or higher), which is available as a free download at http://www.genealogical.com/content/dlfav6.html, or Family Tree Maker for Windows, version 4.0 or higher (Family Tree Maker software can be ordered from www.FamilyTreeMaker.com).

To access information on our Family Archive CDs using the Family Archive Viewer:

1. Install the Family Archive Viewer CD or download it from http://www.genealogy.com/dlfav6.html.
2. Start the Viewer if it is not already running
3. Insert the CD you wish to view into the CD-ROM drive. If you have 2 or more CD-ROM drives, the CD must be placed in the first one.
4. The CD should open automatically, but users of later versions of the Family Archive Viewer must click the CD/magnifying glass icon in the top toolbar (above the template in some versions) to read the CD.
5. When the screen entitled "About this Family Archive" appears, click OK where prompted.

To access information on our Family Archive CDs using Family Tree Maker:

1. Start your Family Tree Maker and open a Family File. (If the program is already running, skip to Step 2.)
2. Insert the CD in your computer's CD-ROM drive. (If you have 2 or more CD-ROM drives, the CD must be placed in the first one.)
3. From the View menu, select Family Finder, or select the Family Finder icon from the toolbar.
4. For FTM 2005, FTM 2006, or Version 16, you must go to the View menu, select Data CD, then View CD. For FTM 2008 or higher, you must download the Family Archive Viewer.

To search the CD for names, select the Search Expert button in the top right of your screen, then select "Search this archive for someone NOT from your Family File." You can also search for names by using the Index.

Note: If a window opens that contains a list of files on the CD, simply close it.