Things you can find on the internet:
Cyndi's List can direct you to virtually every genealogy-related web
site on the internet. Bookmark it at www.cyndislist.com
The National Archives and Records Administration has a guide to what
is in the various US census returns titled www.archives.gov/genealogy/census.
There are lots of interesting things on the NARA website. The
general introduction to the NARA genealogical resources is http://www.archives.gov/genealogy/
US GenWeb is coordinating a volunteer project to transcribe the US
Census schedules. Check it out at http://www.rootsweb.com/~census/
Many of the census records are also available to paid members of
Ancestry.com: http://www.ancestry.com/
Homestead and other Land Patents can be searched online at http://www.glorecords.blm.gov/.
There is also information on the laws governing U.S. Government land
sales and homesteading at the "Visitor
Center".
http://www.mapquest.com/ has
maps for the United States.
The U.S. Government also has some nice maps and an index of
geographical names (rivers, townships, post offices, ghost towns, etc.)
at mapping.usgs.gov/
Minnesota maps can be found at http://www.mnhs.org/collections/digitalmaps/index.htm
For maps of the area in and around Germany (Central and Eastern
Europe) try the shtetl-seeker at http://www.jewishgen.org/ShtetlSeeker.htm
.
Another web-site that deals with the former and current names of
places in East Prussia is http://www.kartenmeister.com/
It includes only areas east of the Oder and Neisse rivers: Memel,
Westprussia, Brandenburg, Posen, Pommerania, and Silesia. Most of
these are areas that Germany lost to Poland and Lithuania after World
War I. One nice feature is that it will give you a list of places
that are around a larger city or town. Another nice feature is a
mini-dictionary of German and Latin terms relating to
land-ownership.
A useful Swedish place-finder is http://www.sna.se/gazetteer.html
A GREAT source of historical maps is at http://www.davidrumsey.com/
http://scripts.ireland.com/ancestor/placenames/index.cfm
has an 1851 index to place names in Ireland.
Use the version at www.genealogy.com/genealogy/gen_ssdisearch.html.
or the RootsWeb version, at http://ssdi.genealogy.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/ssdi.cgi
If you have not checked out the Latter-Day Saints' http://www.familysearch.org/
website, do so now. If you are lucky, your entire family tree will
be right there. If not, you can browse the catalog of books and
microfilm, then get directions to the nearest church. While you
are there, look at their guides to doing research in various areas of
the world.
http://worldconnect.rootsweb.com/
In my opinion, this is the best place to post your family tree. If
you have a genealogy program, it will probably generate a GEDCOM, which
you can easily upload to this site. You can make changes to it, or
even remove it, at any time.
Arrivals at Ellis Island from 1892 - 1924 can be searched at http://www.ellisislandrecords.org/
http://envoy.libraryofmichigan.org/1870_census/
has an index and actual images. OK, so it's not Minnesota.
It's still great.
Minnesota Birth Records 1900-1916 and Death Records 1904-2001
The Minnesota Historical Society has done us all a great favor by
putting these records on-line: http://people.mnhs.org/dci/
for death records and http://people.mnhs.org/bci/ for
births.
The index provides the name of the deceased, certificate number, date
of birth or death, and county of record. Then you can order a more
complete copy of the birth or death certificate for only $8.00, using
the printable order form right there on the web site.
The Historical society also does other searches of their holdings,
and one of the best services is an obituary for $12 -15, depending on
where you live.
There are many guides to doing genealogy available for
download. Some of the best are the RootsWeb, US GenWeb, and
Genealogy.com series of lessons. The Minnesota historical society
guide has some specific Minnesota sources, at www.mnhs.org/genealogy/tracing_history.html
.
www.mennonitegenealogy.com/faq
has some very good tips for research in Central Europe.
The LDS research guides point to the records in the LDS library of
microfilm. http://www.familysearch.org/Eng/default.asp.
http://www.rootsweb.com/~okgs/ch_burned.htm
a great general guide to non-traditional sources of information.
Read it and resolve to try a bit more detective work!
Looking for a third cousin somewhere in the U.S.? Try http://www.anywho.com/ or http://www.dexonline.com/
Please! If you ask for help, follow the rules. Ask for a
specific thing, or a specific piece of advice.
www.rootsweb.com/~mnsibley/lookups.html
has Sibley County volunteers who will do lookups in books.
http://www.raogk.org/ has
Random Acts of Genealogical Kindness volunteers, who will walk around
and fetch things.
The RootsWeb BooksWeOwn has more volunteers
who will look in reference books in their own
libraries. |