Monday Memories--digitized ancestors
There are not many in my immediate family interested in genealogy, but if I point, they'll look. I want to mention a wonderful source for your memories available only through your public library (if it subscribes), The HeritageQuest Online, a book collection made up of 7,922 family histories, 12,035 local histories and 258 primary sources with the 1790-1930 census images. It has been on microfilm for some years, but few libraries owned it because of the high cost. It is a ProQuest product and can be accessed at subscribing libraries (I use Upper Arlington Public Library) or by remote access using your own computer and library card. Sometimes library consortia buy it and make it available to the entire state system (I'm not sure about Ohio and whether what I access is in a consortia).I came across this source just browsing at my library about two weeks ago. I suppose it was publicized, but I hadn't seen it or wasn't doing genealogy just then. The quality and depth is breath taking. You can search by people, place and keyword; you can browse titles with bibliographical data and links. I could easily use the indexes and find the correct pages of the on-line books within this database. Printing the right page was a bit tricky, but considering that in the past you might have had to travel hundreds of miles to examine these sources after frustrating hours of tracking them down, what's a few dollars for printing?
Also at my library, and maybe yours, is the Ancestry.com collection. It duplicates some of Heritage Quest, has some really nice browsing features, but the images aren't as good. My library doesn't allow remote access, but here is a link to the one at Columbia University just so you can see what's in it.
These sources are where I found the photocopy (not just record) of my grandfather's WWI 1918 draft card from Lee County, IL; my great grandfather's public land purchases; the Revolutionary War pension petition by the widows of my don't-know-how-many gggg grandfathers in Virginia; the address of the house where my husband's great grandmother lived in Beaver Co. PA before her husband disappeared. Folks, I've seen a lot of on-line material in my professional and personal life with libraries, and these--for the memories--just blew me away.
Because of name changes, our female family members are difficult to track, so have fun looking for your "lost mothers" in an ever growing digital universe of sources.
P.S. There are also many state archives free on the internet for which you don't need any library access.
family history, genealogical websites, public library, digitized documents, U.S. census
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6 comments:
I'll have to check out some of that information. I haven't seriously tried to do anything with our family histroy but I would love to. I have a photocopy of my great grandfathers naturalization papers, and I tried to look him up, but have come up empty.
Thanks so much! I have been so frustrated thinking where I need to start first to track down my husband's side of the family. When we were in MI for Christmas, I came across boxes of old pictures and nothing was scrapbooked or preserved. So, I went through a bunch of them and Jeremy's grandma is really the only one that can give me some history of these people. I need more information but have been feeling a bit lost. Thank you again!
Very interesting post - thanks for sharing. I think it might be easier to find your relatives in a small country like mine (Norway) and I am tempted to dig into the history.
Btw: Thanks for your visit and compliments. I'm curious about your over 50 link:-)
We have friends who toured Norway this summer and were warmly welcomed by very distant cousins (like 4th) who knew all about their ancestors and were able to take them to the correct local and church sources personally, and had photos they'd never seen. With hundreds of nationalities, US genealogy is a huge challenge.
I'm with most of your relatives... I don't do much pokin' around into the past. What I WISH for, doesn't exist in my family -- and that would be some old journals! But alas, I do NOT come from a family or writers... instead I came from a family of "livers"! LOL! At least I guess they were busy living it -- because they sure weren't busy writing it! My father DID get into geneology -- and he even put together a book about his side of the family. I forget how far he traced it back -- but it was quite a good ways! He tried to share with me some dates and things -- but that just wasn't what held my interest. I just want "stories". Tell me a GOOD story! I guess this means that I really should write that family saga I keep SAYING I'm going to write - but never do, huh? Then my great great grandkids would at least have SOME stories!
I'd love to do some genealogy researching for my ancestors, but in my case it's a bit difficult since they are spread out in several countries. We should do it for Mr Lifecruiser though, since he has much more insteresting ancestors than mine :-)
It must be awesome to have it done. now THAT would really be to feel the winds of history!
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