Genealogy 101 - Lecture I
Presented by David Norris
Sponsored by the New Hanover County Public Library
February 2008
Getting Started, Web Resources, Census Reecords, Cemeteries
Tips for Getting Started in Genealogy
Interview your family! Get their first-hand memories; amusing stories; family legends and lore. Share copies of your family photos, documents, letters, and other interesting papers with your relatives. They’ll enjoy this, and it insures precious family records against loss.
Some Great Genealogy Websites
Available through the internet computers at all branches of the New Hanover County Public Library. Also available using your Library card from your home - see instructions below.
NC Live -has many resources including the Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps for North Carolina; great detailed city and town maps dating back to 1884; and an archive of the WilmingtonStar-News and other NC newspapers available through Newsbank.
HeritageQuest Online - Lots of sources -includeswhich notably offers the US Census 1790-1930 online, most years indexed for heads of households; Revolutionary War pensions; the Freedman’s Bank (great African-American genealogy source); local history books; the PERSI index (indexes 2 million genealogy and local history articles from hard-to-find journals, with instructions for ordering copies).
Accesss to NC Live and Heritage Quest from home: (1) Click here to access the NH County Public Library "eresources" page. No charge access for New Hanover County residents to these for-fee sites is courtesy of the NHCPL |
Available in NHCPL, Main branch, North Carolina Room, only:
Ancestry Library Edition -- Millions of US, UK, and foreign records. Or you can subscribe yourself. Visit http://www.ancestry.com to see what they have.
Available from any internet connected computer:
Family Search -- Free!
http://www.familysearch.org/Eng/Search/frameset_search.asp?PAGE=census/search_census.aspwww.familysearch.org offers the 1880 US Census online – free! Plus, the 1881 censuses for the British Isles and Canada. Look around on their site for more advice, lots of family trees (with millions of names!) and their library catalog.
Godfrey Library www.godfrey.org - Fee-based
One of the Web’s great bargains! A small annual fee gets you access to several paid subscription sites, including US newspapers from 1690-1899, and the London Times. Even without paying you can visit and get lots of free links to great sites and online databases.
Genealogy Bank www.genealogybank.com - Fee-based
Historic newspapers, books, congressional documents, Social Security Death Index, and US obituaries from 1977 on.
Newspaper Archive www.newspaperarchive.com - Fee-based.
Over 75 million US and foreign newspaper pages from the 1700s to now. Coverage of the Northeast and Midwest is better than of the South.
Footnote.com www.footnote.com - Free!
Lots of military and government records, from the National Archives. A must for Revolutionary and Civil War research!
Genforum http://genforum.genealogy.com - Free!
Offers thousands of online genealogical forums for surnames, counties, states, countries, and periods of history.
Genweb http://www.usgenweb.com - Free!
Maintained by volunteer genealogists and local historians, it offers pages for US states and counties. You may find transcribed birth, marriage, cemetery, land, military, court, and other records, along with local history information and useful web links. Some counties have vast amounts of material; some don’t.
Rootsweb: http://www.rootsweb.com - Free!
Social Security Death Index (SSDI) - useful for individuals in the Social Secirity system who died about 1960 and later.
Forums for queries and responses arranged by surname and subject. Uploaded family trees- 480 million names. Data is supplied by individual researchers - use to get starting info for your research, then verify with an original source.
Cyndi’s List http://www.cyndislist.com - Free!
Cyndi’s List offers thousands of links to many categories of genealogical records, and plenty of useful tips on enriching your own family history.
Online Census Records
Ancestry.com - Fee-based (see above) - Every name indexes for all US census records.
Heritage Quest - Fee-based (see above) - Head of household indexes for most US Census records.
Census On Line: www.census-online.com
------ http://www.census-online.com/links - Varies from county to county, but they have some great free census lists.
------ http://www.census-online.com/tools/birthyear - Type in the Census year and a persons age and it does the math to get the approximate birth year!
Census Finder: http://www.censusfinder.com/You can find a lot of online censuses and indexes; includes fee-based and free sites. There are some unusual ones, such as Indian tribal censuses, 18th century tax rolls, etc.
The Domesday Book - http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/domesday English tax roll of William the Conqueror’s reign, begun in 1085.
British Census Online http://www.british-genealogy.com/resources/census/index.htm
Cemetery Records
Interment.net http://www.interment.net Free! Lists thousands of cemeteries.
Findagrave http://www.findagrave.com Free! Another good source of cemetery listings.
Oakdale Cemetery, Wilmington, NC-- http://www.oakdalecemetery.org
Nationwide Gravesite Locator (Dept. of US Veterans Affairs; lists burials in US military cemeteries from the Revolution to the present). http://gravelocator.cem.va.gov/j2ee/servlet/NGL_v
American Battle Monuments Commission - http://www.abmc.gov/search/index.php lists overseas burials in US military cemeteries.
Local history sites, such as those connected to Genweb, list many small church and rural family cemetery records. Many are written down in books, available in the North Carolina Room (798-6305).
Prepared by David Norris for Genealogy 101 sponsored by the New Hanover Public Library, February 2008
Copyright David Norris 2008