Use the Internet for genealogy research!
GEN929.10285 DOLL
Getting Started in Genealogy Online
by William Dollarhide
- Start a notebook and filing system to organize all the information you are about to find. You can obtain several helpful pedigree charts at http://misbach.org/pdfcharts/pedigree_chart.pdf.
- Locate living relatives. Conduct a genealogy interview. Obtain names, dates, and places. Use a phone directory such as Reference USA located on the library's home page http://www.lakeco.lib.in.us/ to find the phone numbers and addresses of living relatives.
- Use Google http://www.google.com/. Enter your surname and your mother's maiden name. Has anyone already done research on your family tree?
- Check http://www.familysearch.org/ the Family History Library's website. You may find some branches of your family tree here.
- Search the Library of Congress website for published family histories. http://catalog.loc.gov/
- Check the World Tree on Ancestry's free website at www.ancestory.com (The library has a subscription to Ancestry Library Edition. It is available only in the library. Our subscription allows you to obtain information from Ancestry without paying a fee.) Your pedigree chart will fill up fast with this wonderful database full of genealogy information. This database has all the available U.S. census records for finding your ancestors with their families.
- Send for vital records http://www.vitalrec.com/. Death certificates for example, give the name of the person's father and maiden name of their mother.
- Send for an obituary. Many libraries have an email service call Ask a Librarian. Search Google or http://lists.webjunction.org/libweb to find a library near the place where your relatives lived or died. Include the person's full name and date of death in your email request. If you do not know the death date or place of death --try using The Social Security Administration's Death Index (SSDI) http://ssdi.genealogy.rootsweb.com/.
- Once you have several names, dates, and places you can search for more information using the Family History Library's catalog http://www.familysearch.org/.
