GENEALOGY & THE INTERNET

Important General Sites

FamilySearch Internet Genealogy Service

In 1988, the Family History Department of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints released a set of genealogy databases known as FamilySearch. The databases included Ancestral File, genealogies submitted to the Family History Department; the International Genealogy Index, information either extracted from original records or submitted by members of the LDS Church; and the Family History Library Catalog, the catalog of the largest genealogy library -- searchable by locality and surname. These databases were available only at the Family History Library and the Family History Centers. In 1999, access to FamilySearch was expanded beyond the Family History Centers.

Cyndi's List

Cyndi's List is the premier finding aid for genealogy on the Internet. Cyndi Howell has created a masterpiece, by organizing over 40,000 genealogy links in over 100 categories. About 2,000 links are added each month.

Family Tree Searcher

Enter your ancestor data just once to search for family trees at multiple web sites.

RootsWeb

RootsWeb is the oldest genealogy site on the Internet. The site contains several search engines for genealogy including the RootsWeb Surname List, the archives for Roots-L -- the original mailing list for genealogy, and the archives of over 16,400 other genealogy related mailing lists hosted by RootsWeb. The site also contain the Roots-L Library, hundreds of text files covering topics as obtaining vital records, tips for beginners, book lists from the Library of Congress, etc.

USGenWeb

The USGenWeb Project is a great locality resource. Volunteers create and maintain the information located on USGenWeb, including information by county, census transcriptions, and tombstone transcriptions.

WorldGenWeb

The WorldGenWeb Project was created in 1996 in an effort to answer the ever growing needs of genealogists world-wide who were trying to research their ancestors. The goal of the WorldGenWeb Project is to have every country in the world represented by an online website and hosted by researchers who either live in their own country or who are familiar with their country's resources. Currently half of the countries of the world are represented on WorldGebWeb. WorldGenWeb works much like USGenWeb and can vary in the same manner in information that is available.

Search Systems

Largest Free Public Records Database Collection.

Online Genealogy Publications and Columns

Weekly column on genealogy by Myra Vanderpool Gormley, well known columnist that originated on Prodigy. Back to Table of Contents