When family historians go to irma and paul milstein’s division of united states history, local history, and genealogy, they want to immediately “type their name” into a database, not be referred to a book on how to trace your family tree.
It’s just human nature. just as travelers (especially men, according to a 2015 study) will wander for hours rather than ask for directions…just as DIYers would rather abort a project than consult an instruction manual…so Also, genealogists are willing to search through thousands of digitized records to (not) find their ancestors rather than consult a genealogy guide.
You are reading: Best genealogy books for beginners
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Try to beat this! your instincts may advise against it, but consulting a genealogy research guide can, and almost certainly will, save you time, effort, and frustration, and also lead you to information and sources you might never otherwise discover.
Do you still feel resistant? Consider some examples of how researchers can benefit from genealogy guides:
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A researcher had been searching unsuccessfully for a deed to her ancestor’s property in Colorado. She consulted the book Digging for the Ancestors: A Detailed Guide to Land Records (available on the shelves in room 121) and learned that the bureau of land management has digitized all land transfers made by the us. uu. government in public land states. Armed with more tips in the guide on how to navigate this database, she was able to find her ancestors’ land grant, pinpoint its exact location, and discover the names and lands of all her ancestors’ neighbors, all within about half -time.
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another researcher who believed his ukrainian ancestor had passed through ellis island spent hours trying to find her on the ellis island passenger lists, with no success. Finally, he consulted the book Ukrainian Genealogy: A Beginner’s Guide (also available on the shelves in room 121). From this book, he learned that “seventy percent of Ukrainians leaving for North America used the two German ports of Hamburg and Bremen” (p. 67), and that departure records from these ports were being digitized. (they are currently available in the ancestry library). edition and the staatsarchiv bremen). Using these online check-out records, the delighted researcher tracked down his ancestor who had departed on the ship Seydlitz from Bremen to New York on July 7, 1923.
A third researcher had been unable to find a death record for her ancestor, who she believed had died in Arkansas in the 1850s. After consulting the Red Book: American State, County, and City Sources (available at Reference Desk in Room 121), he learned that Arkansas did not begin keeping death records until 1914. Forgoing a death record, he decided to concentrate on census research, consulting The Census Book: A Genealogist’s Guide to Federal Census Facts, Calendars, and Indexes: With Master Pull Forms for the Federal Census Calendars, 1790-1930 (available on the shelves in Room 121), in which you learned that, from 1850 to 1880, the census included ” mortality programs” that recorded the deaths of all household members who had died in the year prior to the census. She checked the 1860 census mortality schedule and sure enough found an entry for her ancestor who had died on November 3, 1859.
These examples are just the tip of the iceberg: No matter what genealogy questions you have or where you are in your family research, there is a genealogy guide that will probably help (really help) you find who are you. searching. Its content ranges from very general introductory books, such as Genealogy Online for Beginners, to very specific topics, such as Florida Non-Federal Censuses, 1784-1945, and covers virtually every other genealogical topic in between. And unlike War and Peace, Middlemarch, Huckleberry Finn, or any other classic you may not have read yet, most genealogy guides are a quick, easy read to digest.
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