Again, I am repeating this for those, like me who lost their bookmarks
and for new subbers. The rest can just delete.
I sent this out right after New Year's so if you already have it,
nothing is changed or added. This is for our new listers.
The Top Ten Genealogical Web Sites
(c) 1999 by R. Cole Goodwin
If you were looking for an ancestor, on which ten Internet
sites would you most likely find him or her? Which sites can
help an individual, a family, or a group research family
history?
With over 1,500,000,000 names on over 60,000 genealogical web
sites on the Internet, finding the best sites is no easy task.
Eighteen months ago, I started evaluating over 60,000 web
sites which provide information of genealogical interest in
order to determine the Top Ten. Using Encyclopedia
Britannia's Alexa service, independent reviews, and personal
[observations], I evaluated each site's freshness, speed,
links in, links out, subjective ratings by reviewers, site
size, and other criteria. I have tested my findings along the
way, having found over 16,000 ancestors during the past
twenty-two months, mostly with the help of the computer. Below
are my top ten sites:
FamilySearch (
http://www.familysearch.org )
Owned and operated by The Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-day Saints in Salt Lake City, Utah,
FamilySearch.org has a little (or more) of genealogical
interest for everyone and it is growing quickly. In its
third full month, it has become one of the most popular
sites on the Internet. Using FamilySearch, you can do the
following:
* Search for your ancestors using the International
Genealogical Index (I.G.I.) with over 360,000,000
names, at present, online; Ancestral File (A.F.) with
about 36 million names in linked pedigree charts; and
with hyperlinks to other genealogical web sites. Over
the next month, the site will grow to 600 million
online names, then to 1,000,000 by next spring;
* Collaborate with others who are searching for the same
ancestor, surname, or place as you. At present, there
are over 60,000 collaboration lists and the number is
growing by over 1000 per day;
* Access the Family History Library of The Church of
Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which has over two
million rolls of microfilm with the names of over two
billion people. Once you have identified a microfilm
which interests you, you can order it online and it
will be delivered to an Latter-day Saint Family History
Center of your choosing near you;
* Learn from online Research Guides. For almost any place
or ethnic group for which you wish to do genealogical
investigation, there are online guides that will allow
you to learn how to do the research you seek;
* Access over 60,000 genealogical web sites by
categories, such as those which specialize in census,
land, migration, military, royalty, surnames, and more;
* Preserve your family history by downloading one of the
most popular genealogical software programs in the
world today, Personal Ancestral File (P.A.F.) 4.0 for
Windows, as well as upload your own genealogical
information to FamilySearch to be preserved and to be
shared with others in Pedigree Resource files.
* Coming Up: Australian, British and North American Vital
Records Indexes will be incorporated into FamilySearch
as will the complete 1851 and 1881 British Censuses,
the complete 1880 U.S. Census, the Ellis Island Index
of 17,000,000 immigrants, and more source guides. Also
coming up: Pedigree Resource Files, containing the
online submissions of FamilySearch users (12,000,000
names already received);
Ancestry.com (
http://www.ancestry.com )
With over 274,000,000 U.S. names in over 1700 databases,
Ancestry.com can help you find and put flesh onto the
bones of your ancestors. It offers the following
features:
* Census Indexes, 1790-1870, for the entire U.S., as well
as the complete 1790 U.S. Census and assorted later
censuses for sundry states and counties;
* Social Security Death Index (S.S.D.I.): updated through
June 1999, it is the most current index on the Internet
and can help you locate the disposition of a relative
or friend as well as their parentage;
* World Family Tree: like FamilySearch's Ancestral File,
this contains millions of names linked in pedigrees;
* Periodical Source Index, which references over 5,000
genealogical periodicals for the past 200 years. For
the most part, once you have the index entry, you can
view the articles at the Library of Congress;
* American Genealogical and Biographical Index (Ryder's
Index): the contents of 200 volumes of genealogical
references to individuals in the U.S. throughout the
seventeenth through nineteenth centuries;
* The Daughters of the American Revolution Lineage Books
(125 Volumes)
* Ancestry News-Daily and weekly newsletter providing
news and features of genealogical interest.
Although
Ancestry.com is a paid, subscription service,
major portions of its holdings are made available freely
to the general public. In addition, right now they are
offering a free, 14-day subscription to those who sign-up
through the following link (sponsored by ThirdAge):
https://www.ancestry.com/ancestry/signup/SignupUser.asp?SignupType=TRIALFR
EE&SignupCode=g99af
Cyndislist (
http://www.cyndislist.com )
Cyndislist catalogues and indexes over 43,000 genealogy
web sites and is in the process of adding 10,000 more. If
you are looking for genealogical web sites from different
countries to different surnames, you will find them
listed and indexed here. Online since 1996, it is
operated by Cyndi Howells of Puyallup, Washington.
RootsWeb (
http://www.rootsweb.com )
RootsWeb has over 150,000,000 million U.S. names online
and is operated by the non-profit RootsWeb Data
Cooperative of Pine Mountain Club, California and is a
project of the Rand Corporation. RootsWeb has the
following helpful features:
* Surname Resources on RootsWeb allow you to search
submissions on surnames by other researchers;
* County Resource tie you into genealogical discussion
forums organized by state and by county.
* USGENWEB (
http://www.usgenweb.com ) covers the United
States by state and by county, organizing cemetery,
census, obituary, historical, and biographical
resources by locality. Can be very helpful; for an
excellent example of USGENWEB, go to the Bradford
County, Pennsylvania web site
(
http://www.rootsweb.com/~pabradfo/bradweb.htm );
* Mailing Lists for over 16,000 genealogical areas are
sponsored by
RootsWeb.com
* The Immigrant Ships Transcribers Guild, an online
project to transcribe the passenger lists of all
passenger ships which have entered America. Currently,
400 ships are online;
* Social Security Death Index (SSDI), similar to
Ancestry.com's database;
The Library of Congress (
http://lcweb.loc.gov/rr/genealogy/ )
Through The Library of Congress' Local History and
Genealogy Reading Room, you can access the holdings of
the largest library in the world, which has a collection
of over 250,000 local history and genealogy books
available for researchers, as well as a large repository
of microfilm holdings from The Family History Library of
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Salt
Lake City. Through the site, you can search or browse the
catalogs, access special holdings of various ethnic and
historic reading rooms, and enjoy the American Memories
Collection, an extensive, visual database of American
History. Also available through the Library of Congress
is the National Union Catalog of Manuscript Collection
(N.U.C.M.C.) (
http://lcweb.loc.gov/coll/nucmc/nucmc.html )
which indexes millions of unpublished documents and
contains valuable genealogical information.
GenForum (
http://genforum.genealogy.com/ )
The largest online area for people to share surname and
local history information, with over three million
messages posted. It allows researchers to collaborate one
with another in researching family and local history.
ProFusion (
http://www.profusion.com/ )
Rather than a site for genealogical research, ProFusion
is a Microsoft-sponsored meta-search engine, which can
use up to nine Internet search engines (such as
AltaVista, Google, InfoSeek, etc.) simultaneously to find
that ancestor, or relative of yours on that obscure web
page. Unlike typical search engines which, at most, index
only 16% of the web pages on the Internet, meta-search
engines such as ProFusion, Dogpile
(
http://www.dogpile.com/ ), Fast Corporation's AllTheWeb
(
http://www.alltheweb.com ) and MAMMA, The Mother of All
Web Sites (
http://www.mamma.com/ ) use individual search
engines to collectively scale the web.
The Ultimates (
http://www.theultimates.com/ )
Like ProFusion (above) rather than a single web site with
genealogical information, The Ultimates is a search
engine for multiple online telephone white pages and e-
mail directories. It can help you find people with the
same surname you are seeking. This is especially useful
when you are seeking an unusual surname.
MyFamily.com (
http://www.MyFamily.com )
MyFamily.com is a place where you can post your family
tree, family news, family photos, recipes, and chapter-
by-chapter history for your family to show and to share
with others. It can help a geographically dispersed
family collaborate on its history.
The U.S. National Archives
(
http://www.nara.gov/nara/nail.html ) Using the new U.S.
National Archives and Records Administration's Archival
Information Locator, you can locate information about the
microfilm, archival holdings, and digital copies
available. Also useful is The National Archives Research
Room (
http://www.nara.gov/genealogy/ )
Bonus Web Sites
In addition to the Top Ten, above, following are some
excellent, specialized genealogical web sites. Please
bear in mind that much of this specialized information is
available through the using the Top Ten genealogical web
sites above; indeed, some Top Ten sites have more
specialized data than their more limited counterparts,
below, but the following are always worth checking:
Biographies
From the Arts & Entertainment Network's "Biography"
series, you can search 22,000 online biographies at the
following link: (
http://www.biography.com/ )
Cemeteries and Graveyards
Find A Grave (
http://www.findagrave.com/ )
Censuses on the Internet
Censuslinks (
http://www.censuslinks.com/directory/ )
Educational Resources for Online Genealogy
PBS' Ancestors Series
(
http://www.pbs.org/kbyu/ancestors/ )
Ethnic Genealogy Resources
The Balch Institute for Ethnic Studies Online
(
http://www.libertynet.org/balch/body_index.html )
Family History for Kids
Disney's Family Tree
(
http://disney.go.com/ads/sponsors/ancestry/index.html )
Family Reunions
Family-Reunion.com (
http://www.family-reunion.com )
Geography
The U.S. Geological Service's Geographic Names
Information Service (GNIS)
(
http://mapping.usgs.gov/www/gnis/ )
Heraldry
Heraldry on the Internet
(
http://www.digiserve.com/heraldry/index.htm )
Land Records
The Bureau of Land Management has placed all federal
land patent records online, including millions of 19th
Century Homestead Act records.
(
http://www.glorecords.blm.gov/ )
Medical Genealogy
The Disease Chart (19th century medical terminology)
(
http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Valley/1030/diseasecharttable.htm )
Military Records
Military records databases at
Ancestry.com
(
http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Valley/1030/diseasecharttable.htm )
Newsletters-Online Genealogy
Ancestry.com's Daily News (free sign-up from home page,
with alerts to new, limited-time access to databases,
tips of the day, features, and specials)
(
http://www.ancestry.com/ )
Newspapers
The United States Newspaper Program links you to
hundreds of online newspapers, some of which have put
back issues up to 200 years old online; excellent for
births, marriages and deaths.
(
http://www.neh.gov/html/usnp.html#NEW%20YORK )
Photographs
With over 250,000,000 prints, Corbis Corporation has
the largest inventory of historic and newsworthy
photographs in the world, and has put many online-for
free. (
http://www.corbis.com )
Vital Records
Vital Records Information for the United States
(
http://vitalrec.com/index.html )
WebCasts on Genealogy
Generations is a live, interactive television show
focusing on family history research and is broadcast
over the Internet. It is sponsored by Sierra Software
and carried by TalkSpot, an Internet broadcasting
company.
(
http://www.sierra.com/sierrahome/familytree/community/webcast/ )
World and International Genealogy Resources
WorldGenWeb (
http://www.worldgenweb.com ) will take you
to resources for almost any country in the world.
Pat Connors, listowner