From tracing ancestors on the move to understanding boundary changes to just becoming acquainted with the landscape of your ancestors' lives, maps are an incredibly important resource in your family history research. In this lecture, we will explore various ways in which maps can help broaden your genealogical horizons.
New York has been called “the first West for New England” because so many New Englanders settled there before continuing westward. Understanding patterns of settlement, expansion, and migration can help identify your ancestor’s deep New England roots. In this online lecture, we will discuss the historical context, records, and research strategies for tracing ancestors on the move in the Northeast.
When most family historians think about the census, we think of the population schedule—the enumeration of individuals living within a household. But there is so much more to the Federal Census that many researchers overlook! We will discuss how mortality, agriculture, manufacturing, business, and other social statistics schedules can be used in your genealogical research. We’ll review what data was collected for what years, how to access these non-population schedules, and how to leverage this information in your own family history.
Financial records can help fill in the timeline of your ancestor’s movements and explain motivations behind migrations. Deeds, pension, town, probate, tax, and employment records may exist when vital records do not. This class will demonstrate why financial records should be your go-to for tracing ancestors on the move, discuss what information is included in each, and where to find them.
Today there are an estimated 7.6 million Jewish Americans living in the country, the majority of whom descend from diaspora Jewish populations from Central and Eastern Europe. Learning how to trace your Jewish ancestry is not without its challenges: changing surnames, locating your ancestor's home village or shtetl, and access to overseas records are just the tip of the iceberg. This webinar will discuss the historical context of your ancestor's arrival in the United States, review American records that can be helpful in your research, and provide basic strategies for uncovering your ancestor's exact origins in the old country.
German immigrants first arrived to American shores in large numbers in the late 17th century, and today nearly 45 million Americans have German heritage. Published resources are an essential tool for researching your German-American ancestors. There are treasure troves of published resources including general guides, dictionaries (both for words and surnames), books on paleography, and published records including immigration, census, and military records. Join our expert as they share go-to published resources for German family history research in America.
More than 400 years ago, the Mayflower landed on the shores of Massachusetts with 102 passengers aboard. Today, there are an estimated 35 million Mayflower descendants worldwide. In this lecture, our expert will discuss the foundations of researching your Mayflower ancestors, including key resources, verifying and documenting your line, applying to the General Society of Mayflower Descendants, and more.
If your ancestor had the right to vote, you can find a wealth of information in their voting records. These records can help you to verify the exact years your ancestor lived in a certain location, locate your ancestor on a state census, identify when your ancestor was naturalized, and more. Join our expert as they discuss where to find voting records, the information they contain, and how to use them to advance your family history research.
As genealogists, we may be the only people around who can find an upside to the old adage, “in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” Afterall, if no one can escape taxes, then that makes tax records an ideal record set for family history research! In this lecture, our expert will provide an overview U.S. tax records—including the types of tax records available, where to locate records, and how the information in these records can advance your research.
