HeritageQuest Online Gets Better With Ancestry’s Support
HeritageQuest Online is now even more worth the trip to your local library to access for free, now that its new interface is powered by Ancestry. For the past few months, library patrons have been getting used to a new version of HeritageQuest Online. This online...
How 75-Year Old WPA Records May Help You Find an Ancestor
Got a research brick wall? A "national temp agency" created resources that may help you find your family history in obscure historical records. During the Great Depression, so many Americans were out of work that the federal government launched the Works Progress...
Evernote for Genealogy: Should Evernote Be My Digital Archive?
"If I put a PDF copy of a newspaper article or a jpeg photo into Evernote, can I get a copy back? I am putting them there for safe keeping and an easy way to archive them but I want to be able to use them in other places in the future." Recently Pam sent me the...
Join the Family History Relay Race: FamilySearch Worldwide Indexing Event
The FamilySearch Worldwide Indexing Event: It's like a big, happy relay race for family historians: a display of skill with record-setting accomplishments and the coming together of a community for a cause. Last year, 66,511 FamilySearch indexers helped set a new...
Use Forensic Genealogy Tools: Technology Sheds New Light On History
The forensic investigator pulls up to the crime scene and snaps a fresh set of rubber gloves. She props open the trunk of the car and carefully, slowly, sweeps a tube of florescent light back and forth inside the trunk, watching with an eagle eye for the glimmer of...
She was a “Rounder?” Use Google Search Operators to Define Old or Unfamiliar Words
Get quick definitions of old and unfamiliar words with the Google "define" search operator. Recently, Shelly wrote to us about some correspondence she didn't understand from an older relative. One mysterious phrase particularly stuck out: "She has mentioned several...
We Dig These Gems! New Genealogy Records Online
Every Friday, we blog about new genealogy records online. Do any collections below relate to your family history? Please share with genealogy buddies or societies that might be interested! This week: Midwestern U.S. newspapers (Cleveland, OH and Chicago, IL) and...
Want to Help Index De-Classified CIA Records?
By now, many of us have tried our hand at volunteer indexing and transcribing projects. We can index censuses, civil and church vital records, gravestone images, and more with FamilySearch, BillionGraves, Ancestry's World Archives Project and even with individual...
Was This My Ancestor’s Neighborhood? Using Google Earth for Genealogy
by Sunny Jane Morton When Lisa blogged recently about Google Earth's 10th birthday, it reminded me of something on my family history "to do" list. A few years ago I found a postcard of what I thought was an ancestor's neighborhood. Could Google Earth confirm it?...
Genealogy Gems Podcast Nominated! Academy of Podcasters Award
We're so pleased we just had to tell you our great news....The Genealogy Gems Podcast has been nominated for the first-ever Academy of Podcasters Awards! Ten nominees were named in each category by The Academy of Podcasters in an event expected to become annual,...
Genealogy Gems Podcast Episode 181
Sock hops. Drive-ins. Juke boxes. Fuzzy dice. Letterman jackets. Poodle skirts, bobby socks and saddle shoes. Do the 1950s come to mind? They will when you listen to the newly-published Genealogy Gems podcast, episode 181! The 1950s are a great era to research your...
NEW Genealogy Gems Book Club Title: Pioneer Girl (Laura Ingalls Wilder)
When Lisa and I were young we read the "Little House" series of children's books about growing up on the western U.S. frontier. These books continue to shape the way Lisa and I imagine our ancestors' lives during that era. Well, the "grown-up" version of the Little...
Here’s What Evernote Can and Can’t Do for Family History
Recently Genealogy Gems Podcast listener Rosie wrote in with an Evernote question: "I really enjoy listening to your podcasts. Thanks so much for all your efforts. As a long time researcher I always wondered how the Hunt family got from New England to Ohio around...
What To Do If a Scrapbook Gets Wet (or Photo Album or Pictures)
When family scrapbooks get wet, the result is not pretty. In fact, it can be quite dire for the scrapbook and its precious contents. "Water can cause the bleeding of inks and dyes in journal entries, digital photographs, and decorative papers, causing them to appear...
Can You Believe Google Earth is 10 Years Old?? Are You Using Google Earth for Genealogy Yet?
Ten years ago in June, Google Earth was born. The world put it right to work. Within months, recalls a Google Earth employee, "Hurricane Katrina showed us how useful mapping tools like Earth could be for crisis response efforts. Rescue workers compared before and...
We Dig These Gems! New Genealogy Records Online
Every Friday, we blog about new genealogy records online. Do any of the collections below relate to your family history? Please share this post with any genealogy buddies or societies that might be interested. At the end of this post is a search tip for researching...
Language Translation Tool for Genealogy: MyHeritage’s New Global Name Translation
At some point in the past, many of our relatives--overseas or in the same land--spoke a different language. They used different versions of names we know. Records about their lives were created in a language we don't know, whether their home tongue or the language of...
Irish Catholic Parish Registers from National Library of Ireland
As of today, the National Library of Ireland expects to launch a free, digitized collection of ALL its Catholic parish registers on its website (this link takes you to the English version; it's also available in Irish). Nearly 400,000 digital images of microfilmed...