Church records may be able to fill in our
research blanks, especially since governments did not always require recordings
of births, marriages, and deaths. Richard Kyle, Librarian and Resource Specialist for the Yakima Valley Genealogical Library, discussed on-line access
to church records.
Church records vary by denomination and may
include births, marriages, deaths, christenings, baptisms, and
confirmations. Sometimes they will have
newsletters that could provide a more personal glimpse. Kyle recommended
FamilySearch Wiki as a starting place. For U.S. church records go to familysearch.org/wiki/en/United_States_Church_Records.
The Wiki is searchable by country and denominations. (In case you haven’t used
it much, the Wiki has a treasure trove of genealogy help, from basic concepts
to very specific details. It is well worth the time to get to know this site.)
For many years the Catholic Church allowed the LDS Church access for copying
records. They no longer allow this. Google is also a good place to search for
church records.
Kyle also recommended cyndislist.com that many of us
are familiar with, plus two I never heard. Gengophers.com he said has a faster
interface than FamilySearch. The other one, MooseRoots.com, he also said was very
fast. These are both free sites; MooseRoots requires registration and log-in.
Both sites offer a paid subscription to avoid pop-up surveys.
Kyle also discussed searching U.S. Census
records not yet indexed or for family members not showing up in indexes. Since
the censuses are handwritten lists they can be hard to decipher. These lists
were made by the census takers (enumerators); each enumerator had a district.
To search the handwritten lists you need to know not only the city the person
lived in but also the address or the general neighborhood to find the right
enumeration district.
Both the National Archives federal census
website (archives.gov/research/census)
and the FamilySearch Wiki provide specific information (finding aids) to
help your census research. I played around a bit with both archives.gov and the
FS Wiki and found the Wiki was recently upgraded. If you have problems with the
Wiki, try the federal site.
To record information from the hand written
lists, Kyle recommended downloading census research forms and hand writing the
information to make it easier to refer to. With each census the list of
questions was usually changed somewhat.
Kyle also discussed
resources of the Yakima Valley Genealogical Library (available for our free
use). Go to yvgs.net for more details. Fifty-one people
attended this meeting.
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