Rainy Day Genealogy Readings: resources

Showing posts with label resources. Show all posts

01 July 2010

California Oral Histories

I recently set out to see what types of oral histories relevant to California research were online. I was stunned to see the breadth and depth of oral history information on the web, and the list below is just for California! I hope someone finds a gem in here, as there are countless hours of first-person history here to be perused.

* CSU Fullerton: Featured collections include town histories, various ethnic collections, WWII and labor issues. None online.

* The Bancroft Library (UCB) focii include: Italian-Americans, Portugese, and Jewish. Recordings and videos online.

* The Regional Oral History Office, in connection with the Bancroft Library, has a number of transcripts online at archive.org. Topics include regional history, the AIDS epidemic, Napa Valley history, agricultural history and more.

* The Holocaust Center of Northern California has oral histories available to researchers and the general public. None online.

* UC Santa Cruz has a program devoted to regional and institutional histories. Transcripts online.

* CSU Monterey Bay has an African American Legacy project centered on the central California coast. Video online.

* CSU Long Beach has various ethnic collections, as well as regional and labor histories. Recordings online.

* The Marin County Free Library has a host of interviews online regarding early Marin County (and Bay Area) history. Audio clips and full transcripts online.

* UCSB has various regional, ethnic and event histories. None online.

* The California State Archives has conducted individuals with notable governmental figures since 1986. None online.

* UCLA library has a huge collection of oral histories, on a large variety of subjects. Some transcripts online.

* USC maintains a collection of interviews concerning the history of social work in the State. None online.

* The California State Military Museum has histories of WWII submarine veterans online.

* Claremont College has a number of interviews on a large variety of subjects. None online.

* Caltech has oral histories involving various technical projects and professorial studies. Transcripts and audio online.

* Urban School of San Francisco has an oral history project covering Civil Rights, Japanese internment, the Holocaust, and issues surrounding the redevelopment of the Fillmore in SF.

09 June 2010

Home Movies [Resource Shelf]

I remember, from my earliest days, the shelf in the closet in our television room and the box of home movies that resided there. Along with the (even then) charmingly antiquated 8mm camera were reels and reels of movies that I had never seen. When my mom sold the house I grew up in, that box, along with all of its contents, was put into the trash, and those movies--documentaries of my family and probably a number of my relatives that passed away--are now gone forever. What I wouldn't give now to have copies of those films!

What have you done with your home movies?

If you're feeling particularly adventurous, you could upload them to the internet to let the masses appreciate Dad's handy filming technique and Mom's stylish hairdos. Archive.org's Home movie category includes some real gems for researchers, like a 10-minute movie of San Francisco after the 1906 earthquake, and a charming day-in-the-life movie of a Kentucky family.You can browse the whole Home Movie collection by keyword here.

Feeling a little less like Cannes-abilizing your films? Maybe just transfer reel formats to digital, for the sake of easier viewing.

13 May 2009

Confederate Veteran Magazine Online [Reference Shelf]

I was watching an episode of History Detectives on PBS the other night, and one of the episodes concerned some photographs taken during the Civil War. In the course of the investigation, the researcher consulted a volume of Confederate Veteran, which was a new resource for me.

Published 1893 to 1932, the magazine served as a roundup of news from Confederate Veterans organizations around the country. Sections of the magazine recounted stories from the war, and also offered information on the deaths of veterans as they occurred.

I decided to check online to see what was available, and found the following resources online. Here they are, as an addition to your online reference shelf!

* Confederate Veteran, full view, on Google Books. Only three years are available at this time, (1916, 1920, and 1922), although there is an 1895 edition under the full name of "The Confederate Veteran Magazine".

* Transcriptions of the 1909 editions of Confederate Veteran Magazine, hosted at GenNet. Each issue is presented in a separate PDF file.

* State and regiment index, presented by the St. Louis Public Library. Offers volume and issue references for articles re: different regiments.

* Library of Virginia Confederate Veteran index. Full names-index to all years of the publication.

17 April 2009

City Directories on Internet Archive [Reference Shelf]

Periodically, I like to compile lists of available online resources for this blog, mostly because the web is a mess, and I love to organize information. I also actually refer to lists I have compiled myself, so it makes my own research a little more handy.

Today I am presenting a list of digitized city directories as available on Internet Archive. I limited this list to directories that give general directory to citizens of the locales-I have not included directories that were limited to businesses or business men; nor have I included professional directories like medical directories, etc. I'll save those for another post. Note that some of these books were uploaded to Internet Archive from the Google Books scans.

Researchers in Indiana and North Carolina are particularly lucky here, as the ACPL and UNC contributed a vast number of directories. There are smatterings from other states, both rural and urban.

As always, you can check my Google Books Index for ongoing cataloging of genealogy-oriented books from Google Books.

Arizona
Tucson:
* 1881

California
Los Angeles:
* 1915

Richmond:
* 1914-1915

Sacramento:
* 1868
* 1921

San Francisco:
* 1908
* 1915
* 1920
* 1921

Colorado

Denver:
* 1871 (Includes regions of Idaho, Nevada, etc.)

Connecticut
Hartford:
* 1799
* 1896
* 1897
* 1898
* 1899

New Haven:
* 1840
* 1842
* 1899

Georgia
Atlanta:
* 1867-1868

Augusta:
* 1859-1860

Illinois
Chicago:
* 1844
* 1855
* 1856
* 1863-1864
* Blue Book, 1883-1884

Galena:
* 1854

Paris:
* 1908-1909

Shelbyville:
* 1909

Urbana-Champaign:
* 1878-1879
* 1883-1884
* 1890
* 1893
* 1895-1896
* 1898
* 1900
* 1902-1903
* 1904
* 1906
* 1908
* 1910
* 1912
* 1914
* <1916
* 1918
* 1919-1920
* 1921
* 1922
* 1925
* 1927
* 1935
* 1936
* 1937
* 1940

Wheaton:
* 1915-1916

Indiana
Allen County:
* 1906

Bartholomew County:
* 1903-1904

Fort Wayne:
* 1860
* 1864-1865
* 1867
* 1868-1869
* 1870-1871
* 1874-1875
* 1875-1876
* 1876-1877
* 1877
* 1878
* 1882-1883
* 1883-1884
* 1885-1886
* 1888
* 1898
* 1901
* 1902
* 1903
* 1906
* 1907
* 1910 Parts I and II
* 1911
* 1912
* 1915 parts I and II
* 1916
* 1917
* 1918
* 1919

Hartford:
* 1895

Indianapolis:
* 1855
* 1857
* 1858
* 1865-1866
* 1867
* 1870
* 1875
* 1877
* 1889
* 1890
* 1891
* 1894
* 1899
* 1901
* 1902
* 1904
* 1906
* 1911
* 1912
* 1916
* 1918
* 1919
* 1921
* 1922

Kokomo:
* 1910

Lafayette:
* 1909-1910
* 1920, Parts I and II

Michigan City:
* 1893-1894
* 1909-1910

Richmond:
* 1857

South Bend:
* 1921

Valparaiso:
* 1893

Whitley County:
* 1897

Kansas
* 1916

Maine
Portland:
* 1912

Maryland
* 1858

Michigan
Ann Arbor, Ypsilanti, Washtenaw County:
* 1916

Detroit:
* 1845
* 1846

Saginaw:
* 1915

Union City:
* 1909

Minnesota
Minneapolis/St. Paul:
* 1885

Stillwater:
* 1876-1877

Missouri
Jefferson City:
* 1900

Nevada
Carson City, Reno and Washoe County:
* 1921

Virginia City, Gold Hill, Silver City, American City:
* 1864

* See also: Colorado

New Jersey
Newark:
* 1838-1839
* 1851-1852

New Brunswick:
* 1909-1910

New York
Albany:
* 1869

Brooklyn:
* 1912

Buffalo:
* 1832

Manhattan:
* 1837, Volume I, Volume II
* 1839
* 1853
* 1907
* 1914

* Social Registers, 1887 Volume I, Volume III, Volume IV, Volume V, Volume VI, Volume VII, Volume VIII

Plattsburgh:
* 1913

Schnectady:
* 1862-1863
* 1864

Utica:
* 1883

North Carolina (Note that these city directories have been organized by category and keyword on Internet Archive, therefore I have linked to the aggregate pages for these cities, and listed below the years available as of this posting).

Asheville:
* 1887, 1890, 1896-97, 1899-00, 1900-01, 1909, 1910, 1912, 1913, 1914, 1916, 1917, 1918, 1922

Burlington:
* 1920-21

Charlotte:
* 1875-76, 1905-06, 1907, 1909, 1910, 1911, 1912, 1913, 1914, 1915, 1916, 1917, 1918, 1920

Concord:
* 1908, 1913-14, 1916-17, 1920-21, 1922-23

Durham:
* 1887, 1923

Elizabeth City:
* 1923-1924

Fayetteville:
* 1915-1916

Gastonia:
* 1910-11, 1913-14, 1918-19, 1921-22, 1923-24

Goldsboro:
* 1916-17

Greenville:
* 1916-17

Hendersonville:
* 1915, 1921-22

Hickory:
* 1920-21

High Point:
* 1908, 1910-11, 1913, 1919, 1921-22, 1923-24

Kinston:
* 1923-24

Lexington:
* 1916-17

Lumberton:
* 1916-17

Monroe:
* 1922

New Bern:
* 1916-17, 1920-21

Raleigh:
* 1883, 1886, 1887, 1888, 1896-97, 1899-00, 1901, 1921

Salisbury:
(See Spencer)

Spencer:
* 1907-08, 1913-14, 1915-16, 1917, 1919-20, 1922-23

Statesville:
* 1916-17, 1922-23

Washington:
* 1916

Wilmington:
* 1865-66, 1871, 1877-78,1889, 1922

Winston-Salem:
* 1908, 1912, 1913, 1915, 1916, 1918, 1921, 1922, 1926, 1927

Ohio
Cincinnati:
* 1861

Cleveland:
* 1859-1860

Mount Vernon:
* 1876-1877

Sandusky:
* 1867
* 1877

Wooster:
* 1900

Oregon
Portland:
* 1956
* 1957
* 1959
* 1962

Pennsylvania
Sharon:
* 1919

South Carolina
Charleston:
* 1851
* 1852

Tennessee
Nashville:
* 1865

Utah
Salt Lake City:
* 1879-1880
* 1883-1884
* 1892-1893
* 1909

West Virginia
Parkersburg:
* 1907

23 March 2009

Genealogy and History Channels on YouTube [Reference Shelf]

ResourceShelf pointed out the European Library YouTube channel in a recent post. I was reminded that YouTube is actually a very lush source of information for genealogists... something I forget when I'm turning to YouTube for quick Elmo videos and the latest music. I was amazed at how much there was of interest!

Here are some interesting channels I have found, all with appeal for genealogists:

* Roots Television- Of course!

* The European Library- Includes links to videos highlighting libraries of member countries.

* UK National Archives Channel

* Spelman College- Haven't uploaded a video in a while, but the videos on their Oral History project are great.

* New York Public Library

* History Channel

* Southern California Genealogical Society

* Reno County Genealogy Society

* Family Tree Magazine

* Teapot Genealogy

* Genealogy Guy

* Allen County Public Library

* Genealogy Gems

* Genealogy Scrounge

* Family History Expos

* Elyse's Genealogy Videos

* Travel Film Archive

25 February 2009

Primary Sources Again [Tidbit]

The LOC has a page up that allows you to view primary source materials by state. Very helpful for when you get lost in the matrix that is any government website!

[Via ResourceShelf]

24 February 2009

Primary Schooling [Tidbits]

If you're interested in what your ancestors were forced to study in school, you may be interested in the 19th Century Schoolbook Collection hosted by the University of Pittsburgh.

What child isn't immediately captivated by such works as "Analytical fourth reader : containing practical directions for reading, a thorough method of thought-analysis, a critical phonic analysis of English words, and a large number of new and valuable selections in reading"?

23 February 2009

Reading Women [Tidbit]

Middle Tennessee University hosts Discovering American Women's History, which contains links to digitized primary source and transcription collections around the web. You can browse by subject or time period, and all collections provide insight into various facets of women's lives throughout American history.

Cool random collections include:

* Fraktur Art

* Salem Witch Trial Documentary Archive

* The Historic American Cookbook Collection

20 February 2009

Best Map Resources [Roundup]

I've been map-centric in my research lately. Cartogeeking, really. Here are the sites that have really sucked me in of late:

* Panoramic Maps Collection from the LOC.

* Cultural Landscapes, also from the LOC. Waterway, resource and topographical maps, even some illustrated atlases!

* Rumsey Map Collection

* Perry Castaneda Map Collection

California:

* Historic California Topographical Maps

* Bay Area Historical Topo Maps

12 January 2009

Dream Research Resources [Random]

I've been engaged in smatterings of random research on relatives lately, as I attempt to organize and tame my research files. I realized that often we are blessed with a great resource in one research location--great newspaper coverage, fabulous online records, that sort of thing--that we wish we had for EVERY location we're researching.

I thought I would share with you some of my absolute FAVORITE online resources for research, whether because of their usability, potential, or content. Each resource is particular to a certain geographic area, but each gives us an idea of what is possible when it comes to the future of online research. Only in my dreams would a single place I am researching have all of these kinds of resources online!

Newspaper Resource:

Pennsylvania Civil War Newspapers. Impressively searchable (wildcard, phrase and exemption searching) as well as an easy interface. I wish Ancestry could get something this usable working on their newspaper collection.

Vital Records Indices:

Louisiana Secretary of State. All death records that can be ordered are found on this index. No more shots in the dark when ordering a record! As a runner up I would vote for the Illinois State Archives and their myriad databases, although I find their site a little more confusing to navigate; I suppose that could be because they are presenting so much more information on so many more people from so many more places!

Vital Records Online:

South Carolina Death Records, 1821-1955, from Ancestry. I may be biased in this, since my husband has roots in South Carolina on both his mother's and father's sides, therefore I do a lot of research there. I do find this database (along with the Delayed State Births and Charleston Births database) to be very very useful to me as they provide images of the original certificates! This saves me about $15 per record I would have had to order from the state (and their turn around time was in the MONTHS)! Well worth the cost of the Ancestry membership just right there. I imagine that as data storage costs continue to drop, and broadband access increases, we'll see more and more primary documents going up on the web, as opposed to the index focus of previous years.

Various online indexes and transcriptions:

sfgenealogy.com. Hands down one of the best. A mind-boggling assortment of information bound to help anyone researching in the Bay Area. I have found reference to many people that I've researched in the Bay Area. That's pretty impressive.

For this category, I also really like the Illinois Genealogy Trails sites. The Genealogy Trails sites started in Illinois in 2000, and they recently started expanding to cover the entire United States. They don't say it directly, but I get the feeling they're trying to take another crack at what GenWeb has tried to do, but has failed in some regards: provide updated, data-heavy sites that are user-friendly and contain pertinent information. I would imagine as Genealogy Trails expands it will have the same "hit or miss" character to the individual county sites (some better than others, as is the case with GenWeb), but for right now their emphasis on DATA DATA DATA seems to be working.

Religion-specific:

Cheers to the Milwaukee Archdiocese for their Catholic Cemeteries Burial Records database. While some other diocesan records are incongruously protected from the light of day (*COUGHCOUGH ORLEANS PARISH I'M TALKING ABOUT YOU COUGHCOUGH*), the Milwaukee Archdiocese seems to understand that genealogical research connects people to their Catholic heritage. Seems like a no-brainer, but, well. As a Catholic myself I can admit that the Catholic church can stymie all reason sometimes.

Overseas Research:

The Jewish Records Indexing-Poland project. Talk about a dream online resource for overseas research! Unfortunately, the project was axed by the Polish government a few years ago, which saddens me greatly.

These are just some of the resources that come to mind when I think of sites that I visit again and again. What are some of your favorites?

09 January 2009

Getting Into Google Books II [Lessons]

On Monday we covered how to set up a personalized Google Books library, done with the aim of getting us to take better advantage of this digitized resource.

Today, I want to cover using the iGoogle Google Books gadget as a portal to your personalized library. If you use iGoogle as your homepage (or even if you don't) the gadget provides a handy access point for your library that is never more than a few clicks away. Let's get started.

Getting the Gadget

To get the gadget, you should be logged into your Google Account and have an iGoogle page setup. (If you don't have an iGoogle page already, you can check out my post on how to get one. The look of iGoogle pages has changed since that post, but the basics are the same). You can get the Google Books gadget here.

Once installed the gadget will look something like this (assuming you have added enough books to your library to generate recommended reads):

The Bigger The Better

Clicking on the maximize button (the little window shade in the top right corner of the gadget) will expand your gadget to full-size, taking up the full real estate of your iGoogle page, like this:

A fine, expansive palette upon which your genealogy-research masterpiece can be wrought.

Benefits and Drawbacks

First, the benefits. With the increased real estate of the gadget, you can now access your personalized library (and other books within Google Books) from within the gadget.... meaning you don't have to go to the Google Books site in order to search or browse books (the embedded API of the book is cut off a little in the pic below, but you get the idea):

Note that you can search within any given book (using the search field noted by the arrow, above) within the context of the gadget. You're deep into Google Books functionality at this point, but still on your own iGoogle page:

You can also browse all books within your library from the gadget, and preview suggested titles that are generated by Google Books' algorithms.

Unfortunately, there are some aspects where the Google Books gadget falls a little short, at least for now. Remember all those neat tags we attributed to our books in our last lesson? Well, for now, those tags are non-existent within the world of the iGoogle gadget. Add that absence to the hopeless cover view of the gadget, and your personalized library can get VERY difficult to browse once you have hundreds of titles accumulated.

On top of that, you cannot (within the gadget) refine a search to range only within the contents of your library; this is an option that is available on the Google Books site. This means that any "Search Books" term search you run through the gadget will default to searching the entire Google Books library... useless if you are trying to find something you have already placed within your own library, or if you are fishing for a term within a specific set of books you have in your library.

Despite those two problems (which I imagine will be remedied in future gadget releases), the iGoogle Google Books gadget is a great way to incorporate the world of digitized books into your research rotation. This way you can stuff your bookshelves full and still have room for more!

31 October 2008

Money and Economics in Family History [Reference Shelf]

If you're anything like me, economics and finance have been center-stage in your brain of late. Of course, if I had a dollar for every ancestor of mine who worried, at some point, about their economic and financial future, I'd have a lot of dollars, and would probably still be concerned.

In honor of the money flux we all find ourselves in, here is a list of potentially useful links for researchers looking to round out the dollar-denominated side of their ancestors' lives:

Cost of Living and Purchase Power- from the LOC. Links and calculators that answer the question "what is that worth today?". Great for getting a better grasp of the economic identities of your ancestors. You might also try out The Inflation Calculator.
Cost of Living-from Harvard University. A 1936 publication covering the cost of living in the United States from 1914 to 1936. Again, cost of living puts the financial situation of your research subjects in perspective.
Economic Recessions Throughout History-from EOGN. A great article to bookmark and reference when researching families. Recessions precipitate job losses, movement of households, merging of households, etc... all things that we, as genealogists, are very interested in. You can also check out the Wikipedia list of previous United States recessions for more links and resources on historical economic downturns.
Business History Resources-from LOC. Resources, both online and off, related to researching "an old company or extinct firm". Always interesting to learn more about a company for which an ancestor worked. Or, a company for which an ancestor used to work, as the case may be.

27 October 2008

New Online Book Resource [Site Review]

Background
Recently launched, Hathi Trust bills itself as the "shared digital future", being a common digital repository that already has over 2 million volumes and 700+ million pages on its servers. According to their site, "HathiTrust was conceived as a collaboration of the thirteen universities of the Committee on Institutional Cooperation and the University of California system to establish a repository for these universities to archive and share their digitized collections."

Using Hathi Trust
This site is relatively new, and at the moment there is no single search-interface for works digitized under this cooperative, but their site mentions that this is an ultimate goal. For now, users have to use the search engines of various participating institutions (like the University of Michigan)to find some content, or can browse some of the collection through the Digital Library Interface, also particular to UMich.

Poking around, I found some interesting titles just by running a few easy subject word searches. A search on cemeteries yielded 164 results, including some monument transcriptions from Eastern Europe, and death records of European deaths in Southeast Asia. Numerous volumes record transcriptions from graveyards along the Eastern seaboard. Public domain volumes are full-text, those volumes not in the public domain are "search only", meaning they are not browsable:

Unfortunately, the results shown for intra-text searching on restricted, "search only" items, are uniquely unhelpful (note that you can't see the search results in situ at all):

The breadth of the collections seem to be interesting, and will be of use to most researchers. A quick search on Oakland, California yielded me (among other things) a 1910 report on the urban park system in Oakland California... this from the UMich library! Therefore, even if you don't see an institution from the exact areas of your geographic concerns, you should make an attempt to check out what you can of Hathi Trust to see what you can find. You may be pleasantly surprised.

In Conclusion

It's clear from Hathi Trust's site and the lack of a centralized searching function, that this project is in its early stages, and is first and foremost crafting shared digital depository practices for its central users, Universities and Archives. However, as the ultimate goal is to make the repository "available, to everyone, anywhere, any time", this is a site to watch, and one which, if successful, could give Google Books a serious run for its money.

10 October 2008

State Encyclopedias [Reference Shelf]

A short list of specifically termed state encyclopedias:

Alabama: Encyclopedia of Alabama

Arkansas: Encyclopedia of Arkansas History

Connecticut: Connecticut's Heritage Gateway

Delaware: Delaware History Online

Georgia: New Georgia Encyclopedia

Illinois: Encyclopedia of Chicago

Nevada: Online Nevada Encyclopedia

North Carolina: North Carolina Encyclopedia

Ohio: Encyclopedia of Cleveland History

Oregon: Oregon Encyclopedia Project

Tennessee: Tennessee Encyclopedia

Utah: Utah History Encyclopedia

Washington: HistoryLink.org

06 October 2008

Free Journal Access [Tidbits]

SAGE journals is offering free access to their journals through October 31st. If you've never given academic journals a look on some of your research interests (cultures, history, events, etc.) you may well be surprised.

Registration gives you access to over 500 journals. The following disciplines have the most potential interest to genealogists:

* Communication & Media Studies
* Cultural Studies
* Economics
* Ethnic Studies
* Gender Studies
* Geography
* Language & Linguistics
* Politics & International Relations
* Sociology
* Special Education
* Urban Studies, Urban Planning & Development

Get the free trial here.

[Via ResourceShelf]

24 September 2008

Wordless Wednesdays [Random]

[Warning: words! I always enjoy the Wordless Wednesday posts at a number of other blogs, so I have decided to take the plunge. To stay germane to the topic of this blog, I will post both snaps of great discoveries I have made online in the course of my own research, as well as logos for interesting new websites I have discovered. Enjoy!]

Ancestor patent, via Google Patent Search.

10 September 2008

Flickr Cemetery and Headstone Pools: International [Resource Shelf]

This is part two, a continuation from my United States listing of cemetery and headstone pools on flickr.

Canada:

08 September 2008

Flickr Cemetery and Headstone Pools: United States [Reference Shelf]

Next time you're lamenting the fact that Findagrave and Interment.net don't have photos of your ancestor's graves, cheer up and check the following flickr pools to see if someone else hasn't snapped a photo of the dear departed's final resting place. Photographers love the poetry of cemeteries, so we're blessed with a large chronicle of various tombstones and cemeteries across the world.

[Note: I have had to break this list into two parts, first being the United States and General pools. I will post part two, the international listings, another time.] In the meantime, enjoy these pools!

United States

Cemeteries of the United States
Ghost Town and Mining Camp Cemeteries
Southern Cemeteries
New England Cemeteries

Alabama
Birmingham, Alabama Cemeteries

Akansas
Arkansas Cemeteries

California
Hollywood Forever (Los Angeles)
Northern California Cemeteries
Southern California Cemeteries
Mountain View Cemetery (Oakland, California)

Connecticut
Connecticut Cemeteries

Florida
Florida Cemetery

Georgia
Coastal Empire Cemeteries (Savannah, GA etc.)
Georgia Cemeteries
Bonaventure Cemetery (Savannah, GA)
Cemeteries and Memorials of Augusta and the CSRA (Georgia/SC)
Westview Cemetery (Atlanta, GA)
Oakland Cemetery (Atlanta, GA)

Illinois
Chicago Cemeteries
Jefferson County, Illinois Tombstones

Indiana
Crown Hill Cemetery (Indianapolis, IN)
Indiana Cemeteries
Jefferson County, Indiana Tombstones

Kentucky
Cave Hill National Cemetery (Louisville, KY)

Louisiana
Louisiana Cemeteries
Slidell Cemeteries

Maine
Maine Cemeteries

Maryland
Maryland Area Cemeteries

Massachusetts
Boston Cemeteries and Burying Grounds
Mount Auburn (Cambridge, MA)
Oak Grove Cemetery (Fall River, MA)

Michigan
Detroit Area Cemeteries

Mississippi
Mississippi Cemeteries
Natchez City Cemetery

New Mexico
Cemeteries of Chaves County, New Mexico

New York
Cemeteries of Central New York
Cemeteries of the Capital Region, New York
New York State Cemeteries
Green-Wood Cemetery (Brooklyn, New York)
NYC Cemeteries
Cedar Street Cemetery (Cold Spring, New York)

North Carolina
Cedars Cemetery (Milton, North Carolina)

Ohio
Spring Grove Cemetery (Cincinnati, Ohio)
Harvard Grove (Cleveland, Ohio)
Ohio Cemeteries

Oregon
Oregon Historic Cemeteries

Pennsylvania
Philadelphia Cemeteries
Laurel Hill Cemetery (Philadelphia)
West Laurel Hill Cemetery (Pennsylvania)
Homewood Cemetery (Pittsburgh, PA)
Charles Evans Cemetery (Reading, PA)
North East Pennsylvania Cemeteries

Tennessee
Tennessee Cemeteries

Texas
Texas Cemeteries
Texas Cemeteries, Pre-1950
Brite Cemetery (Texas)
Houston Cemeteries
Glenwood Cemetery (Houston, Texas)

Virginia
Evergreen Cemetery (Richmond Virginia)
Hollywood Cemetery (Richmond, VA)
Arlington National Cemetery

West Virginia
West Virginia Cemeteries
Cemeteries of Wisconsin

General
CEMETERIES & GRAVEYARDS & TOMBS & HEADSTONES
Graves, Tombs and Cemeteries
Cemeteries
Forgotten Cemeteries and Graveyards
Cemetery Central (Geotagging)
Tales Tombstones Tell

By Surname
Matteson (and variants) Cemeteries and Headstones

05 September 2008

Flickr Civil War Pools [Tidbits]

For today's tidbit, I present some Flickr groups of interest to those with ancestors who fought in the Civil War. I covered how to subscribe to the RSS feeds for Flickr groups in a previous post. If you haven't yet given Flickr an eyeball with your ancestry in mind, give it a shot. Some groups serve as virtual visits to battlefields and towns. Some document cemeteries, headstones and monuments. Some include uploaded photographs of individuals. All are bound to interest the genealogist-turned-Civil War buff.

Veterans of the American Civil War: "This group is dedicated to photos and other images of authentic veterans of the American Civil War; 1861-1865. Photos may have been taken before, during, and after the Civil War, in or out of uniform."
Graves of Veterans of the American Civil War: "This group is dedicated to photos of the tombstones, headstones, and graves of authentic veterans of the American Civil War; 1861-1865."
American Civil War Battlefields: "We hope that this group will be a place where you can showcase your best photos of Civil War battlefields throughout the United States."
Photographs of the Civil War: "Many photos were taken and are now archived. Many are still in the pocession of family members and collectors. Please share your images with this group, be they yours or from other sources. Include those sources if possible. If you have any history of the photographs you post please include that as well."
War Between the States: "This group is dedicated to those who died or sacrificed in other ways for the cause they believed in regardless of the side they fought for. This group is for the memory of those souls."
Civil War Sites and Memorials: "pictures of the sites and memorials today"

Confederate Specific
Confederate History Sites: "Photos of sites, monuments, etc. connected to the history of the Confederate States of America."
Confederate Monuments: "Confederate monuments, like the type that are found on most courthouse squares across the South, are the focus of the group."

Union Specific
Southern Unionists: "Like their Confederate brethren, they fought to defend their homes, neighborhoods, and families, and stood up bravely for principles they held to be true and right. This group is to document the lives and careers of these Southern Unionists."

Site Specific
Gettysburg: "This group is for people who love the historic town that hosted one of the most famous battles of the U.S. Civil War. Battlefield, surrounding area and town photos welcome."
Journey Through Hallowed Ground: Gettysburg to Charlottesville: "This stretch of land, less than 200 miles long, has witnessed a disproportionate amount of US history: the greatest concentration of Civil War battlefields in the country, the homes of four US Presidents (Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Eisenhower), African American sites, scenic rivers and countryside, etc. Virtually the entire length of the corridor is threatened, by explosive growth in the towns at the two ends of the corridor, exurban sprawl from Washington, DC, etc."

03 September 2008

Newspaper Indexes-California [Reference Shelf]

I have compiled here a list of indices to California newspapers and obituaries, arranged by county. I have focused on indices of historic newspapers (1940 and earlier), to the exclusion of more modern indexing projects. I have included here obituary indices, which seem to fall under the auspices of this listing.

I hope to maintain and update this listing as new sources are discovered. If you know of any pre-1930, California county newspaper indexing projects that are not listed here, please let me know by leaving a comment below.

Alameda

Oakland Tribune Indices

Butte
Paradise Genealogical Society Butte County Obituary Index

Lassen
Lassen County Obituary Index
Lassen Advocate Index

Los Angeles
Pasadena News Index
San Fernando Valley Newspaper Index

Mendocino
Mendocino County Indexes

Placer
Indices to the Placer Herald

San Francisco
The San Francisco Call Database - Index

Santa Barbara
Santa Barbara California Newspapers

Santa Clara
Palo Alto News Indices

Santa Cruz
Mountain Echo Index

Siskiyou
Siskiyou County Newspaper Index

Tulare
Tulare Co. Obituary Index

Ventura
Ventura Obituaries index

Yolo
Woodland Daily Democrat Indices

Pages