Genealogy and Local History Blog

Category: Genealogy

Genealogy

Genealogy: Public Land Records

At the close of the American Revolution in 1783, the new United States was cash-poor and land-rich. To help fill the federal treasury and ensure an orderly settlement of lands west of the original 13 colonies, Congress devised a system of settlement to encourage westward movement. The result was the Rectangular Survey System (RSS) or Public Land Survey System (PLSS). This post is meant to give you an idea of how western lands in the U. S. were laid out for settlement and how you can find out if your ancestor bought some of this land from the federal government. The Land Ordinance of 1785 and Northwest Ordinance of 1787 established the PLSS to control the survey, sale, and settling of the new land. Land was systematically surveyed into square townships, six miles on each side. Each township was then subdivided into 36 sections of one square mile each, or...

Genealogy

Exploring Family History with Nancy: Virtual Collections

Genealogists want to physically visit libraries and other institutions to find their ancestors, but did you know that you can visit many of these places virtually through their digital collections? These resources may contain a wide variety of materials you can use to find your ancestors or supplement your family history with some local history. You may find books, maps, documents, photographs, and artifacts, just to name a few. These collections are available on state, public, academic, and special library web sites as well as historical and genealogical society sites. One good way to locate a digital library or collection is to Google search terms such as the state and/or locality and either “digital library” or “digital collections”. The first photo shows search results relating to Nebraska. We can see results from academic, public, and state libraries in just this short list. If we look at the digital collections of...

Exploring Family History With Nancy

Genealogy

Genealogy with Nancy: A Guide to Online Resources for Digitized Historical Books

Before the digitization of books, genealogists had to either visit a library in person to use a book or attempt to request it through interlibrary loan. Today there are an amazing number of FREE digitized books that genealogists can access with an Internet connection. Today we’re going to look at some web sites containing digitized historical books. FamilySearch The FamilySearch Digital Library is a free virtual online library of rare historic books contributed by large public libraries and societies that can help you discover rich, unknown details about the lives of your ancestors. This makes the Library a priceless online repository of some of the greatest hidden historic treasures. The collection, numbering in the hundreds of thousands, began in 2007 and is invaluable to genealogists and family historians. When you click on the link below, it will take you to the FamilySearch Digital Library. You need to be logged into...