Tuesday, October 15, 2013

Newspaper research links

"How to search old newspapers re obits & birth announcements"

Do you mean how to research or what's available online or what's online for free?

There are many published books of indexes &/or extracts for specific locales.  Try WorldCat.

There's lots more than obits & births: social pages, mail pick-up, lost & found, business ads, foreclosures, horses for sale, bankruptcy, scandals, new-in-town ....

Most "free" sites have links that will lead to for-a-fee sites or for-a-fee premium services.  Most commercial sites have lots that can be done for free.  

Searching is often tricky: be very flexible in spelling because OCR on blurry newsprint is not terribly reliable.  

If you know a time period and a town, be prepared to read every page of the paper for the whole time period.  

If you know a location, check the local society for access to their databases or abstracts or microfilms.  UsGenWeb county sites may have indexes online.  

Do a general internet search for town, county, genealogy, newspapers, etc.

Book
How to Find Your Family History in Newspapers by Lisa Louise Cooke
https://www.shopgenealogygems.com/collections/print-books/products/how-to-find-your-family-history-in-newspapers


Free Sites
Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers
http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov

Access Newspapers Archives
available free at a local Family History Center

FamilySearch Research Wiki
https://familysearch.org/learn/wiki/en/Digital_Historical_Newspapers
https://familysearch.org/techtips/2012/04/adding-to-your-genealogy-with-online-digital-newspapers

FamilySearch catalog search -- includes abstracts, indexes, and how-to's
https://familysearch.org/search/catalog/results#count=20&query=%2Bkeywords%3Anewspapers

Cyndi's List
http://www.cyndislist.com/newspapers/
http://www.cyndislist.com/newspapers/general/

Online Historical Newpapers *
https://sites.google.com/site/onlinenewspapersite/

What happened to the Google Newspaper Archive Project (but is it coming back???)
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/05/google-shuts-down-newspaper-archive-project/239239/

Historical Newspapers in Google News Archive *
http://www.library.illinois.edu/hpnl/newspapers/gna.php

Ancestor Hunt blog post on free newspapers (with links)
http://www.theancestorhunt.com/1/post/2013/02/researching-newspapers-for-genealogy-for-free.html

London Gazette
http://www.london-gazette.co.uk

* Some links at this site lead to for-fee or subscription sites


Subscription companies

http://www.genealogybank.com

http://www.worldvitalrecords.com/indexinfo.aspx?ix=newspaperarchives

http://www.archives.com/genealogy/records-newspaper-archives.html

http://www.findmypast.com/articles/world-records/newspaper-archives/us-newspaper-archives

http://newsarchives.com

https://www.newspapers.com/
ancestry.com (I think most of their newspapers were "moved" to Newspapers.com after the purchase of the company)

Native American Records & Research

A question from the audience:

"Where do I get marriage records for Indian Territories?"

1.  Are you sure that's what you need?  Are you going by a family story or have you worked back one generation at a time to get to that goal?

2.  What is your goal?  "Marriage records" or evidence they were married or a couple? Or evidence of who parents were? Or....

3.  This is not a "beginner" topic!  Learn something about the topic in general: books, online, join a society, ....

4.  Don't expect to find it online.  That way, if you do, it's a pleasant surprise!

5.  You must have as much as you can on location (specifics and general history, jurisdictions, etc.), date range, name variations, family members, ....

6.  Message boards and blogs and society/museum/library websites could be a big help for individual names and areas. (Things that lead you to another individual or group with knowledge/experience with the same area/era/goals.)


FamilySearch Research Wiki
https://familysearch.org/learn/wiki/en/American_Indian_Genealogy

FamilySearch catalog
https://familysearch.org/search/catalog/results#count=20&query=%2Bkeywords%3Aindian%20%2Bkeywords%3Aterritory

Cyndi's List --  Native American
http://www.cyndislist.com/native-american