If you are actively researching the history of your family,
you may already be aware that the Library subscribes to HeritageQuest. a
genealogy reference database. Unlike Ancestry.com, however, HeritageQuest
can be accessed from home by persons with a valid Library card.
If you haven’t accessed HeritageQuest either here at the
Library or from home recently, however, it’s probably time for a second look.
They recently made significant additions to their already substantial database,
and some of that material may be just what you’ve been looking for.
Recent additions include a number of map sets:
U.S. Indexed County Land Ownership Maps, 1860-1918: You can
do a name search, or browse by state and county.
U.S. Indexed Early Land Ownership and Township Plats,
1785-1898: You can do a name search, or browse by state, principal meridian,
and township and range.
Their map coverage also includes the Map Guide to the
Federal Census, 1790-1920, and U.S. Enumeration District Maps and Descriptions,
1940.
If you are researching immigrants, HeritageQuest now includes
numerous collections of foreign records. Coverage is most extensive for
European countries, as you might expect, but there is also significant coverage
for other continents/geographic areas, including Canada, Central and South
America, the Caribbean and Pacific Islands, Africa, India, and Asia.
European countries with significant coverage include
Armenia, Austria, Belgium, Channel Islands, Czech Republic, Denmark, England,
Estonia, Finland, Germany, Gibraltar, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Isle of Man, Italy,
Lichtenstein, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russia,
Scotland, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Ukraine, and Wales.
Foreign records are generally searchable (as opposed to
browse only), but are ordinarily recorded in the native language, and are best
searched using name and location spellings commonly used in that language.
