By Dennis L. Maness,
MLS
Call me old-fashioned but I love books! But I also love
computers and what they can do, especially on the Internet. And, as I’m sure
all of you do, I love genealogy. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could combine all
three of these loves? Well, that’s what this post is about—genealogy books on
the Internet!
There are books all over the Internet (a Google search
for “~genealogy books online” gave me 3,800,000 results!) but for our purposes
we’ll discuss the Big Three--Google Books, FamilySearch, and The Internet
Archive.
There is a YouTube video (of course!) on what Google Books is and a bit on how to use it at http://youtu.be/9DGQO5Kp2og
Quick Search Tip—On Google the use of the tilde “~” (it’s on the top of
the upper left key on my keyboard) means that the search will include synonyms
of the word you’re searching for. For instance “~genealogy” will include the
words “family history”, “family tree” “vital records” “genealogical” “surname”
and probably many more in your search.
But I digress:
What kind of genealogical books can you find on Google
Search?
There are vital records--
and individual genealogies,
family genealogies--
classic genealogical studies--
county histories--
historical works that may give you more insight into your
ancestor’s lives—
and
And even genealogy themed novels!
=======================
FamilySearch Books
The last time I was at the Family History Library in Salt
Lake City I went to look for a family history book on one of my family lines.
When I got to the place where it should have been I found rows and rows of
shelves that were empty! When I asked the staff what was going on they said
that the books had been taken to be digitized, so that is why this site is so
important for online users. I may be wrong but I think they said that the books
would not be coming back for public display but would be kept in some
underground or offsite storage.
Here’s how to read them:
Go to
https://familysearch.org click on “Books” (near the top), then click on the “Family History Books” link.
Below the search form there is a good description of this site:
Family History Books is a collection of more than 40,000
digitized genealogy and family history publications from the archives of some
of the most important family history libraries in the world. The collection
includes family histories, county and local histories, genealogy magazines and
how-to books, gazetteers, and medieval histories and pedigrees. The valuable
resources included in Family History Books come from the following partner
institutions:
§ Allen County Public Library
§ Brigham
Young University Harold B. Lee Library
§
Brigham
Young University Hawaii Joseph F. Smith Library
§
Church
History Library
§
Family
History Library
§
Houston
Public Library - Clayton Library Center for Genealogical Research
§
Mid-Continent
Public Library - Midwest Genealogy Center
There’s not much more that needs to be said about this
wonderful jewel of genealogy knowledge. There is, however, one warning you need
to know—when you do a search for a title or subject the site will
download the entire book as a PDF file before you can begin to read it. This is
sometimes a lengthy process with large books. But worth it.
========================
The Internet Archive
Go to http://archive.org/, and click on the word “Texts” at the top.
You can search for pretty much the same kinds of books as
I listed in the Google Books description.
In addition they have the [non-indexed] entire run of the
U. S. Census. But again a warning—the interface is really ugly and often
confusing but worth it when you find something that isn’t anywhere else on the
Internet.
======================
There are many other sites that offer books. You might
consider using Heritage Quest and Ancestry.com at your local library if you
don’t have a subscription.
Sidenote: Here are two descriptions of the difference between the home
subscription of Ancestry.com and the Library Edition:
http://proquest.com/assets/downloads/products/ale_ancestcom_comparison.pdf
http://blog.familytreemagazine.com/insider/2009/03/23/WhatsNOTInAncestryLibraryEdition.aspx
http://blog.familytreemagazine.com/insider/2009/03/23/WhatsNOTInAncestryLibraryEdition.aspx
Check
out Cyndi’s list at http://www.cyndislist.com/books/ebooks/.
Dick Eastman discusses an interesting new web site called “Genealogy Book Links” in his July 12, 1012 blog post at http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2012/07/genealogy-book-links.html/.
And finally there is a useful web site called “Your Personal Genealogy Library: Family History Books Online” at http://uvtagg.org/classes/dons/dons-fhbooksonline.html.
Dick Eastman discusses an interesting new web site called “Genealogy Book Links” in his July 12, 1012 blog post at http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2012/07/genealogy-book-links.html/.
And finally there is a useful web site called “Your Personal Genealogy Library: Family History Books Online” at http://uvtagg.org/classes/dons/dons-fhbooksonline.html.
=========================
Remember,
as Legacy Family Tree’s Geoff Rasmussen says,
“Life is short; do genealogy first!”
“Life is short; do genealogy first!”