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 April 2008 Back to Table of Contents Back to Archives Main Page Section: Life & Leisure
Angelo Coniglio is Forever Young’s new genealogy columnist. In part two of our interview with him, he offers more tips on finding your own family history. What are the best resources for those interested in finding their own family histories, and how does one begin? There’s probably no single best source for everyone. It depends on their ancestors’ origin, the time frame, the length of time the family has been in America, etc. For those who are tracing relatives who were immigrants in the late 1800s and early 1900s, the free site www.ellisisland.org is very valuable. If one knows the approximate birth year of a relative and his/her town of origin, one can search the Ellis Island site with the person’s first and last names, and often find their ship passenger manifest. Generally, you begin with the earliest ancestor for whom you have a name, the date of an important event in his or her life (birth, marriage, emigration) and a place of origin. You try to find as much information as possible about him, to lead you to facts about his parents, and so on, back into time. For example, a person may be found on the 1930 U.S. census, at an address you know to be correct. The census would give his or her name and birthplace, age and year of entry to the U.S., if not born here. That information could be used to search passenger records, which could give the town of origin, and possibly a parent’s name. Then a Mormon microfilm could be ordered for the person’s home town and year of birth, and the birth record may be found. Another valuable resource is the Mormon Church, which has microfilms of birth, marriage, deaths, and other vital statistics from thousands of towns all over the world, as well as access to American census, military, and other records. There are two Mormon Family History Centers in the Buffalo area which function as genealogical libraries where researchers can use free in-house information, or rent microfilms for a modest fee, and use the Center’s facilities to read or copy records. The Church has a free online genealogy site at www.familysearch.org. Surfing it will show ways to find films for your ancestors’ towns and locate local Family History Centers. Also, I have a ‘tips’ page at my website — www.conigliofamily.com/ConiglioGenealogyTips.htm — that gives details and links for researching immigrant ancestors. What kind of help network is there in the genealogical community? The Buffalo Historical Society has historic community and ethnic newspapers and documents. The Buffalo and Erie County Public Library has New York State census data and city directories for past years, which list residents alphabetically by name. And Erie County Hall has archives of historical immigration and naturalization records. You’ll be writing a column on the subject of genealogy for Forever Young. What kinds ofquestions would you like people to send you? If a reader has a question about how to do the research, I hope to be able to suggest approaches or sources, or answer questions about Anglicization of foreign names, or about the types of information available on census, passenger or other civil records.I can be reached at GenealogyTips@aol.com or at 438 Maynard Drive, Amherst, NY, 14226. back to top back to table of contents Current Issue | About Forever Young | Where to Find | Advertise | Our Advertisers | Community Calendar | Contest | Clubs | Contact Us | Archives | Home |
