New York Public Library, Map Division

On Tuesday I visited the New York Public Library with the New York Genealogical and Biographical Society.  We were tutored on use of the Library's website and we toured the Lionel Pincus and Princess Firyal Map Division.

The map division a huge collection of maps, with a concentration on the New York City area.  You can view several maps online, but maps that are too large, delicate, or recent are not online.  You will want to view farm maps for the area in which your ancestors lived.  Individual properties are labeled with names of the owners, thus enabling you to locate your family of interest and their neighbors.  You can also find local churches and cemeteries that may not exist today.

NYPL.org

You can search holdings online.  From the home page, click the "Research" tab and explore some of the options.  For a genealogy angle, search "Classic Catalog" and then do a keyword search for a surname followed by "family."  Searching for "Duryea Family" resulted in eight hits.

NYPL.org

Duryea family miscellany is the listing for the file folder from the New York Genealogical and Biographical Society.

Family files from the New York Genealogical and Biographical Society now housed at the New York Public Library.

Manuscript found in the Duryea family folder.  Note the delicate paper.

The Library has its own family files that can be located under the classic catalog call number search of APT-F.

NYPL.org results for family file holdings.

If you locate a family file of interest, you need to visit the library to view the contents.  As I previously wrote, checking a family file can yield little or a lot, including pictures and research notes from long ago.

Picture found in the Cook family folder at the New York Public Library.

1813-1814 New York City city directory by Longworth.  Rebound.