Indexing Projects

The Italian Genealogical Group has indexed many records useful in researching New York City area family lines, such as vital records and naturalization records.  These indexes are free at their website.  I have used their death indexes and marriage indexes to locate many important dates and discover birth names for some ladies.

I have been given the opportunity to give back to this group by helping index naturalization records for New Jersey.  The typing part seems simple, but once this index is created and online, so many people will be aided in their research.

An example of the information that I am keying to help index New Jersey naturalization records
for The Italian Genealogical Group.

If you would like to participate in such a project, Ancestry has a World Archives Project where you can select from several different records.  You can also help index at FamilySearch.  It is so easy to click, click, click on a free database and find so much information within seconds, but please remember that all of the information you find was placed there through the efforts of someone else.

Organize

I proudly present a better organization of my genealogical papers and photographs.

These boxes are from the Stockholm collection available at The Container Store.  You can shop online if you are not fortunate enough to have a store near you.

Someday I will have a master list of the contents of these files, but for now, these boxes are far better than the towering piles I have been navigating.  Most of my newly acquired records never morph into a paper version.  I am able to shoot clear photos with my iPhone and libraries are increasingly offering scanners in lieu of photocopiers.

The amount of records becoming available is staggering.  You need to be organized to collect, process, and retain the information or you will waste time retracing your steps.

Rather than print out a grainy copy of this obituary from the Bayonne Times,
I snapped a picture with my iPhone and edited with Picasa by Google.
Unfortunately, I can't find the piece of paper where I was writing down the dates and page numbers.
It will turn up.  I can figure out the date of the paper by her death certificate.

Monmouth County Archives Day 2011

Today I attended Archives and History Day at the Monmouth County Library in Manalapan, New Jersey.  Table after table was filled with helpful people and information from various municipalities in Monmouth County.  I was treated to a tour of the Archives, located in the bottom of the library, which is a wonderland for someone who loves to research old records.

I previously touted the digitization and free online availability of the Red Bank Register Newspaper.  In this spirit, the Archives are busily digitizing the myriad of records in these boxes.  Some are already done and are available online for you to search and view for free.  I was told that if a record is not viewable online yet, you may request a paper copy.  I recommend doing your research online first and then making an appointment to visit the archives to retrieve copies and search for yourself all of the paper copies that are not yet digitized.

http://www.visitmonmouth.com/page.aspx?ID=1990

If you search in the Coroner Inquests for last name "Wall," you come up with listings such as this:

The Archives holds the Coroner Inquest papers regarding the death of Maud Walling.  Death by murder could provide more details about your family than other modes of death, so it's definitely worth checking out.  (Do not overlook the people in your tree who did not marry or have children.  They also left a paper trail that might be more discoverable than the breadcrumbs left by your direct ancestors.)  The actual papers are not available online yet, but you can request them.  This goes beyond merely reading the articles concerning the death in the Red Bank Register.

Maud's abrupt ending provides us with some great family information.
She was the daughter of Wyckoff Walling; her cousin was Clinton H Walling, son of John H Walling;
John's wife was married previously and had a daughter named Bessie Blauvelt.
You can also research Maud's death and what became of Clinton Walling in the Archives.

If you have branches of your tree that lived or worked in Monmouth County, New Jersey, you have a lot more records to find.