I attended the National Archives’ Genealogy Fair today. Do you think the National Archives only has veteran pension files, immigration records and census records? You need to keep reading. Today’s presentation titled The Best National Archives Records Genealogists Aren’t Using showed many examples of other records that the Archives holds like relinquished, rejected or canceled land entry files; rural rehabilitation loan case files; and war risk insurance files for WWI vets. I’m going to make a list of my ancestors who lived on farms in the 1930’s to see if they applied for a rural rehabilitation loan!
National Archives Innovative Online Resources and Tools to Help with Your Genealogical Research showed how the NARA website is improving and highlighted even more useful record types I never knew about. I also learned about a program that allows people like us to download selected records and transcribe the contents. This information becomes part of the NARA catalog. Eventually, we will be able to type in peoples’ names and get search results that will take us directly to their digitized records. Are you disappointed that you weren’t able to attend? Not to worry! Go to https://www.archives.gov/calendar/genealogy-fair/2016/schedule-handouts. You will see a list of the talks given and find links that will take you to the videos of the talks and let you see the slides and handouts.
Go to this link and scroll down to Online Learning Resources to view videos and handouts from the 2013, 2014 and 2015 Genealogy Fairs: https://www.archives.gov/research/genealogy/start-research
Happy Hunting!
Lisa Christensen
