The Minnesota State Archives is housed in the Minnesota History Center in downtown St. Paul. The Archives is part of the Library and Archives Division of the Minnesota Historical Society. The website for all of these parts is at www.mnhs.org. This includes the massive electronic catalog that enables researchers to find book, manuscripts, state and county records, and artifacts. Additional and important finding aids are “in-house.”

To see what MHS might have that relates to your ancestral county just type keywords such as “Winona County” into the catalog search. On the State Archives page, click on recent acquisitions to see the monthly lists of acquisitions for the past year. These list are phenomenal.

A few exciting examples of acquistions, many of which are original records. In many cases, new acquisitions complement original records the state archives already has. Some acquisitions may not be immediately available as processing and cataloging occurs.

November 2007
Rural Credit Department. Contract for deed files (ca. 1920s-1995), county plat maps (ca. 1920s-1930s), and an index (1936) to the contract and deed files and the county plat maps. 4 boxes.

January 2008

• St. Louis County Marriage License Records 1871-1944, on microfilm

• Winona County Courts Records including plaintiff and defendant indexes 1854-1960, index to probate files 1856-1983, and civil case files

June 2008
Adjutant General. World War I bonus records, including warrants paid registers (ca. 1920-1924) which serve as a name index to the World War I paid bonus files, registers (undated) of World War I bonus payments and of Spanish-American War Veterans Relief Payments, and World War I veterans relief record (1931-1941) of the State Auditor. These records were created by the State Auditor, then used by the Adjutant General’s office to administer the World War I bonus program. World War I Bonus Disallowed/Rehearing Files (1921-1922) of the Soldier Bonus Board of Review. World War I Bonus Application Registers (1919-1924) of the Soldiers Bonus Board. 6 boxes, 4 oversize volumes, 1 oversize folder.

I have to admit that I enjoy sitting at home in my pj’s doing genealogical work online. Still, there are many repositories with one-of-a-kind records. One of these is here in Minnesota. The Immigration History Research Center is part of the University of Minnesota.

This repository focuses on the history of American immigration with materials on 24 ethnic groups from eastern, central, and southern Europe and the Near East. It includes newspapers, periodicals, church records and histories, photos, personal papers, genealogies, business papers, records of ethnic fraternal organizations, and oral histories. Some of the groups covered are Czech, Finnish, Polish, Italian, Greek, Hungarian, Jewish, Russian, Slovak, and Ukranian people. It is not limited to those who settled in Minnesota. Many of the records are in the native languages.

The IHRC website provides many details. A 1991 publication, Immigration History Research Center: A Guide to Collections described many collections (Susanna Moody and Joel Wurl, eds., Greenwood Press, 1991.) The website also has descriptions of many collections.

Some examples of records at the IHRC:

• Order Sons of Italy in American, Alabama Grand Lodge Records 1923-1987

• Holy Ghost Greek Catholic Church, Cleveland Ohio, Marriage Records 1909-1967

• Milford Finnish Relief Committee Records, 1939-1941 [Milford, New Hampshire]

• New York City P.S. 20 Alumni Association Records, 1958-1972

• Jarven Kukka Temperance Society, Sparta and Gilbert, Minnesota, Records 1897-1921

You can still be a part of the 2008 Federation of Genealogical Societies Conference, Footprints to Family History, being held in Philadelphia, September 3-6. Four full days of lectures, luncheons, a banquet, and an Exhibit Hall with many vendors is not to be missed.

Registrations or changes to a registration can still be done online through Friday, August 22nd, 5:00 p.m. CDT. After that point, registrations and modifications will need to be done on site at the Philadelphia Convention Center beginning on Tuesday, September 2d at 3:00 p.m.

Visit the FGS Conference Website or the Conference Blog for more of the exciting details.

See you there! While at the conference, be sure to visit the FGS booth area and pick up information on the 2009 FGS Conference being held in Little Rock, Arkansas. The local host, the Arkansas Genealogical Society, is planning some very special events in the area of the Statehouse Convention Center.

10 August UPDATE: all registrations for Course I can be done online. Thanks to the webmaster for fixing this!

I received this note today from the 2009 Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy (January 8-12) about the course that I coordinate at SLIG.

“For some reason, the popular Course 1 “American Records and Research: Focusing on Localities” with Paula Stuart Warren does not appear in the registration area of the UGA members section. It is listed in the non-member section. Our programmer is still working on solving this problem.

To register for Course 1, UGA members should email [email protected] to reserve a place. Then submit payment ($280 until Oct. 30th):
– by mail to UGA, PO BOX 1144, Salt Lake City, UT 84110
– or by credit card by calling our toll free number at 1-888-463-6842

For further info, please contact the Utah Genealogical Association.”

Ancestry has launched the 1891 Census of Canada, which is online for the first time. The 1891 Canadian census contains 4.5 million searchable names and 90,000 images of original census pages. Included is information from all 10 present-day Canadian provinces and its three territories. The 1891 census is fully indexed and searchable and can be accessed on Ancestry.ca, as well as on Ancestry.com at: http://content.ancestry.com/iexec/?htx=List&dbid=1274.

I have been searching for some of my ancestral surnames. Maybe I can find my great great grandfather’s brothers!

Project cooperation between FamilySearch (Family History Library) and Ancestry.com (The Generations Network) including reindexing of the 1920 U.S. census.

Thinking about becoming a certified genealogist? The Board for Certification of Genealogists now has a full application and judge’s comments online. If you are attending the FGS Conference in Philadelphia this September, visit the BCG booth in the Exhibit Hall and check the sample portfolios there.

Speaking of the FGS Conference: if you have just registered or haven’t quite done that yet, you might want to gather a group of your genealogical society’s members and become eligible for a rebate. Full details are on the FGS Conference website and on the Conference Blog.

FamilySearch has been posting many new indexes and digitized records at its website.

The Utah Genealogical Association has posted overviews of its ten courses and nighttime lectures for the annual week-long Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy to be held January 12-16, 2009.

I was asked to share this press release:

The International Society for British Genealogy & Family History (ISBGFH) is sponsoring the 8th Annual British Institute in Salt Lake City, October 6-10, 2008. The Institute will be held at the Crystal Inn, 230 West 500 South.

For registration and course description details, visit the website at http://www.isbgfh.org; or write to ISBGFH, P.O. Box 350459, Westminster, CO 80035-0459.