Can Genealogy Sites Help
Me Find My Birth Parents?
Posted by Jeff
Q: I need to find my birth family. I have my mothers name at my birth and her age and place of birth but that is all. Which service will be best suited to find her family ancestry and anything current?
A: The best site to start your search would be Ancestry.com. It has a vast collection of databases and documents that it can pull information from, so you have a better chance of finding information about your birth family. And since Ancestry has such a wide range of documents, including military, immigration, death, birth, crew lists, census, and other documents, you can compare documents against each other to confirm the identity of the person you are looking for.
The first thing to do is set up a family tree with Ancestry. Make sure you include as much information about yourself as possible, as it's easier for them to match records to your name. Once you've finished, add all the information you have for your mother. You can then search Ancestry's databases to see if there are any document matches to the information you gave about your mother. You can add relavent documents to her profile, and as you do, Ancestry will suggest other possible family members that are connected to her.
While Ancestry and other genealogy sites will help you get information about your birth family's history, they will probably not have the most up-to-date information such as address, telephone number, etc. If you are looking for contact information for your birth family, you can try a people search service to find them. Intelius has the most comprehensive search that we saw, so they might be a good place to start.
If you want to check out reviews of other genealogy or people search services, click on our genealogy compare page or our people search compare page.
Archives.com Helps National Archives Release 1940 Census Data
Posted by Jeff
Which of your relatives were included in the 1940 U.S. Census? Now you can find out. Archives.com has teamed up with the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) to release digital records from the 1940 census. This is the first time that the NARA has made digital census documents available to the public.
Archives.com was instrumental in building the tools that showcase the census information. Anyone can browse, view, and download images from the 1940 census using their preferred genealogy service.
In celebration of the historic genealogical event, Archives.com and Ancestry.com are offering all their users access to all 1 billion documents from the 1940 census for free. To read our review of Archives or Ancestry or to take advantage of this deal, click here.
Do Genealogy Services Provide Both Marriage and Divorce Records?
Posted by Jeff
Q: Does Archives.com provide marriage and divorce records or just marriage records?
A: Yes, Archives.com and many other genealogy services provide both marriage and divorce records dating back as far as the 1700s. When looking for the records, keep in mind that, generally, marriage records are vital records, which are maintained at a state level, while divorce records are public court records and are maintained at the specific court level. Also, some states have restrictions on marriage records, while divorce records generally have no restrictions.
Archives.com offers marriage records in over 20 states, as well as Canada and the United Kingdom, dating back as far as the 1700s. It also offers divorce records in over 15 states dating back to the 1750s. If Archives.com doesn't include the information you are looking for, Ancestry.com offers a more robust archive of records, including records from all 50 states, as well as Australia, Canada, Europe and Mexico, dating back to the 1600s.
Check out our genealogy compare page to compare the pricing and services of all of the genealogy sites we reviewed.
How Can I Locate Old Birth and Death Records?
Posted by Mary
Q: Which is the best people search service for Birth/Death records for going back over 75 years?
Image Source: tonrulkens on Flickr
A: While people search and background check services like our top-rated option, Intelius, can be great for locating criminal records, marriages, and legal histories, the best resources for finding birth and death records that old are generally geared towards genealogy research. In most states, birth and death records must be at least a certain number of years (often 75) old before they become public information. Once this information is public, it becomes easily accessible for genealogy enthusiasts and historians alike.
Our top three choices, Ancestry.com, Archives.com, and Footnote all do a pretty good job of locating birth, marriage, and death records, as well as census data, immigration information, and a wide range of other resources. We recommend Ancestry.com for its large resource base and ease of use, particularly for people planning to build a family tree. Footnote is more geared towards historians, if you're doing research on a family other than your own.
To compare all the genealogy services we've reviewed, head over to our comparison chart.
Black Friday/Cyber Monday Deal: Get an Ancestry.com Discount of 25% Off Family Tree Maker
Posted by Polina
Ancestry.com is our most comprehensive genealogy service, and from Friday, November 25 to Monday, November 28 they are offering a 25% discount on the new 2012 family tree maker. Whether you get it for yourself or give it as a gift, there is no better time to discover your family than the holidays. There is no coupon code needed, just click on any Ancestry.com link from the Ancestry.com review to take advantage of the offer.
For more Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals, keep checking our blog, sign up for our newsletter, or follow us on Twitter or Facebook. We'll have great deals on web hosting, online backup, security software and more!
What is the best online genealogy service with documentation dating back to the 1900's?
Posted by Tasha
Q: I am interested in genealogy and want as much documentation as I can get on marriages, divorces, etc as early as possible beginning in the 1900's. What would be the best genealogy service to use?
A: Ancestry.com would be the best genealogy service for your specific requirements. Ancestry.com is the most comprehensive of all the online genealogy services we've reviewed, and it has the largest resource base. You'll have access to birth, marriage & death records, U.S. Census records back to 1850, Social Security death indexes, voter records, immigration and passenger lists, newspaper articles, photos, maps and memoirs. In addition, you can see and connect to other Ancestry members who have compiled their own family trees and made them public—a great feature if you share relatives and want to leverage their information.
Right now Ancestry.com is offering a free 14-day trial, so you can start your family tree research free of charge. After the 14-day trial period the U.S.-based membership is $12.95 per month while the International membership is $24.95 per month.
How easy/appropriate a site is Ancestry.com for a 15-year-old just starting his research?
Posted by Kent
The following is an actual user-submitted question:
Q: How easy/appropriate a site is Ancestry.com for a 15-year-old just starting his research? What are the 15 Countries are covered in the World Deluxe membership? He'd need England, Ireland, France, Portugal and Spain for starters.
A: Ancestry.com is probably the easiest genealogy site to use, and it's also the most comprehensive. How well your 15-year-old will take to it depends a lot on his experience with computers and web sites in general. If he's already using the Internet to check email, search for information, and play games, he'll have no problem using Ancestry.com
Ancestry.com's World Deluxe Plan covers man countries around the world including the United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany, France, Italy, and more. Chances are you'll find all the countries you need covered. There's even a forum on Ancestry.com devoted to Portuguese genealogy.
The best way to find out the answers to both of these questions, is to sign up for the 14-day free trial.
Lisa Kudrow goes from Friends to Ancestors
Posted by Kent
Lisa Kudrow, who rose to fame playing Phoebe Buffay on Friends, will be doing something decidedly different on TV this Friday night: she'll be tracing her family history with the help of Ancestry.com. Kudrow's genealogical journey promises to be a sobering reminder of how we can still be affected by the past:
Watch as Lisa Kudrow visits the homeland of her Jewish ancestors to learn the heartbreaking truth about what happened there during the Holocaust — and solve a 60-year-old mystery for her father.
Check out the episode this Friday, August 13th on your local NBC affiliate. Maybe it will inspire you to uncover your own family history.
Oversharing: It's nothing new
Posted by Kent
The phenomenon of oversharing—to divulge excessive personal information, as in a blog or broadcast interview, prompting reactions ranging from alarmed discomfort to approval—is not a new thing at all. Sure, the word was added Webster's dictionary in 2008, but as our recent research into genealogy websites proved, people have been doing it for a while. The only difference, really, is how they're doing it. Today it's on Facebook, but in 1938, it was in the newspaper.
We discovered this while testing Footnote.com, a site that gives its members access to millions of historical documents including newspapers, comic strips, census records, military registries, crew manifests, and so much more. The Social Activities Page of the May 12th, 1938 edition of the Golden Dale Sentinel provides us with the following tidbits, many of which would not seem terribly out-of-place on Facebook or Twitter:
Mr. and Mrs. M. E. Larsen shopped in Yakima, Wednesday of last week
Mr. and Mrs. Carl Nygaard and Arnold were dinner guests of Mr. and Mrs. Earl Lasley, Sunday.
Mr. and Mrs. Edward Hooker spent from Saturday to Wednesday visiting their daughter Mrs. Raymond Naught and family in their new home near Omak, Wash.
The little son of Mr. and Mrs. Nute Bromley, who was injured by his older brother on the head with an axe Friday of last week, is not as seriously injured as at first believed. He is able to be up and playing.
So it seems that people, at least in the last two centuries, have had a desire to share the most quotidian and personal details of their lives with strangers. Facebook and Twitter haven't changed that. All that's changed is that people do it themselves, with more frequency, and without an editor.
Of course this is just one of the cool things we discovered in our exploration of the past with our online genealogy reviews. To see how all the services stacked up, check out our genealogy reviews and comparisons.
NextAdvisor reviews Genealogy websites
Posted by Kent
NextAdvisor is proud to announce its newest review category: Genealogy Research Sites. We put 5 popular genealogy research sites to the test, looking for the best site for researching one's family history, from family tree building to DNA testing. By using one family line as the control, we were able to get an honest assessment of which site had the best resources.
As the lead reviewer for this category, I had a lot of fun. I discovered that a great, great uncle had been an oil well engineer in Iraq during the post war oil boom. I was able to read first-hand accounts of my great uncle's service in WWII, which tragically coincided with the death of his father, and read the original obituary too. I saw family photos that I'd never seen before. I reconnected with a family member I had not seen in years. It's the first time that I reviewed an online service with a tear rolling down my cheek.
We spend a lot of time on this web site talking about what's next—heck, it's where we get our name. We look at what's new in telecommunications, Internet security, and identity theft protection. This time we looked back. While it's technology that enabled this unparalleled access to family history, it's getting in touch with the past that makes these services so amazing.
Check out our genealogy research reviews and comparisons.
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Disclosure: NextAdvisor.com is a consumer information site that offers free, independent reviews and ratings of online services. We receive advertising revenue from most of the services we review. Our editors thoroughly research and whenever possible test each service we review and offer their honest opinions about each one. We are independently owned and operated and all opinions expressed on this site are our own.