Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Jean Wilcox Hibben Series on National Archives Records

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I received an email from genea-blogger (Circlemending), speaker and genea-musician par excellence Jean Wilcox Hibben, who lives in Riverside County, California.  As luck would have it, the Pacific Region branch of the National Archives moved to Perris, California just a few miles from her home!  Talk about good fortune!  Apparently, Jean is working there also! 

Jean has started mining records on her ancestral families at the Archives branch, and sent this email to me:

"I want to let you know about a blogging project I have begun, in conjunction with the National Archives, Pacific Region, Riverside County (CA). There are many microfilms with helpful genealogical information, available for viewing, but most people are unaware of them. With the help of Kerry Bartels, my supervisor there, and Gwen Granados, the director, I am highlighting some of these collections throughout the upcoming weeks and months. The first of the blogs simply tells how to navigate the NARA site to find microfilms, then I focus on Letters of Application and Recommendation from various Presidential administrations. Below are the links to these 4 different blogs."

National Archives, Pacific Region, Riverside County, CA - How to Find Microfilms in the Facility (posted 25 February 2011)

Letters of Application and Recommendation During Presidential Administrations, 1797-1877, Microfilm Collection, NARA Riverside (posted 22 March 2011)

Letters of Application and Recommendation During the Administration of Ulysses S. Grant, 1869-1877, Microfilm Collection, NARA Riverside (posted 23 March 2011)

Letters of Application and Recommendation During the Administration of Ulysses S. Grant, 1869-1877, Examples from NARA, Riverside (posted 24 March 2011)

Letters of Application and Recommendation During the Administration of Ulysses S. Grant, 1869-1877, Microfilm Collection, NARA Riverside, continued (posted 29 March 2011)

The first one, about finding records on the National Archives site, is especially useful for all researchers.  The step-by-step instructions can be applied for any National Archives facility.

The posts about specific documents available in National Archives record collections are useful as examples of collections that should be searched for your ancestors. 

Note that the method to access the Index for the specific records that Jean is discussing was described in the first post in her series.  Once you have an index entry for your person of interest, you can then go to the National Archives branch that has the record (not every branch has every record set) and read the microfilm (yes, they are on microfilms, not yet imaged or indexed and online). 

I know that I have avoided going to the National Archives branch for many years, and have been very confused by the organization of their records and how to access them.  Jean has provided a wonderful entre into this vital resource that may hold solutions to many elusive ancestor problems. 

1 comment:

Jean Hibben said...

Thanks, Randy, for calling attention to my blog series. The next collection I will feature deals with US Post Offices and personnel. More potential leads.