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Recommended Books

Books are wonderful research references.  Here are a few I recommend as great aids to Genealogy Research.  I have these in my personal library and refer to them often.

 

Courthouse Research for Family Historians, Your Guide to Genealogical Research, by Christine Rose. 

This book is so valuable for doing courthouse research, especially if you’re a beginning genealogist.  I’ve been doing Genealogy research for more than ten years and still, every time I go to a courthouse, I take this book with me and make constant reference to it.  It’s easier to look up an answer to a question than find someone in a courthouse to ask.

 

Forensic Genealogy, by Colleen Fitzpatrick, Phd

Wow, what I learned about analyzing old photographs from this book!  This woman should work for the FBI.  She dissects photos like coroners dissect bodies.  If you have old photos, especially in towns or business locations, and don’t know when or where they were taken, this book is an excellent place to learn how to become what the author calls, a Digital Detective.  There are clues for determining the age of other photos, too, and not by the type of clothing the person is wearing, either.  In addition to photo, Colleen covers coroner’s reports, city directories, and a lot of other ways to track your ancestors through cities that I’d never encountered since none of my ancestors lived in cities.  And she has a full section about genealogy through DNA, another area that’s always been beyond me—until now.

 

Walking With Your Ancestors, A Genealogist’s Guide to Using Maps and Geography, by Melinda Kashuba

Maps are an excellent and underused resource for learning about our ancestors.  Melinda’s book is a thoroughly researched and presented text that allows even total amateurs like me to understand what’s she’s talking about.  There’s also a section on GPS and a list of major map collections in the United States, although I’m certain there are plenty more places to look for maps collections, too.

 

The Family Tree Problem Solver, Proven Methods for Scaling the Inevitable Brick Wall, by Marsha Hoffman Rising.

This is another book I own and an excellent text for beginners.  I still refer back to it from time to time.  There’s a chapter titled “Sorting Individuals of the Same Name” which I found especially helpful since I have four generations of Matheney ancestors all named Samuel, as were several of their cousins. They all lived in the same region, too.  What a fun family.

 

The Lost, A Search for Six of Six Million, by Daniel Mendelsohn

This book isn’t a text that teaches you how to research, and yet I learned so much from it.  It’s a narrative of a man’s quest to discover from among the six million people killed by the Nazi’s, the story of six people of his mother’s family.  It is amazing to me that in this big world we live in, he found the few people still alive who remember the children and parents of this little family who died in a Polish town half a century earlier.  Not all at once, but slowly, one by one, during all the years of the war, in much the same way Daniel Mendelsohn unlocks their secrets in this wonderful book.

 

 

More from my library:

The following books focus on my personal area of research, western Virginia and West Virginia.  However, these books might be of interest because you may be adding similar types of book to you own library to aid in your research.

 

Virginia Tax Payers, 1782-1787, by Fothergill and Naugle.

A compilation of tax records for all Virginia Counties intended to replace the missing Federal Census for 1790.

 

1790 Greenbrier County Virginia Census

Pamphlet containing tax information for 1782-1786, used as a substitute for the missing 1790 Federal Census for the residents of Greenbrier Co, VA.

 

Greenbrier County, Virginia 1810 Tax List

A pamphlet containing tax information for 1810, a substitute for the 1810 Federal census for the residents of Greenbrier Co, VA.

 

Virginia Wills Before 1799, William Montgomery Clemens

“A complete abstract register of all names mentioned in over six hundred recorded wills,” from the Amherst, Bedford, Campbell, Loudoun, Prince William and Rockbridge County courthouses.

 

Early Marriages, Wills and Some Revolutionary War Records, Botetourt County, Virginia, compiled by Anne Lowry Worrell

Exactly what the title states, listed in very small type. 

 

Monroe County (West) Virginia Marriages, a Compiled List, 1799-1850, by Norma Pontiff Evans

Exactly what the title states.

 

Augusta County, Virginia Baptism Records, Rev. John Craig 1740-1749

A reproduction of a baptism list kept by Rev. Craig with the name of the child, the father’s name and the date of the baptism.  Also occasional additional notes, such as “mother died same night,” date of child’s death or location of baptism.

 

Transallegheny Pioneers, Historical Sketches of the First White Settlements West of the Alleghenies, by John P. Hale

The history of an important era in western expansion, with many true incidents involving early pioneers.

 

John Jay Janney’s Virginia, An American Farm Lad’s Life in the Early 19th Century

Memoir written by Janney, after he reached the age of 90, about his boyhood on a farm in Goose Creek, Loudon Co, VA.

 

Kelly’s Creek Chronicles, The Illustrated Diary of James Alexander Jones, A West Virginia Coalminer, 1870-1939, by William Roosevelt Hudnall

Memoir by James Alexander Jones about his life as a coal miner in a small West Virginia town.