About This Category:

Family and local histories provide personal details you won't find in more technical and succinct records. Discover photographs, stories, maps, and histories that add priceless depth and personality to your family history research. This rapidly growing collection of over 20,000 books will be an invaluable tool for expanding your knowledge of your ancestors.

The Family & Local Histories Collection lets you read journals, memoirs, and other first-hand historical narratives right on your computer. Gathered from some of the world's finest libraries, these materials may provide hard-to-find town, county, and state information; tax records and wills; military, church, and court records; as well as photographs, stories, and maps.

General Search Tips

• If you don't get any matches with an exact search, try broadening your search by including less information.
• Want to refine your "best matches" search? Try the Advanced Search options and fill out as much information as you can.
• Use the Soundex search. Names are often misspelled in historical records. Soundex allows you to search for last names that "sound like" the one you're looking for. Try this even if you think the spelling is obvious. Remember, even Smith can be "misspelled" (e.g., Smithe, Smyth, Smythe).
• Use a wildcard to view all words that begin with the same stem. You can use an asterisk for up to six characters. For example, a search for "fran*" will return matches such as Fran, Franny, Frank, Frannie, and Frankie. Use a question mark for a single character. For example, a search for "Hans?n" will return matches such as Hansen and Hanson.