RELEASE DATE: MARCH 9, 2008
KINSEARCHING
by
Marleta Childs
P. O. Box 6825
LUBBOCK, TX 79493-6825
[email protected]
A much-used "how-to" book since its first publication in 1987, Angus Baxter's IN SEARCH OF YOUR GERMAN ROOTS: A COMPLETE GUIDE TO TRACING YOUR ANCESTORS IN THE GERMANIC AREAS OF EUROPE is now available in a new updated fourth edition. As the title indicates, this manual aids family researchers in tracing their Teutonic roots in Germany and in all the German-speaking regions of Europe--from Belgium to the Czech Republic and from the Baltic to the Crimea.
Like the rest of Baxter's guides, this reference work shows family researchers in the United States and Canada how to conduct research by e-mail or regular correspondence, utilizing library and archival resources as well as records of church and state. By using your home computer and working at your own pace, you can achieve much more than you may realize is possible. If you are planning a research trip to Europe, the volume will help to prepare you for locating and understanding the materials you need.
Because all major archives and many smaller ones now have data online, this updated fourth edition provides their website addresses and discusses valuable new genealogical tools, such as the Hamburg Passenger Lists, 1850 - 1934. Baxter also tells about the opening and holdings of new facilities like the German Emigration Center. Due to the increasing amount of information in online databases and on CD-ROMs, the discovery of facts about German ancestors is often an easier task than in previous years.
Since many Jews have a longtime connection to German-speaking areas, the author devotes an entire chapter to records of that ethnic group. He includes Jewish materials in Hungary, Israel, and Poland. Also, the author presents information about the microfilm collection of Nazi files available for public research at the National Archives in College Park, Maryland. In addition, he furnishes details about digitized copies of the International Tracing Service's records pertaining to Holocaust victims; these records are in the process of being transferred to the U. S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC.
Baxter's manual covers a vast amount of material in a concise manner. Anyone seeking Teutonic ancestors should find helpful data in the updated fourth edition of IN SEARCH OF YOUR GERMAN ROOTS: A COMPLETE GUIDE TO TRACING YOUR ANCESTORS IN THE GERMANIC AREAS OF EUROPE.
The 127-page paperback includes a map of Germany, an introduction, a list of German genealogical associations in Canada and the U. S., a selective bibliography, and a subject index. To the book's price of $16.95, buyers should add the cost for postage and handling charges. For U. S. postal mail, the cost is $4.00 for one book and $2.00 for each additional copy; for UPS, the cost is $6.00 for one copy and $2.50 for each additional book. The volume (item order #396) may be purchased by check, MasterCard, or Visa from Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc., 3600 Clipper Mill Rd., Suite 260, Baltimore, Maryland 21211 (for phone orders, call toll free 1-800-296-6687; fax 1-410-752-8492; website www.genealogical.com).
This interesting item about some nineteenth-century German immigrants to the New World is found on page 1, column 6, of the 11 Feb 1836 (Vol. XIII, no. 11) issue of the Staunton Spectator and General Advertiser, a newspaper published in Staunton, VA:
"A German paper states that a caravan of 300 persons, men, women and children, have left Westphalia on their way to Jamaica. They have signed a condition which obliges them to labor in quality of domestics, or field laborers, for 5 successive years, at the end of which time they are each to receive a few acres of land as a compensation for years of suffering and servitude in a tropical climate."
On May 14-17, 2008, the annual National Genealogical Society Conference in the States will take place in Kansas City, MO. Local hosts will be the Missouri State Genealogical Association, the Mid-Continent Public Library, the Northland Genealogical Society, the APG Heartland Chapter, and the Johnson County, Kansas, Genealogical Society. Using the theme "Show Me the Nation's Records," the conference will offer a wide variety of lectures, workshops, and genealogical exhibits. For more information, get in touch with the National Genealogical Society, 3108 Columbia Pike, Suite 300, Arlington, VA 22204-4304 (website www.ngsgenealogy.org; e-mail [email protected]).