What are the archives anyway?

The USGenWeb Archives are a "virtual library" of historical documents that have been transcribed and donated by folks like you. This newsletter contains some of the newest submissions. In The USGenWeb Archives you may find items such as wills, obituaries, letters, biographical sketches, county and township histories, census, cemeteries, etc. This will vary by state and county, dependant upon what has been submitted. The Archives were first established as a support tool for the USGenWeb County Coordinators, to provide a permanent storage place for valuable genealogical date, with unlimited space available.

What a wonderful wealth of information -- free genealogical data online -- what a concept.... there must be a catch. There ISN'T a catch. The USGenWeb Archives should be supported and presented as an alternative to other avenues of publishing genealogical data. The Archives are housed on a server with unlimited space for data storage.

The USGenWeb Archives Digital Library was implemented in July 1996, and files are being added everyday. If you have transcriptions to contribute, please read the Guidelines for file contributions.

On the sites linked from this site you will find genealogically significant files that have been transcribed and contributed by volunteers. It is folks like you who have helped this project grow from its beginning in 1996 to what it is today. Please consider donating a file so that others may have free access to it. Remember, this site is what you make of it! If you have found useful information, please take a moment to thank the volunteer who donated the file.

The USGenWeb Archives Census Project
The USGenWeb Archives Digital Map Project
The USGenWeb Archives Marriages Project
The USGenWeb Archives Obituaries Project
The USGenWeb Archives Pension Project
The USGenWeb Archives Special Collections Project

The USGenWeb Tombstone Transcription Project was started by Pam Reid to encourage people to walk cemeteries and donate copies of the surveys to The USGenWeb Archives. Many transcriptions are already available online and more are added daily.

That's exactly why the organizers and the current volunteers of the USGenWeb Archives structured them the way they are (for future growth). Every circumstance, idea, possibility, technology (present and future), was considered when setting the Guidelines of the USGenWeb Archives. They've grown to over 2.5 GIGS of text data, and way over that in scanned documents... in just three years. The first file was uploaded in June 1996.

We have a million hits (downloads) a month, and researchers find the present structure very easy and useful. The archivists have made very few changes since June 1996, for example - including adding the USGenWeb Archives Notice to each file, because several ventures were starting to point to the files behind a fee-based website, and some were copying the files to build a library for their own purpose.

File submitters are from all over the Internet, including genealogical societies, departments of the United States government, and local and county offices. People see the advantage of the Archives for researchers, and go out of their way to help. We're constantly getting messages asking, "How can I help?"

The Archives have also gained a respect from the NGS, who helped us start the Chalkley Chronicles project , and other genealogical societies - who send databases of their out-of-print publications, and government offices - census and Bureau of Land Management.

Since 1996, The USGenWeb Archives and it's volunteers, have been dedicated to free online genealogy.

USGenWeb Archives File Managers

Special Projects Representative: Rebecca Maloney