There is an abundance of old digital books available from sources such as the Library of Congress. Old books, especially those printed prior to 1930’s typically contain much greater detail, including names and places, than books produced more recently. Old digital books are often available in multiple formats including some which allow for full text searching.
Visual Access to Online Digital Books – On our website we have included several thousand online books published between 1800 and 1949 which provide great insight into the past . We selected a broad range of titles which include topics such as genealogy, family history, early settlers and military, as well as others. All books are freely available to view at no cost and can be located using our Google maps interface.
Pennsylvania immigrants 1727 to 1776 – A collection of upwards of thirty thousand names of German, Swiss, Dutch, French and other immigrants in Pennsylvania from 1727 to 1776 also, an appendix containing lists of more than one thousand German and French names in New York prior to 1712 by I. Daniel Rupp.
Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands – was established in the War Department in 1985 and supervised all relief and educational activities relating to refugees and freedmen, including issuing rations, clothing and medicine. We have identified over 450 books from the Library of Congress containing detailed records.
American Ancestry pre 1776 – In 1887 Thomas P. Hughes produced a 12 volume series American Ancestry giving the name and descent, in the male line, of Americans whose ancestors settled in the United States previous to 1776. We have provided links to all 12 volumes both in digital and text versions which are fully searchable and freely available at no cost.
Official Register of the United States – We have included over 90 volumes of the Official Register of the United States spanning the years of 1816 to 1959. These books include the names and salaries of all civil servants and in some cases members of the military as well.
Register of the Department of State – Register of the Department of State contains a list of persons employed in the department and in the diplomatic, consular and territorial service of the United States. These 38 volumes cover 1870 to 1950 showing the names and salaries of the staff of the Department of State.
Annual obituary notices of eminent persons – who have died in the United States 1857 & 1858 is a two volume set written by Natan Crobsy.
Pioneer mothers of America – a three volume set published in 1912 is a record of the more notable women of the early days of the country, and particularly of the colonial and revolutionary periods.