FamilySearch is one of the most popular genealogy websites. Part of what makes it so popular is that they are constantly updating their website and adding records that genealogists can search through for free. It is an excellent resource, especially for genealogists who are on a budget. Here is what’s new at FamilySearch this week.
This week, FamilySearch gave us another update to their ongoing 1940 Census Indexing Project. Their blog is calling it the “1940 Census Indexing Progress Report”. As of June 1, 2012, the volunteers at FamilySearch have indexed 51.88% of the census. This means that they have indexed more than half of the collection in just two months time.
They note that this does not mean that more than 50% of the census has a searchable index. It simply means that the indexing part has been completed on more than half of the data. It still needs to be made searchable.
FamilySearch also posted some interesting statistics about their 1940 Census Indexing Project. At this time, a total of 72,893,427 names have been indexed and arbitrated. A total of fourteen states : Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Idaho, Kansas, Oregon, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, and Wyoming, are published and searchable. A total of 123,104 indexers have signed up to work on indexing the 1940 United States Census.
FamilySearch also has posted a blog called “Wuerttemberg Genealogy Church Record Extracts”. The blog gives some very helpful information for genealogists who are trying to search through these records. For example, there are some abbreviations for first names that a genealogist might not understand or be able to correctly identify. I am unsure if you can actually search these records through the FamilySearch website, or if this blog is simply informational.
They also have a blog post called “When You Don’t Even Know the Questions?” This post gives details about four videos that can help people who are brand new to genealogy to get started.
The videos can be found, and viewed, on the FamilySearch YouTube Channel. Each of the four videos was posted in February of 2011. If you have been using FamilySearch for a long time, you may have already seen these particular videos. However, if you really are brand new to genealogy, then you might want to take the time to check out the four helpful videos that are linked to in that blog.
Image by Steven Worster on Flickr