Be Sure to Visit my new 1900 Galveston Storm Website at: http://freepages.genealogy.rootseb.com/~barnette 

INTERNET WILL RULE IN NEW CENTURY

  With it's meager beginnings as a small network of scientists in the early 1990's the Internet has expanded at a phenomenal rate into a humongous network of everyday people. The webmaster of  the megasite Rootsweb has stated their user traffic has grown many times over and doubles nearly every month or two. Much of this traffic and exchange of information is in the form of e-mails. During the third quarter 1999, Rootsweb moved 151 million messages on nearly 17,000 genealogical mailing lists.

 In November according to the Neilson Net Ratings for website visits, Ancestry.com, MyFamily.com and Rootsweb.com were the most visited genealogical websites on the Internet. They had 288,943;  255, 163 and 249,066 hits, respectfully.

 Governmental agencies in all states and many cities and counties have jumped on the Internet band wagon by maintaining a website. At the very least each website contains the address, business hours,  telephone number and other information about the agency. Some agencies, such as the National Archives and the Library of Congress  place indexes, descriptive indexes, extracts and digital copies of many of their records online. State agencies, such as the Virginia State Library, have placed marriages, Bible records, land records, military records and other important data online and with no user fee. Future improvements in Intelligent Character Recognition software will help make more documents and indexes available.

 During 1999 vigilant citizens in Texas were able to prevent the State Legislature from passing a bill closing birth and death indexes which are so vital to genealogical research. Had the proposed legislation not been posted on the internet and e-mail not been so fast the bill would have been passed and made a part of  state law before anyone was aware of its existence.

 As we enter the new year several free and subscription websites offer so much genealogical information it is hard to fathom the content or benefits of so much data. The World Genweb and the US Genweb connects every genealogist with most countries and all U.S. states and counties. There are groups of people on the Genwebs attempting to list and post on a website every passenger on every ship, every cemetery and every tombstone and every person listed on every US census.

 The LDS/Church of Jesus Christ LatterDay Saints website is only a few months old. Already the site has 600,000 names in its database and plans to have a billion by this Spring. While one may not view the county records microfilmed or purchased by the LDS, a researcher may view the index online and order microfilm from Salt Lake City. The microfilm will be delivered for use to a Family History Center in Houston.

  While the Internet is considered so fantastic and the reports so glowing, researchers need to continue using libraries, courthouses and microfilm. It will be a long time, if ever, before most of the raw documents are anywhere but in a courthouse file. Researchers should educate themselves on the availability of records and how to use them by attending classes, joining societies and reading genealogical journals. Genealogical research is not difficult, but it is very deep and complex.

 GENEALOGICAL CLASSES

 A genealogical class is an excellent way to begin the new year. Classes will be offered at several locations in Houston beginning this month. For more information be sure to read this column next week. In the meanwhile classes are schedule to begin at Houston Community College in Bellaire on January 25, at Houston Community College in Missouri City on January 19, at Rice University on February 17, at Leisure Learning on January 11 and at the First Baptist Church on February 7.

DGS SEMINAR and SLC TRIP

 Each year the Dallas Genealogical Society sponsors a research trip to Salt Lake City. The trip this year will be February 20-27. On January 15 the society will hold a full day seminar with tips to help travelers prepare for the trip to Salt Lake City.

 The seminar is open to all, but limited to 175 people. The Salt Lake City Research trip is limited to 60 persons. The deadline for registration for the seminar is January 8. For more information contact DGS Salt Lake Seminar/Trip, PO Box 12446, Dallas, TX 75225-0446, telephone 214-670-7932,  email info@dallasgenealogy.org, or, visit the DGS website at http://www.dallasgenealogy.org/.

       NEWS FROM THE BOOKSHELF

 Genealogically titled CD-Roms have been on the want list of many genealogists over the past several years. What started as a small group of titles, mainly census and marriage indexes has mushroomed into several hundred titles. Marthe Arends, author of  GENEALOGY SOFTWARE GUIDE,  has compiled a new book to help researchers make their way through the maze of new and old CD-Rom titles.

  Arends' new book, GENEALOGY ON CD-ROM  is a compilation of CD-Rom titles available which genealogists, libraries and societies would be interested in purchasing. The book is arranged by subject category. For each title the listing includes the title, publisher, price, system requirements and a description of the contents of the CD-Rom. The system requirements explain the computer operating system compatibility, such as IBM or MAC. It also provides the RAM, hard drive, monitor and CD-Rom reader specifics required to view the CD-Rom. An appendix of  publishers and a topical index of titles concludes the book.

 The category listing consists of the following subjects: biographies, genealogical references, historical references and dictionaries, journals, newspapers, military records and geographical finding aids, such as maps and gazetteers. It includes immigration and naturalization records, including ship passenger records and ethnic records, such as African American and Native American records. There are United States and foreign locality records and indexes, bibles, compiled family histories and genealogies.

 GENEALOGY ON CD-ROM, is available for $33.45, postpaid,  from the Genealogical Publishing Company, 1001 North Calvert Street, Baltimore, MD 21202.