The News of the Family History Library is copyright by the Corporation of the President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It is offered to CompuServe subscribers for their personal use. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- News of the Family History Library 35 North West Temple Street, Salt Lake City, Utah 84150 Vol. 3, No. 1 Winter 1991 News of the Family History Library is published six times yearly by the Family History Department of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. ISSN 1052-8644. Not available by subscription. General information about the hours and services of the Family History Library is available at 801-240-2331. Comments are welcome. Please address them to Editor, News of the Family History Library, 35 North West Temple Street, Salt Lake City, UT 84150. FROM THE DIRECTOR In 1991, we will issue News of the Family History Library quarterly. We invite you to copy the text in full or in part and share it with others. In this issue, we are announcing a new feature of the Family History Library Catalog(TM) on compact disc and recent acquisitions. We will also clarify information about Ancestral File(TM). David M. Mayfield FAMILY HISTORY LIBRARY CATALOG LOCALITY BROWSE Locality Browse, a new Family Search feature for the compact disc edition of the Family History Library Catalog, is similar to a gazetteer. It lists the localities in the Family History Library Catalog in the following ways: towns in the world towns in a county towns in a state or country counties in the world counties in a state or country states and countries Locality Browse can also manipulate the lists to reveal several types of information. For example, if you know that the name of a town begins with Mar and is in England, you can list all towns in England that begin with Mar. Or if you know the name of a town but do not know what state it is in, you can list all the towns in the catalog with that name and see which states have a town by that name. The Locality Browse has one function for topics which the Locality Search does not. On the Topic Display window you can press the F6 function key to change from a town to its county or state. ANCESTRAL FILE Contributing to Ancestral File A brief guide entitled Contributing Information to Ancestral File is now available free of charge at the Family History Library and at our family history centers in the United States and Canada. It briefly explains the basic steps required to contribute information to Ancestral File. A number of questions are frequently asked about contributing to Ancestral File. Here are a few of them and their answers: How do I computerize my data when I do not have a computer? All Ancestral File contributions should be on a floppy diskette in GEDCOM format. If you do not own a computer or the necessary software, you may be able to use Personal Ancestral File at a Latter-day Saint family history center. You can also encourage genealogical societies and public libraries in your area to make Personal Ancestral File or other Ancestral File-registered software available on their personal computers. For a list of Ancestral File-registered software packages see the September/October issue of the News. The following programs have since been registered: SesameTM (COMMSOFT, Inc.) Griot Alternative (Thierry Pertuy) Brother's Keeper (Brother's Keeper) If you cannot computerize your own material, please consider these suggestions: Ask someone in your family, church, or community to do it for you. Have someone in your family organization do it. Hire someone to do it. Individuals and firms now advertise this service in genealogy magazines. How do I decide when and what to contribute? Few, if any, pedigrees are completely finished or completely accurate. Do not wait until you have every detail before submitting the information. To prevent submitting data already in the file, we encourage you to check Ancestral File before you contribute your data. However, if you don't have ready access to Ancestral File, or if you have too many names to check in the file, feel free to contribute all of your data. Ancestral File should be able to determine which of your data is new information. What should I do about source notes? We encourage you to include sources notes in contributions to Ancestral File, but we do not require them. If you have source notes in your computerized data, include only the genealogical, not autobiographical or historic, citations in your contribution. Contributing Information to Ancestral File explains how to do this using Personal Ancestral File. If you did not enter your sources, do not wait until you have added them before submitting your information. We will be happy to add your family information without sources. Please note that the current version of FamilySearch does not allow you to view source notes. A future version of the program will allow you to view source notes if they were submitted with the family information. RECENT ACQUISITIONS FOR THE UNITED STATES California - Naturalization U.S. District Court, California Southern District, General Card Index to Naturalized Citizens, 1915-1978 (114 microfilms). California - Genealogy - Indexes California Information File, 1846-1986; these 717,000 index cards from the State Library include citations to California periodicals, newspapers, manuscript collections, county histories, and biographical sources (550 microfiche). California - San Francisco - Newspapers San Francisco Newspaper Index, 1904-1959 (703 microfiche). Connecticut - Military Records Military Census Questionnaires, 1917-8; indexed by town, then by person (454 microfilms). Iowa - Military Records Grand Army of the Republic, Index and Post Returns, 1840-1900 (69 microfilms). North Carolina - Military Records Applications for Confederate Soldiers' and Widows' Pensions, 1885-1950s; alphabetical in two sets (105 microfilms). United States - Directories The Family History Library has purchased an extensive collection of city directories on microfilm from Research Publications for 1790 through 1935. The number of cities covered depends on time period: 1790 - 1860 249 cities 1861 - 1901 79 cities 1902 - 1935 54 cities Of the 50 largest cities in terms of 1910 population, the following are not included in the new 1902-1935 set of directories: Albany, Birmingham, Bridgeport, Chicago, Jersey City, Louisville, Oakland, Spokane, and Toledo. The Family History Library may already have acquired directories for these cities elsewhere. To find available city directories, search the catalog under UNITED STATES - DIRECTORIES or STATE - COUNTY - CITY - DIRECTORIES. City directories are generally published annually and are arranged alphabetically (like a telephone book) by head of household. Directories do not always mention other family members. For example, the 1905 Lakeside City Directory of Chicago mentions only 688,000 of the city's 2,273,000 residents.