Recently I spent the week with my Aunt near Des Moines, Iowa and thought I would take the opportunity to do some research at the Iowa Genealogical Society Library as well as the Iowa Historical Library. Since I was going to be there for several days on the first day I wanted to spend time getting to know the library. I did have a couple of articles I found on PERSI and a book that I wanted to look at plus I am always looking for my grandfather's birth certificate and family of one of my great -great grandmothers. I had been near the libraries during a recent visit to town so knew the building and parking situation. So here we gooooooooooooooooooooooooo.........................................
From visits to other libraries I knew I needed to bring quarters, pencil, paper plus I brought my camera and flip pal and tablet.. I also knew there was not a lot of eating places near so I brought some water and snacks that I could eat for lunch. I had looked at the online information so was aware of the hours of operation.
When I entered the library I was greeted by several friendly ladies who welcomed me to the library. I was a member of the Iowa Genealogical Society so knew I did not have to pay a 10$ research fee. I signed the register as instructed. I explained I had never been there before and could someone give me a tour. A very nice lady gave me a wonderful tour. I think had I not gotten the tour I would not have been aware of all that was there. The Iowa Genealogical society Has: file cabinets with Family Newsletters; File cabinets with an assortment of family information filed by family; files with certificates for those living in Iowa pre statehood and for 100 years; shelves with magazines, map files, books ranging from passenger lists, lists of military pensioners; then books on states, book submitted on specific families; and lastly microfilm - vital records donated when they digitalized the county records, census' among many more. WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I asked whether they had the magazines that had the PERSI articles and they did not. No problem I figured the Historical library had those.
Now, to formulate a plan of action. I looked through the card catalog for the book I wanted to look at.
So, I next decided to do a surname search. My ancestry program on my tablet helped with that. I made a list of all the surnames who might have settled in Iowa. I had names from my father's family who settled in southwestern Iowa and my mother's family in south central. So lots of counties covered. I next went to the family newsletters to see if there were any for my family. Stuck out!! then took a couple of books about Germans who settled in America. and looked through them. No real information in the first few volumes. (I made sure I wrote the name and volume of the book as well as information on the title page and the Dewey decimal number on the spine) I was careful to place the books on the Book cart to be shelved by the librarian or volunteers.
I next went through the published family genealogies. I found quite a number for my surnames some even at a couple of publications. I decided to pull the book out about the "Cone Family" After pursuing a few pages I found a few names which matched my family. Referring again to the ancestry app on my tablet I found that birthdates, death dates, spouses matched mine. I then used my flip pal to copy the Title page, as well as the families that were probably mine. I noted the Dewey decimal number for this book also. I made a lot of notations also. I should add I asked permission to copy items and was told there was a $3 fee for members. (I was glad to pay as it helped cover the Library costs)
I had made note that they did have scanners for $.25 as well as a computer. The computer meant I could get by just my Samsung tablet.
Time really flies when you are learning new things. So too soon it was time to return.
When I returned to my Aunt's house I looked over my notes. Shared some of the names and she let me know what names she was familiar with. I got bummed out that the flip pal copies did not come out to well. I need to do some reading and practice some more at home. I blurred a lot of the pages and some of the ancestral charts did not merge well as their was lots of white space.
Tomorrow, I return ....
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