Thursday, February 27, 2014

The Iowa Gnealogical Society Library 101

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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