Issue 28.14
Part 2
It also means more historic records are being preserved and protected against future damage and loss, and the speed at which they are being made available online for research is rapidly increasing. For example, it took 18 months on average for FamilySearch to make a historic document available to the public using microfilm. With the new digital technology, a camera team digitally captures the image from its current resting place in some archive somewhere in the world today, and in just 2 to 4 weeks, it can be accessible online for the first time. It’s a new dawn for historic records preservation and access.
“These historic records are now literally going from the archive to your living room in brilliant, high definition images, just like that. The world’s archives are coming to you online,” added DeGiulio.
FamilySearch’s ultimate goal is to make the information from the billions of historic records in the digital images more easily searchable online for family history purposes. That will happen as FamilySearch’s growing base of online volunteers pore through each document searching for names and other relevant information. They have already indexed 3.2 billion records in this manner at FamilySearch.org. The most popular FamilySearch.org record collections today indexed by volunteers are the U.S. Censuses, immigration, and birth, marriage, and death records.
FamilySearch has worked with more than 10,000 archives in over 100 countries. Patrons will be impressed at the large diversity of records available online, like the Swedish church records and Peruvian civil registration.
“We are very pleased with the excellent cooperation we have enjoyed for many years between FamilySearch and the National Archives to microfilm and scan the Swedish church records. The simplicity of finding and reading about one’s ancestors on the web in the millions of scanned records will attract many beginners of all ages,” said Tomas Lidman, former Director, National Archives of Sweden (SVAR).
“The National Archive of Peru is very happy with the cooperative relationship we maintain with FamilySearch. It is already bearing beneficial fruits to the people of Peru,” Added Dr. Lizardo Pasquel Cobos, former Director, National Archive of Peru.
Visit FamilySearch.org, register for a free account, and use the Search feature to explore indexed records and the “Browse All Collections” feature to search digital images of historic records for your ancestors. If you want, attach your discoveries to their respective ancestors in your free FamilySearch Family Tree online.
For more information, contact Shanna Jones shannasjones@msn.com (435) 628-4900