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The Illinois State Archives include a state wide family history database including vital records database, Illinois State Marriage Index from 1763-1900, the Illinois State Death Index, before 1916, and Illinois State Death Index from 1916-1950.
In both the US and the UK there are volunteer based initiatives to digitize and index Birth, marriage and death records for family history purposes. In the US you can refine your family history search by county, state and names. In the UK you can access the index of births, marriages, and deaths from England and Wales from 1837 to 1983. The free BMD database includes over 68 million family history records.
The world wide web is a great place to start searching for family history. Just type in the names you are looking for into any of the standard search engine like MSN, AOL, Google, Yahoo or AskJeeves. Be aware though that this method of searching is hit and miss. Arcalife provides a family history web search that narrows the focus on the Internet to specific sites and categories where family history information is located. Start by entering the names and years you are looking for, and go from there
Family history interviews are a key skill for the amateur family historians. A good place to start is with your parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins in your close family. Another opportunity exists with friends of the family. Letting know that you are researching your family history can help you make rapid progress . Find out what they know about birth and death dates and places, marriage dates and places and the circumstances surrounding these events. It’s usually more productive to begin with the current year and work backwards. When you run into a family history dead-end move on to the next line or investigate the brothers or sisters of your ancestor. A lot of useful information can be found by researching the brother or sister of my direct line of ancestry. It’s a good idea to ask them if they mind checking their homes for information they might have on ancestors, family member, family history or family heirloom.
