Indexing is a great way to participate in genealogy while taking a break from research.\u00a0 And who knows, maybe you’ll even come across an ancestor!<\/p>\n
There are probably hundreds of projects going on (think genealogical and historical societies).\u00a0 There are also two huge projects going on that are focused on making indexes available and searchable online.<\/p>\n
Volunteer to help out local genealogical\/historical societies with their indexing and transcription project.\u00a0 Or, if you’re feeling bold, create your own project.\u00a0 You could index surnames in local history books or newspapers, or you could transcribe cemetery records.\u00a0 Be creative, but also find ways to share the information with others.<\/p>\n There are several ways you can help others solve those little mysteries.\u00a0 It’s really a case of good karma, help others and others will help you, and it’s really true!\u00a0 Here are some ways you can help:<\/p>\n Unclaimed Persons<\/a> – A group of people who try to locate next-of-kin for deceased persons.\u00a0 You can participate through their Facebook Group.<\/p>\n Random Acts of Genealogical Kindness (RAOGK)<\/a> – This is a website that holds a listing of people by state and county, who are willing to do small genealogical tasks.\u00a0 These tasks could include making court record copies, lookups, or photographing gravestones.\u00a0 You choose what you are willing to do.\u00a0 Head over to the RAOGK website and sign up as a volunteer.<\/p>\n Books We Own<\/a> – This website provides a listing of books that other people own and who are willing to do lookups.\u00a0 If you have some books (genealogies, local histories, etc.) stop by and sign up as a volunteer.<\/p>\n USGenWeb<\/a> – All of those documents and transcriptions you’ve collected could be of great help to others.\u00a0 USGenWeb is designed to put people in touch with information for a particular county.\u00a0 Collect some of your records and head over the the applicable state\/county site and submit your info.\u00a0 You can also volunteer to do lookups.\u00a0 You may also want to participate in some of their index\/transcription projects<\/a>.\u00a0 Or volunteer to adopt an orphan county by becoming a County Coordinator.<\/p>\n Message Boards – There are many genealogy-related message boards.\u00a0 Two of the most popular are RootsWeb<\/a> (an Ancestry<\/a> community) and GenForum<\/a> (at genealogy.com<\/a>).\u00a0 Spend some time perusing the boards and see if there is anyone you can help.\u00a0 Who knows, you may just discover a cousin!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Sometimes you just need a break from your own family research.\u00a0 Sometimes it’s best to step away from the brick wall to get a fresh perspective.\u00a0 But as we all know, genealogy is a passion, so it’s hard to break away.\u00a0 That being said, there […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[27,25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-how-to","category-genblog","cat-27-id","cat-25-id"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3HcLI-hp","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1079"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1079\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4255,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1079\/revisions\/4255"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/genealogy.julietarr.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"FSIss\"](\"http:\/\/lh5.ggpht.com\/_udfzp1vLXt0\/SXKetqlwx-I\/AAAAAAAACyw\/dWMobIpsu5s\/FSIss4.jpg?imgmax=800\")
Family Search’s Worldwide Indexing Projects<\/a> – Family Search is a service provided by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.\u00a0 It offers free access records worldwide.\u00a0 Many indexing projects have already been completed.\u00a0 But there are plenty more to go around.\u00a0 To participate in an indexing project, simply sign up, download their program, and start indexing.\u00a0 The program is easy to use and once you get into a rhythm, it goes by very quickly (assuming the one you’re working on is not terribly illegible).<\/p>\n![\"WAPss\"](\"http:\/\/lh6.ggpht.com\/_udfzp1vLXt0\/SXKeuO4DFQI\/AAAAAAAACy0\/Gykn9roOejM\/WAPss4.jpg?imgmax=800\")
Ancestry’s World Archive Projects<\/a> – This indexing project is fairly new.\u00a0 According to their site “The World Archives Project lets anyone from the genealogy community help bring FREE historical record collections to the public. Contributors become the first to see new collections as they type in information that creates searchable record indexes.”\u00a0 To participate, sign up (or login to your existing Ancestry account), download the software, and start indexing.\u00a0 The program is a little tedious until you get used to it.<\/p>\nHelp Others<\/strong><\/h6>\n