Exhibitor Profile-Center for Family History and Genealogy at Brigham Young University

Booth #124

The Center for Family History and Genealogy at Brigham Young University is a community of family history scholars working and learning together. Our mission is to support the training of new family historians and genealogists, simplify the finding of ancestors, and aid researchers in the study of families and the populations in which they reside. Family history majors have the opportunity to be employed at the Center and work on various faculty-mentored projects to improve their skills. All projects produced by the students are available to the public free of charge.

Immigrant Ancestors Project: An index created to assist researchers in locating the birthplaces of immigrants, which are generally missing on records in arrival countries. Emigration records, such as passport files, passenger contracts, vestry minutes, and consular records are rich in genealogical information. Most are accessible only by visiting the archives containing the records. Students serve internships in Europe to acquire records identifying immigrants’ places of origin. At the Center, students extract the records and then verify data entry for accuracy. The project currently focuses on emigrants from England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Spain, Germany, and The Netherlands. It contains over 460,000 entries.

Script Tutorials: Guidance in the deciphering of manuscripts and other old documents that were printed in old typefaces or written in old handwriting styles. Languages covered include English, German, Dutch, Italian, French, Spanish, and Portuguese. This site is frequently recommended by FamilySearch Indexing.

Visit booth #124 to talk to the students and learn more about their projects and go to http://familyhistory.byu.edu.

Exhibitor Profile-Center for Family History and Genealogy at Brigham Young University