Hi Everyone, The following article is the first in a series being presented in Rootsweb Review. I hope you find something helpful. My best, John HIDDEN TREASURES AT ROOTSWEB by Robert R. Tillman, President and CEO <rrti@rootsweb.com> RootsWeb's many treasure boxes can not be opened with just a simple "Open Sesame" as was done in "Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves." First, RootsWeb is huge -- there are literally more than a million Web pages of content and hundreds of millions of names on RootsWeb. Second, RootsWeb actually consists of thousands of Web sites, databases and files that have accumulated in numerous different formats over more than 13 years, and continues to grow daily. However, because this accumulation was not planned, there is no single place where you can search through all of these dazzling jewels. Of course, genealogists know that half the fun is in the hunt. Here, in the first part of a series, are some tips and a treasure map to lead you to the gold buried at RootsWeb. There are the "searchable" parts which are accessible through the numerous search engines at RootsWeb, and there are resources at RootsWeb that are not searchable, but which must be browsed. Take time to "browse" as much as you "search," since the free association inherent in browsing can lead you down many interesting and fruitful paths. Finally, come back often, as many megabytes of new material are added daily. o Mailing Lists. Browsing is the best way to find mailing lists that relate to the surname, location and/or topic of interest to you. Genealogy-related mailing lists hosted at RootsWeb can be found at <http://www.rootsweb.com/~maillist/>. Once you have found a mailing list of interest, you can search the messages year by year by using the Mailing List Interactive Search. <http://searches.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/listsearch.pl> It provides access to the millions of e-mail messages in the Mailing List Archive. Do a separate search for each mailing list and for each year that such mailing list is archived. Some messages date back to as long ago as 1987. o When choosing a promising list to search, be creative and thorough. Don't limit yourself to just surname hunts. While looking for a particular ancestor, check out also the mailing lists that relate to country of origin, places of habitation, migration routes, ethnic group and general interest topics, such as the Roots-L list <http://searches.rootsweb.com/roots-l.html>. Wonderful gems turn up in the most unlikely places. o USGenWeb Archives National Search. Search a large variety of material, including census records compiled by the USGenWeb Project, the largest volunteer genealogy project on the Web. <http://searches.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/htsearch> Tracing your roaming American ancestors? Try a state-by-state search in the USGenWeb Archives Digital Library <http://www.rootsweb.com/~usgenweb/ussearch.htm> o U.S. Town and County Database. Know the name of the town or city, but not the county? To find the name of the county, use <http://resources.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/townco.cgi> o WorldConnect. Search the names of millions of ancestors in family trees submitted by other genealogists. More than 100,000 new names are added daily. <http://worldconnect.genealogy.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi> Other places to dig for gold: much material at RootsWeb is not indexed by a search engine. In addition, it is often useful to browse certain material looking for associations, ideas, and inspiration. Search engines answer exactly the query you enter; however, you might not always ask the right question. Here are some places to browse: o Genealogy Web Sites on FreePages. This is a growing area. <http://freepages.rootsweb.com/directory/genealogy.html> RootsWeb Resource Clusters. These are research templates that facilitate research by surname or location. In many instances, individuals with Web sites at RootsWeb of relevance to a particular surname or location have linked their Web sites to the relevant resource cluster. o Surname Resources at RootsWeb. <http://resources.rootsweb.com/surnames/> o U.S. County and State Resources at RootsWeb. <http://resources.rootsweb.com/USA/> o World Resources at RootsWeb. <http://resources.rootsweb.com/world/> o WorldGenWeb contains links to Web sites listing resources available for researching genealogy related to many countries around the World. <http://www.worldgenweb.org/> o International Pages at RootsWeb: <http://www.rootsweb.com/~websites/international.htm> Good luck with this treasure map. May it lead to valuable new information about your ancestors.