I very much agree with you Marco, because I have seen a lot of mistakes on these forms, sometimes conflicting entries by several batch numbers which sources provided by several people for the same ancestor. You can find the originator by batch number but you have to go through IGI or LDS administration for that. The batch number will lead you to the source. You can then contact the originator and ask him if he is willing to share the documents that were used for the input. In my experience, I was not very often successful, as the originator had passed away - in the meantime - and the families had no ideas where these documents were kept. So you will have to find this same source all over again. You can screen Internet genealogical banks and there are many. Since most of them are given an alphabetical surname list, the scanning is easy. But I found that you get the best "hits" if you get in touch with genealogists working the geographical area of your ancestors and for that you can contact Rootsweb lists to give you a hand in establishing successful contacts. German place names do not guarantee that their geographical location is in Germany, as borders have drastically changed since after WW1 1918, and then again after WW2 in 1945. For this I found the Shtettlseeker extremely helpful. It is an old tool, but new researchers need to know about it. Remember that you MUST have information from lead documents to retain legality of your family tree, or it will be worthless. But it sometimes happens that we have to flag the work status for certain family members. It will help the individual who works after you to know how far you have gone to achieve documentation. Mostly, even distant family members will help you exchange information on common family records. But it will be up to you to negotiate an exchange, or to be willing to defray their research costs. That is a fair exchange. The document itself is a valuable item for which fees are paid. This has nothing to do with the voluntary service we provide for you by transcribing or translating documents so that you can merely understand the contents. If we find a "hit" for you, you can then request a certified translation. But the IMPORTANT and valuable part of any document is the source, place and date and legal name of your ancestor you are researching. All name changes or anglicizing of German names are recorded on the back of the US Naturalization document. Aida Aida On Tue, May 29, 2012 at 6:06 PM, Marco Scavo <marco.scavo@comcast.net>wrote: > The information contained in the IGI varies. Sometimes it's from records > themselves, sometimes it's from people. I would suggest that it merely be > used as a guide to doing your own research. I personally wouldn't read too > much into the lack of a father's name on there until I had independently > verified it. > > https://www.familysearch.org/learn/wiki/en/International_Genealogical_Index > > -----Original Message----- > From: german-bohemian-bounces@rootsweb.com > [mailto:german-bohemian-bounces@rootsweb.com] On Behalf Of judy petersen > Sent: Tuesday, May 29, 2012 3:14 PM > To: German Bohemians mail list > Subject: [GERMAN-BOHEMIAN] the IGI at familysearch.org > > Vera Nagel, Germany) raised the issue of the IGI in trying to help another > researcher. I have used the IGI (International Genealogical Index) but > have > some questions. What exactly is the info on the IGI? Is it transcribed > info from the actual birth, marriage, death records (civil or > religious) in a given country, or is it info from a researcher's family > tree > or Bible, etc. (posted by a person on the IGI) rather than from the actual > civil & parish records? > > German-Bohemian Heritage Society web site http://www.rootsweb.com/~gbhs/ > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to > GERMAN-BOHEMIAN-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without > the quotes in the subject and the body of the message >