>From Dick Eastman's online genealogy newsletter: A new Internet-based "Link To Your Roots" service of Hamburg emigration records is now appearing on the Web. I looked at the site this week and found that there isn't much information available yet. However, the site promises that much of the data will be online by the end of this year. Quoting from information found on the site: An enormous project was begun in May 1999 at the State Archive of Hamburg: in the course of four years the personal data of 5 million people, who emigrated via Hamburg from 1850 to 1934, will be digitalized and gradually made available for inquiries on the Internet. The idea hereto stems from the Publicity Department which also was able to rally all those involved. Making all this possible was a partnership between the public and private sectors. The software and hardware was made available by Debis, Oracle, Siemens, as well as Sun. 25 disabled employees will enter all data as well as answer any inquiries made via the Internet. Employees involved will be remunerated by the State Welfare Office, with financing protecting the handicapped by law, stemming from a number of corporations not having fulfilled their duties toward this law. Beginning in the winter of 1999 the first period of years starting with 1890 should partially be accessible on the Internet. The entire scope of data can be accessed for a fixed charge as well as the issuance of a certificate. In the long term these charges should be used to secure some of these working places permanently. Note that the site does not claim that original documents will be available online. Instead, it says, "the first period of years starting with 1890 should partially be accessible on the Internet" and that "...employees will enter all data as well as answer any inquiries made via the Internet." Remember that the port of Hamburg was the point of embarkation for many non-German people as well. More than four million emigrants, including about one million Jewish refugees escaping from Czarist Russia, traveled overland to Hamburg from many countries in Eastern Europe. That is why the Hamburg emigration lists are so important for many genealogists in the USA and Canada. The leading role played by the Port of Hamburg in the emigration business was primarily due to the activities of the Hamburg American Package Travel Company (HAPAG). Around 1900 HAPAG was the world's biggest shipping line and Hamburg the most important emigration port. HAPAG's strategy of employing emigration agents in Eastern Europe to praise the quality of the accommodation on the huge HAPAG ships resulted in streams of emigrants sailing from Hamburg. So it was mainly Eastern European emigrants who sailed to the States via Hamburg. Hamburg is the only emigration city in Germany that still has complete lists of all emigrants to the U.S. via Hamburg between 1850 and 1934. In other German cities such as Bremen, also an important emigration port, the ships' lists have disappeared or were destroyed in the war. In Hamburg the lists are not only complete, but they also contain details of the emigrants' places of origin -- a considerable advantage in locating ancestors from Eastern Europe. Now researchers who know or think that their ancestors emigrated via Hamburg will be able to find out for sure on the Internet. The 1890-1893 lists are already on the Net, and from now on, another year will be added every month. By 2003 all the lists with the names of around five million emigrants who left Hamburg from 1850 to 1934 will be accessible via the Internet. If you believe that any of your ancestors left Hamburg during the years mentioned, you will want to keep an eye on the Hamburg Link To Your Roots site at: http://www.hamburg.de/LinkToYourRoots/english/ Cheryl Rothwell clrothwell@mindspring.com