TIP #235 - MAPPING YOUR ANCESTORS CONCLUSION. Again, many thanks to Ancestry for allowing this to be distributed. The Internet is providing the genealogist with many opportunities to explore new map sources. The number and variety of these maps is truly amazing. The Federation of Eastern European Family History Societies has a wonderful map room on their site. A researcher can view and download actual copies of nineteenth century European maps. The GenWeb projects worldwide are also providing enhanced access to map indices if not the maps themselves. One can see the 50,000 most common U. S. surnames mapped for the 1850, 1880, and 1920 censuses as well as the 1990s phone books on yet another site. The National Atlas of Canada is available online, offering some interesting search options. For researchers concentrating on the United States, the TIGER (short for Topologically Integrated Geographic Encoding and Referencing) mapping systems of the U. S. Census Bureau can provide a wealth of information. This system is a huge "connect-the-dots" database, which can be used to create maps that have customized amounts of detail. (See "Understanding the Census: A Guide for Marketers, Planners, Grant Writers and Other Data Users" by Michael R. Lavin, p. 186-189.) The "Virginia TIGER/Line Data Browser," available at the Virginia Digital Map Library site, allows one to select a county of interest and then further select the type of details the online map should display. Some of the features that can be selected for detailing include four different types of roads, railroad lines, military installations, religious institutions, schools, and cemeteries. It's almost like having one's own research map created. Once the customized map is launched from the digital map site, there are additional zooming features available to pinpoint many of the features more accurately. Printing a customized TIGER map and using it in conjunction with a political map for the same area can truly enhance research opportunities in a particular area. More and more of these kinds of maps are available on the Internet. There are a number of excellent publications to assist the researcher in becoming familiar with maps as a significant part of genealogical research. Among the group of the best publications is a compilation by E. Wade Hone entitled, "Land & Property Research in the United States." An impressive tome of more than five hundred pages, this work equips one with much information about various types and uses on maps. The second edition of "The Source: A Guidebook of American Genealogy" (Szucs & Luebking, 1997) also contains a useful chapter on "land and property records." Mapping one's ancestors can be a most useful and exciting way of ensuring that all available data for a particular individual is discovered and incorporated into the family story. BIBLIOGRAPHY: "Rand McNally Commercial Atlas and Marketing Guide" (Chicago, IL: Rand McNally & Company) http://www.randmcnally.com/home/index.htm "Map Guide to the U.S. Federal Censuses, 1790-1920," by William Thorndale and William Dollarhide, (Baltimore, MD: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1987) http://shop.ancestry.com/ancestry/mapguidtousf.html "A Handy Guide to Record-Searching in the Larger Cities of the United States," by E. Kay Kirkham (Logan, UT: Everton Publishers, Inc., 1974.) "Understanding the Census: A Guide for Marketers, Planners, Grand Writers and Other Data Users," by Michael R. Lavin, (Kenmore, NY: Epoch Books, Inc., 1996) "Land & Property Research in the United States," by E. Wade Hone (Salt Lake City, UT: Ancestry, Inc., 1997) http://shop.ancestry.com/ancestry/lanandpropre1.html "The Source: A Guidebook of American Genealogy," edited by Loretto D. Szucs, and Sandra H. Luebking, (Salt Lake City, UT: Ancestry, Inc., 1997) http://shop.ancestry.com/ancestry/source.html INTERNET LINKS: Federation of Eastern European Family History Societies (FEEFHS) Map Room http://www.feefhs.org/maps/indexmap.html USGenWeb http://www.usgenweb.org WorldGenWeb http://www.worldgenweb.org U.S. Census Bureau TIGER Map http://www.census.gov/geo/www/index.html University of Virginia Library Geographic Information Center http://viva.lib.virginia.edu/gic/services.html Virginia Digital Map Library http://viva.lib.virginia.edu/gic/maps/maps_va.html Editor's Note: "Printed Sources: A Guide to Published Genealogical Records," edited by Kory L. Meyerink also has a great chapter on "Geographic Tools: Maps, Atlases, and Gazetteers" (Salt Lake City, UT: Ancestry, Inc., 1998) http://shop.ancestry.com/ancestry/printedsources1.html (c) Copyright 11 March 1999, Sandra K. Gorin, All Rights Reserved, sgorin@glasgow-ky.com TIP OF THE WEEK! 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