Clermont County Genealogical Society
http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~ohclecgs/

Clermont County Historical Society
http://www.clermonthistoric.org/

Doris Wood Branch
180 South 3rd Street
Batavia, Ohio 45103
732-2128

Clermont County Library System
http://www.clermontlibrary.org/

Library Genealogy Catalog
http://www.clermontlibrary.org/research.shtml

1. Your first focus should be on the filing cabinets they have in the Doris Wood Branch library containing family files. I have found a lot of information in there and also clues leading to more research. Genealogy investigation is similar to doing any type of modern background investigation. You’ve got to be a detective.

2. There are three basic books which will give you background on Clermont County and what is available. They are available at the library.

“History of Clermont and Brown Counties, Ohio” by Byron Williams
“Genealogical Guide to Clermont County, Ohio” by Barbara McCarthy
“History of Clermont County, Ohio: With Illustrations and Biographical Sketches of its Prominent Men and Pioneers”

3. Census Records

The Doris Wood Library has, on microfilm, the following census years for Clermont County: 1820-1880, 1900-1930. That darn missing year 1890 has caused us all trouble! They also have indexes to the Ohio census for the years 1820-1880. Personally I recommend looking at census data in the leisure f your own home. All of the data is available at one of the following two Websites, both of which any serious home genealogist should belong to:

Ancestry.com Free Trial

Footnote.com Free Trial

4. Vital Records

Births
If you are looking for births here before 1867, you may be out of luck. There were some recorded in 1856-1857 but they weren’t recorded again until 1867-1908. You can view these family history records on microfilm at the Doris Wood Branch library in Batavia. You can also go to the county probate court to see the records. If you need other birth records from 1908 to the present, you can obtain them at the Clermont County Board of Health. There is no indexing available for birth records.

Clermont County Probate Court
http://probatejuvenile.clermontcountyohio.gov/probate.aspx

Deaths
With death records you may have a little more luck. They were recorded in Clermont County from 1856 to 1908. If you want latter ones, again, you have to go to the Clermont County Board of Health. Microfilmed records of the 1856-1908 deaths are available at the Doris Wood Branch library. Otherwise you can see the records at the Clermont County Probate Court. The records are well organized at the court house and easy to look through. These records do have an index.

Clermont County Board of Health
http://www.clermonthealthdistrict.org/

Ohio Department of Health
http://www.odh.ohio.gov/vitalstatistics/vitalstats.aspx

Wills, Estates
The original books for Wills, Estates and Guardianships, for the years 1800-1900, can be viewed at the Clermont County Probate Court. Records for these same years can also be viewed on microfilm at the Doris Wood Branch library of which there is an index.

Marriages
Many marriage records and indexes are available online. Do a search for these first. Indexed and microfilmed copies of marriage books for the years 1800-1874 are available at the Doris Wood Branch library. Clermont County has records of marriages available from 1800 to the present.

Divorces
If you are looking for family history records prior to 1934 you will have to search the Clermont County Courthouse Annex, Recorders office, which is within walking distance of both the library and Probate court records. If looking for records after 1934 you will have to check the Court of Common Pleas Office.

Clermont County Recorders Office
http://recorder.clermontcountyohio.gov/

Here are some helpful family history books related to vital records available in the Doris Wood Branch:

“Clermont County, Ohio, Deaths, 1856-1908: An Index” by Aileen M. Whitt
“Marriage Records of Clermont County, Ohio 1800-1850″, published by Clermont County Genealogical Society (CCGS)
“Clermont County, Ohio, Marriages, 1850-1874, published by CCGS
“Ohio Marriages Recorded in county Courts through 1820: An Index”, published by Ohio Genealogical Society
“Index to Death Records for Clermont County, Ohio 1913 to 1922: Held by the Ohio Historical Society” by Michael L. Whalen

5. Newspapers

The CCGS has many copies of newspapers on microfilm. The only newspaper earlier than 1814 that appeared in Clermont County was the “Political Censor” in 1813. No copies exit. Here is what you can find in the library from the CCGS.

Western America
1814-1816
All issues and an index

Clermont Courier
1836-1989
Gaps missing

Clermont Sun
1852-Present

Bethel Journal
1902-1988

6. Cemetery Records

A very good online site to find cemetery records is:

www.findagrave.com

When at the Doris Wood Branch library, check out the CCGS book:

“Monument Inscriptions Prior to 1900 from Cemeteries in Clermont County, Ohio”
This book was compiled by the DAR, Beech Forest Chapter and is an excellent book to look at.

Other resources at the library are:

“Cemetery Records for Clermont County, Ohio”, compiled by the WPA
“Index to Monument Inscriptions Prior to 1900 from Cemeteries in Clermont County, Ohio” by Myra Erion

7. Maps and Land Records

Clermont County, Ohio was founded in 1800. The land was part of bounty given to soldiers of the American Revolutionary War under the Virginia Military District. These records are readily available.

Some books in the Doris Wood Branch that may be of use to you are:

“Clermont County Ohio Deeds and Mortgages, 1791-1830, An Index” by Alma A. Smith
“The Virginia Military Surveys of Clermont and Hamilton Counties, Ohio 1787-1849″ by Alma A. Smith
“Clermont County Ohio Land Records, 1787-1812: Surveys, Patents, Deeds, and Mortgages with Index of Grantors and Grantees”, by Alma A. Smith
“Clermont County Ohio 1891 Atlas and History” by Aileen M. Whitt
“Clermont County Ohio: Atlas and History 1870″ by Aileen M. Whitt

The county Recorders Office will have old land records and it is well organized.

http://recorder.clermontcountyohio.gov/default.aspx

8. Other Resources (all links are as of Sept. 2010)

Clermont County Local History
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~clermontcountyohio/Index.htm

Genealogy Trails
http://genealogytrails.com/ohio/clermont/

9. Important books you may wish to purchase

First Ownership of Ohio Lands
Ohio Lands

Early Ohio Settlers – Southeastern Ohio
Ohio Settlers – Southeastern

Early Ohio Settlers – Southwestern Ohio
Ohio Settlers – Southwestern

New Genealogy Books and CDs
New Genealogy Books

Footnote.com Free Trial

Those beginning in family history research often are not sure how the classification of the information found really works.  To do research properly and to understand the value of what you find it is important to learn how to group your information into classifications. As well, it is also good to learn how the review process works.  Confused yet?

What A Source Is

When doing family history research you find out information from various sources.  Sources are things like family bibles, tax returns, census data or things your grand mom said.  More specifically we can classify sources into the below Types.

1. Books

2.  Documents

3.  People

4. Artifacts

Sources are considered “original” or “derivative”.  An “original” source can come in various forms.  We are not concerned with the reliability of the information at this point, but simply the type of information such as visual, oral or written down.  How was the information distributed to you?  To be original it needs to be straight from the source and not derived from some other source.

A “derivative” source is information that originally came from another source and so is repeated or copied in written, oral or visual format.  Such records include things like indexes, a typed copy of a record, transcribed wills, etc.

Defining Information

Having gathered your sources you will then have “information” to look at and sort through.  This information is classified into “primary” or “secondary” types.  Many researches get confused at this stage, by those two classifications.

Primary information is written or oral communication that comes from a primary witness to the event or from a person with first hand knowledge. An official who is responsible for directly dictating records of a court proceeding will produce primary information.  A relative who was at a wedding of your father will produce a primary oral history of the event.  A family member writing down births in a bible right after the event is producing primary information.  The form of the information is not important and the accuracy is not guaranteed either, but it is primary.

Secondary information is information received from a secondary source such as a story handed down verbally through the generations.  Such a story is far removed from the original witness to the event.  Again, the form of the information is unimportant here.  If the information you have on hand was written or spoken by someone not directly knowledgeable to the event or officially appointed as the recorder of the event, then it is secondary.

Determining The Evidence

With your sources and your information in hand, you can now determine how strong the evidence is for your family history questions.  Ask yourself, “What is the relevance of the information I have and how well can it answer my family history questions?”  Evidence is born from information and comes in two types, Direct and Indirect.

In family history research “direct” evidence is evidence that is complete in itself.  You don’t have to fill in missing pieces or assume things.  This evidence includes all the details you need.

“Indirect” evidence is incomplete and needs more supporting evidence before you can reach a decision as to its conclusiveness.  It can be compared to the circumstantial evidence decreed in law courts.  If you are looking at evidence that seems to need some assumptions on your part before you can reach a conclusion, than it is “indirect” evidence.

Check out this excellent video about citing online sources:

Ancestry.com Free Trial

Footnote.com Free Trial

There are several methods or principles you can use for searching land records in family history research to get a better understanding of how or where your ancestor lived.  One of the methods used is to recreate the neighborhood in which your ancestor lived.

You can use land records to reconstruct who lived in and around your ancestors.  They are a really good source for doing this.  The reason you should look at your ancestor’s neighbors is to notice any similarities between them and your ancestor.  Neighbors many times had similar migration patterns or immigration patterns.  You may find that it appears all of the surrounding neighbors came from one common place, either a foreign country or another state.  There were only so many migration routes from state to state, and your ancestor probably traveled on them.  If you had been unsure where the ancestor you are researching came from, this can give you a hint where to look.  It was common, the farther back you go for people to migrate together and live near each other.  If, in doing family history research, you acquired the land deed of your ancestor, take a look at the witnesses to the deed. They may have been neighbors.  By looking at the neighbors surrounding your ancestor you may find common patterns leading to more research.

In reconstructing a neighborhood while doing family history research you may employ other records such as census, tax or church records.  Using those records along with your land records can give you a better picture of the neighborhood.  If you were to look at local tax records you can see what families lived in the area.  Combining that with land records, connecting witnesses or examining tract books, you can confirm who lived near each other.  You may also find that some abstracts of land records have been published. They will list people living in the same small town.

Don’t forget to look at the Federal Land Tract Books.  Using these you can get a list of grantees as well as the location of their land.  The Family History Library has a lot of these on microfilm and many are available online as well (growing every year).

As an example, the below link is for a Federal Land Tract book for Butler County Alabama for before 1908.  It includes the first grantee of the land, and the location in range, township and section.  It also shows the year a patent was issued for the grant.  A map is on this site as well, indicating the location of the land.

http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Bluffs/3010/butl-idx.htm

Here is one for Washington County Florida for before 1908:

http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~flwashin/WASH-IDX.htm

The National Archives also has Land Tract Books which are excellent for family history research. You may want to visit them.

http://www.archives.gov/publications/general-info-leaflets/67.html#use

As time progresses so does the availability of family history records online.

As we move forward it becomes increasing imperative for family history researchers to go online and do research.  Gone are the days of all hands-on research. We all knew it would come to this someday.  Yet researching in the online world is made complicated by two things.  The records appearing online are scattered and what records there are many times cannot be 100% trusted since the data may have been entered by a human.

As any family history researcher who has been online knows there is no way to avoid an eventual membership to Ancestry.com or access to it.  This is the premier online genealogy research site.  Any researcher who wants to move forward quickly probably needs access to this site to do so.  We all do want to move forward quickly because, lets face it, genealogy becomes a rush to complete what you can before you become an ancestor yourself!

Footnote.com is another online family history research site you need to think about joining.  It also is becoming a mandatory site.  With regularity the only two online sites we belong to are Ancestry.com and Footnote .com.  Even if we neglect to join some of our other sites every year, we make sure we at least join those two.

We want to particularly discuss Footnote.com right now because it is increasingly becoming a really cool site (as well as useful to family history research, of course).  If you don’t already belong to it you will want to take a look.  It is a little confusing to use at first but the amount of information available there is staggering.  Currently there are nearly 53 million historical documents there!  This is not a sales pitch.  Footnote.com is simply becoming a premier research site.

What is the coolest thing about Footnote.com?  They provide the original scanned copies of the documents they have.  Pay attention to this important fact.  The documents there are not indexes or copies of handwritten copies; they are scanned copies of real documents.  So you get to see the original source records.  As a family history researcher this is like finding a pot of gold!

The Free Material

There are several good free things on Foonote.com if you would like to try the site.  Some of the free reading material is just plain interesting reading, but may not have much to do with genealogy.  Most of it does though.  Some examples are below, but that is not all that is there.

-Free Photos.  You can upload your own and make comments on others photos, as well as view a huge library of historic photos for free.

-You can read Project Blue Book which contains 13,000 government UFO reports on sightings from around the world.

-You can look at the complete Pennsylvania Archives, which is 100,000 pages of information from 1664-1880.  This publication contains everything from tax, early military and early marriage records to historical accounts of Pennsylvania events from the Revolutionary War.  It is essential to Pennsylvania family history research.

-The Papers of the Continental Congress are here for free.  These were the official records of the early congress from 1774-1781.

Membership Benefits

There is almost too much on Footnote.com to cover in this article.  The major benefit of this site to family history researchers is the ability to see original documents and to attach notes to these documents.  Through the notes and interactions with other people looking at the same documents you can share information and history with each other.  It kind of connects original documents, with photos with stories with comments so that you get a much broader and updated view of the things you are looking for.

Footnote.com puts it like this, “…is a place where original historical documents are combined with social networking in order to create a truly unique experience involving the stories of our past.”

The help section has some very good introductory videos so you can learn to work with the site better.  I suggest starting with these as they do help a lot.  When we first got into Footnote.com we were confused as to how to use it.  It is heavily picture oriented so a fast internet connection is best.  The software they use which lets us read documents is powerful but can get bogged down.

I can’t emphasize enough the staggering information being put on this site.  They add millions of records a year, so you do have to go back in often.  They are especially big on war records.  I found the complete Revolutionary War pension records of my 4th great grandfather.  It was a scan of all the documents in his file at the National Archives.  Incredible!

Some documents they are currently putting on the site are:

-Board of Commissioners – Emancipation of Slaves in DC

-Civil War IRS Records – PA

-Civil War “Widows’ Pensions”

-Bayland Orphan Home Records

-Custer’s Court Martial

-FBI Case Files

-Missing Air Crew Reports, WWII

-Mormon Battalion Pension Files

-Newspapers (317 titles)

-Passport Applications, 1795-1905

-Pensions Index, Civil War to 1900

-Much, much more….

Some of the above are currently free to use.  They are not just indexes but scans of the originals.  There is a little green bar next to the current items that Footnote.com adds which tells you the percentage of how far they are to completing a project.

There truly is nothing close to this on the internet and it is reasonably priced at $55-$65 per year (they offer specials often so the price is in this range).  One trip to the National Archives, even if you live close, would cost more than that.  If you are at all into both history and family history research we suggest you try Footnote.com