City Directory Coverage Can Be Spotty in Many Ways

These days my genealogy life is busy and not very productive of blog posts. But this morning I re-learned a lesson already known to genealogists who are cautious or experienced or both.

We've all benefited greatly from the increased on-line presence of city directories on commercial websites. Today I was trying to track a particular couple through a few years of on-line city directories for Kansas City, Kansas.

The name I sought was not in Ancestry.com's index for 1945, 1947, 1954, 1955, and 1959 -- but when I went into the directory itself, it was there for each of those years. The error was not systematic; other family members with the same fairly distinctive surname were indexed.

Not every year is represented on Ancestry.com, and I wondered if KCK directories were not published every year, or whether the microfilming was more complete than digital coverage. It is, a little bit: the Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center's microtext catalog shows that they have the 1948 KCK directory, which Ancestry.com does not have (and which I will have to check on my next visit). On the other hand, Ancestry.com has the 1961 and 1963 directories, which may or may not be on the shelves in Fort Wayne, but are not in the microfilm collection.

Of course, directories themselves are not gospel either, though sometimes they may be about as close as we can get to some facts. I remember having one person's death record I had: she was survived several years by her directory listing!

No news here, just a reminder that good genealogy standards and practices survive digitization and other novelties. You'll find this one in Genealogy Standards #13: "Wherever possible, . . . research plans follow such materials [indexes and family histories and similar items] to original records and primary information." Happy Searching Holidays!

Thorough research in city directories, one quick example

I recently had occasion to compare physical and virtual city directory holdings. The results for this one location -- Decatur, Macon County, Illinois -- are as follows.

Assume that you're researching families that might be in Decatur over a 50-year period. Which source has the best collection of city directories 1870-1924?

Neither.

Exclusive holdings for each are in bold underline.

Ancestry has 1889, 1893, 1896, 1899, 1903, 1907, 1909, 1910, 1911, 1921, 1922, 1923

Decatur Public Library has 1871-72, 1881, 1884, 1889, 1896, 1899, 1901, 1903, 1904, 1905, 1906, 1909, 1910, 1911, 1912, 1915, 1919, 1920

Don't assume that local repositories have a full collection for their own city! Indeed, since these books were ephemeral, more years may yet be out there.

Methodology Monday with city directories

City directory research can be time-consuming, but the truth is I rarely spend enough time on them. This morning's stint reminded me that they are deceptively easy to use -- deceptive in that it's easy for us to leave some of their information ungathered. (It also reminded me why I sometimes prefer physical directories to the on-line versions.) Eight suggestions:

(1) Especially in the 19th century, different publishers may have issued multiple directories in the same year. Make sure to see them all.

(2) Look at every edition. Not only do some years contain obvious mistakes (obvious if we know the context), some years also contain unique pieces of information. More importantly, seeing them all allows the series of still shots of our research target to merge into a motion picture of his or her life.

(3) Check for known associates or relatives of interest and work them the same way as the research target.

(4) If one person is at 444 E. 44th Street and another is at 666 S. Presidential Avenue, check the directory's map or street listing or both. They might be right around the corner from one another.

(5) If previous research or the directory itself has provided the name of an employer or a business or a partner, look them up in the business portion of the directory. Where are they? Who's in charge? Do they relocate or disappear over time? . . . And check to see if there is a "vertical file" or clippings file on them.

(6) For cities and towns of the right size at the right time, don't overlook the criss-cross directory (which lists addresses in order, number by number and street by street). Not only does this make neighbors easier to detect, these listings may indicate who was thought to be the owner, whether they had a telephone (still an issue in the 1950s!), and who the various tenants were.

(7) Again, for cities and towns of the right size at the right time, don't overlook the appended directories for twin cities, small towns, suburbs, and farmers (AKA rural taxpayers, often with the acreage and/or assessed amount listed). Our people might be a few steps outside the city limits.

(8) Don't be too sure that a place was too small to have a directory. Size is relative -- especially a century and more ago, when most small towns really believed they had a future as economic centers. You may need to go there to be sure. Even towns that have some directories digitized or on microfilm usually have additional years that have not been picked up, for whatever reason. Worse yet, some small-city directories have been grouped randomly together on unlabeled reels of microfilm identified only by the state name. I have provided indexes to these reels for Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, and Michigan. But don't believe for a minute that those towns didn't produce additional directories. A lot of local, niche, and small-market publishers saw this as a business opportunity.

I haven't made up a form for all this stuff (similar to forms some people use to make sure they don't overlook items in deeds), and it wouldn't always help. Sometimes we learn of a new associate or employer, the research turns back on itself, and we have to go back through. City directories are the records that just won't quit.



Harold Henderson, "Methodology Monday with city directories," Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 24 June  2014 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : viewed [date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]

Now up to eleven mostly Midwestern indexes and finding aids

In addition to the nine links posted last year, two additional research aids are available on my web site:

Wisconsin Small City Directories 1903-1936 -- four rolls of microfilm published by City Directories of the United States, containing 29 directories for various years for more than 24 different towns and 7 different counties -- but labeled neither on the boxes nor at the beginning of the films themselves!

In order to make this resource useable I have spooled through the four films and listed title and publisher (when available) and date, and posted the lists and indexed them. This Wisconsin listing joins similar listings for Illinois, Indiana, and Michigan. I have included CDUS's numbers as well as the numbers assigned to them at the Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center, where I consulted them.

Few of these towns were able to support annual or even biennial directories, but it's a good bet that diligent researchers who visit local libraries and archives will find directories for more years than were microfilmed here. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries each of these towns had their own confident local business community.

Indiana private laws relating to La Porte County 1843-1847 and 1850, abstracted from Google Books. This is an experiment in making this relatively obscure resource more available. These are drawn from "session law" books describing the laws passed relating to particular people and organizations in each legislative session. Are your people mentioned?



Harold Henderson, "Now up to eleven mostly Midwestern indexes and finding aids," Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 24 April 2014 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : viewed [date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]

Nine indexes and finding aids on the web site

Continuing our holiday observance of free, here are five indexes and four finding aids available in full for your consultation at Midwestroots.net:

INDIANA

1857 Porter County, Indiana, Assessor's Book (all townships)

1902-1933 Indiana small city directories on microfilm; where to find specific cities and years on 5 otherwise unlabeled films, Adams County to Winchester.

List of Indiana newspapers available at the Mishawaka Heritage Center.

Finding Ancestors in Fort Wayne: The Genealogist's Unofficial One-Stop Guide to the Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center

ILLINOIS

1902-1933 Illinois small city directories on microfilm: where to find specific cities and years on 12 otherwise unlabeled films, Addison to Winfield.

MICHIGAN

1902-1935 Michigan small city directories on microfilm: where to find specific cities and years  on 7 otherwise unlabeled films, Allegan to Sturgis. 

MIDWEST
List of Midwestern city directories available on microfilm at the Valparaiso Public Library.

NEW YORK

Estate Papers 1807-1930, Box 2, Allegany County, New York, indexed by name and initial image number as found in the FamilySearch collection, “New York, Probate Records, 1629-1972.” These would be deaths in the 1830s and 1840s.

FHL MICROFILM

FHL microfilms already in the Midwest, including a listing by number of those held at the Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center.



Harold Henderson, "Nine indexes and finding aids on the web site," Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 5 July 2013 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : accessed [access date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]  

Valparaiso, Your #3 Genealogy Library Stop in Indiana?

Larry Clark has done a lot at Valparaiso. He oversees the genealogy room there, part of the Porter County (Indiana) Public Library System. The most visible thing about the room is that it's ringed with marriage and court records from the county clerk's office, in the process of being indexed. Next most visible are the impressive array of periodicals, including four of the five best in the field: The American Genealogist, New England Historical and Genealogical Register, New York Genealogical and Biographical Record, and the National Genealogical Society Quarterly. (And you can read the current issues!) Also visible are the extensive book collections for many states besides Indiana. Also visible, but expected, are good microfilm collections of local newspapers.

Less visible but highly valued are microfilmed records of the Gary Diocese, covering many years between 1850 and 1991, including births, deaths, confirmations, marriages, and christenings. Least visible but especially interesting to me is the large collection of city directories, with microfilms for 24 cities in Indiana, 14 in Illinois, 10 in Ohio, 4 in western New York 3 in western Pennsylvania, 3 in Michigan, and one in Wisconsin. These are not complete runs but they are way more than you'll find in most local genealogy collections. I have posted a list of the cities and dates at Midwest Roots -- part of my ongoing series there of "unfindables," undercatalogued collections in various libraries, including microfilms of old Indiana newspapers in Mishawaka and of small-city directories in Fort Wayne.

After Allen County and the Indiana State Library, this could well be the third best public library for genealogy in Indiana. Check it out!



Harold Henderson, "Valparaiso, Your #3 Genealogy Library Stop in Indiana?," Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 8 October 2012 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : accessed [access date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]

Top Five MWM Posts for April 2012

I have my own favorites, but these are the people's choices from April (rankings as of late May):

1. Illinois Small City Directories Content and Index (April 5)

2. Indiana Genealogical Society seminar (April 28)

3. Michigan Small City Directories Content and Index (April 30)

4. Top Genealogists on the Web (April 8)

5. Tales from the Courthouse (April 20)


Oh yes, and for you contrarians, this post was the least viewed:

Volunteer for the 1940 Census Indexing! (April 7) 

I'll post the favorites from May in early July, once the dust has settled. Sometimes folks read posts a few days or weeks after the fact.



Harold Henderson, "Top Five MWM Posts for April 2012," Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 2 June 2012 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : accessed [access date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]

Michigan Small City Directories Content and Index

There's still something cruelly tempting about an inadequately labeled box of microfilm! For those who don't recall my previous posts on this topic, I recently discovered (by accident, while looking at Texas) that the admirable "City Directories of the United States" series includes a few boxes for most states that are labeled only with the state name and a date range. The only way to find out what's in them is to scroll through and look, which can be a pain when your target may not be there at all!

Michigan has seven such boxes, and microfilmed therein are a scattering of directories from the early 1900s for smaller cities that didn't have continuous runs (or at least appear not to -- check locally before concluding that!). I went through and found that these films contain 39 directories covering 37 communities and six counties for the first third of the 1900s. Each film is identified both by its long CDUS number and by its short Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center number (where I encounter them); that plus the item number within specifies each directory. (Most city directories at Allen County are well labeled and catalogued in their microtext catalog.)

I worked from the title pages and did not analyze the contents of each directory. It could well be that some of them cover more of the surrounding rural county than expected. In all cases, there is hope that additional directories may be held locally.

Over at MidwestRoots I have posted the item-by-item, film-by-film listing, followed by an alphabetical index by community or county and time, running from Allegan in 1921 to Sturgis in 1934. (If you get lost just go to midwestroots.net and hit the top menu for "Unfindables" or the entry for Michigan on the list of categories on the right-hand side.) Happy hunting!


Harold Henderson, “Michigan Small City Directories Content and Index” Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 30 April 2012 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : accessed [access date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]

Illinois Small City Directories Contents and Index

There's still something cruelly tempting about an inadequately labeled box of microfilm! For those who don't recall my February 25 Indiana post on this topic, I recently discovered that the admirable "City Directories of the United States" series includes a few boxes for most states that are labeled only with the state name and a date range. The only way to find out what's in them is to scroll through and look, which can be a pain when your target may not be there at all!

Illinois has 12 such boxes, and microfilmed therein are a scattering of directories from the early 1900s for smaller cities that didn't have continuous runs (or at least appear not to -- check locally before concluding that!). I went through and found that these films contain 66 directories covering 100 communities in 22 counties for the first third of the 1900s. Each film is identified both by its long CDUS number and by its short Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center number (where I encounter them); that plus the item number within specifies each directory. (Most city directories at Allen County are well labeled and catalogued in their microtext catalog.)

I worked from the title pages and did not analyze the contents of each directory. It could well be that some of them have more coverage of the surrounding rural county than expected. Several of these directories are for neighborhoods of Chicago. In all cases, there is hope that if you visit or consult locally you may find additional directories that the microfilmers missed.

Over at MidwestRoots I have posted the item-by-item, film-by-film listing, followed by an alphabetical index by community or county and time, running from Addison in 1915-1916 to Winfield in 1924-1925. (If you get lost just go to midwestroots.net and hit the tab for Illinois small city directories.) Happy hunting!

Small City Directories for Indiana

There's something cruelly tempting about an inadequately labeled box of microfilm. I recently discovered that the admirable "City Directories of the United States" series includes a few boxes for most states that are labeled only with the state name and a date range. The only way to find out what's in them is to scroll through and look.

Indiana has five such boxes, and microfilmed therein are a scattering of directories from the early 1900s for smaller cities that didn't have continuous runs (or at least don't any more -- but always check locally before concluding that!). I went through the Indiana boxes and found that they contain 34 directories covering 24 towns and 18 counties (more northern than southern) for the first third of the 1900s. Each film is identified both by its long CDUS number and by its short Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center number (where I encounter them); that plus the item number within specifies each directory.

I worked from the title pages and did not analyze the contents of each directory. It could well be that some of them have more coverage of the surrounding rural county than expected. And in at least one case it was difficult to tell where one Randolph County directory ended and another began. In all cases, there is hope that if you visit or consult locally you may find additional directories that the microfilmers missed.

Over at MidwestRoots I have posted the item-by-item, film-by-film listing, followed by an alphabetical index to county and town and time, running from Adams County in 1908 to Winchester in 1912-1913. (If you get lost just go to midwestroots.net and hit the tab for Indiana small city directories.) Happy hunting!

[Added later: Amy Johnson Crow points out on Facebook that the vast majority of city directory films are well labeled in Allen County's microtext catalog (which everyone should check before visiting). The films I'm talking about in this post are a small group with several different cities included on each reel, not described in detail on the box provided by the microfilm vendor nor at the beginning of each reel. Since I need to know what's in the boxes anyway, why not share?]

NGS magazine

The Midwestern items in the current NGS Magazine include some examples in my evidence article and Carol Cooke Darrow's "Why was Joseph Gosling buried in Ann Arbor?" which reveals an unusual Michigan source for researchers.

Some other articles of methodological interest in this issue:

Jessica Albert's "Using OCR to search city directories by address" (applicable only to on-line images);

John P. Deeben on using unit records of combat organizations to overcome WWI veterans' record loss;

Claire Prechtel-Kluskens on innovative ways of using Soundex codes in searching; and

Robert Erland's case study of researching an unknown frequent witness on known relatives' records.

Find your Midwesterners in Pittsburgh

Thanks to ResearchBuzz for pointing out a very interesting subset of genealogically valuable material within the historical gold mine that is Historic Pittsburgh: 125 city directories 1815-1945.

As city directory digitizations go, this is a wonderfully well designed site. Let me count the ways:

* it includes actual images of directory pages, as opposed to error-prone transcriptions.

* it offers a long run of consecutive years, which is required for good research, given that directories often missed people in any given year.

* it keeps pages in their actual sequence, rather than mechanically rearranging them in numerical "order," or even conflating different directories of the same year, as Footnote sometimes unfortunately does.

* it allows searches of ancillary matter such as addresses -- making it possible to find extra residents at a given address, even if the city was too large to have had a criss-cross directory organized by address. So this new format is far more than a mere convenience and travel-saver; it is a powerful research tool.

Right now I'm recalling the long afternoons I spent cranking microfilm following my wife's Boren ancestors in the Pittsburgh directories. They were hard-working but not well off, and they moved every year. Happy New Year, and use this fine resource in good health!

Sanborn maps in Cincinnati!

I blogged about Sanborn fire insurance maps, a great resource for buildings up close and personal, in May and June. Now the Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County has digitized two volumes with more to come. They're in color, 1904-1917 and 1904-1930. Even if they cover the same area (not a given), the distinction is important because these were working maps and often changes were pasted right over the original version.

While you're there, enjoy their excellent collection of Cincinnati city directories, beginning in 1819 and covering pretty much every year 1849-1895. That kind of close coverage is what researchers need.

October News from Wisconsin

The new issue of the Wisconsin State Genealogical Society Newsletter (membership required) includes a bird's-eye view of the combined libraries of the Marathon County Historical Society and the Marathon County Genealogical Society. The available goodies include high-school yearbooks from 1919, wills and probates 1850-1918, Wausau city directories and telephone books from 1883, various church records 1860-2003, school censuses 1919-1962, plat books from 1882, and a marriage index 1899-1960.

It's a must-see if you have research targets in north central Wisconsin. As always, call ahead to check on hours and availability.

Methodology Monday in Philadelphia

This month the article study groups of transitional genealogists (mailing list archives here) are reading and discussing an article from the December 2004 National Genealogical Society Quarterly by Kathryn C. Torpey, CG: "Assembling and Correlating Indirect Evidence to Identify the Father of Susan Kennedy (1815-59) of Philadelphia." (The issue is available free in PDF format to NGS members. Aren't you one yet?)

One rule about all these articles is that rereading them pays off, and sometimes rerereading too. The writing is packed. A single sentence may stand in for months of frustrating work, such as this one from page 258: "Extensive research in Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Chester County, Pennsylvania sources -- church registers, Bible transcriptions, military records, pension files, tax lists, deeds, wills, estate papers, and orphans' court records -- has turned up no direct evidence that Robert Kennedy was her father."

The only direct evidence (that is, evidence that says straight out who her father was) came from family tradition and from an unsourced family history from 1906. She was able to find various bits of evidence that confirmed various elements of family tradition, among them a newspaper marriage announcement of Robert's 1811 marriage, a city directory entry calling him a carpenter, and -- most importantly -- an 1841 city directory entry locating Robert's mother Margaret either in or next to the household of Peter Devlin and Susan (Kennedy) Devlin. Of such gossamer threads are proofs woven.

Watchdog Wednesday

[A series dedicated to keeping up with the quirks of the indispensable big indexing companies, and suggesting workarounds or even actual changes to deal with them...]

Footnote.com's collections of city directories are admirable for offering images rather than transcriptions, and for covering long continuous spans of time (any one year's directory can be wacko).

Unfortunately, they also rely on the notion that there was only one directory for each city for each calendar year. After 1875, that was pretty much true in Chicago -- where most of my experience lies. But prior to that time there were often competing directory companies, which often adhered to different publication schedules. Footnote has dealt with this by interleaving all the different directories that it has assigned to the same year. (That's right, all page 4s appear one after the other. City directories are notorious for random and inconsistent pagination in various sections anyway; this just makes it worse.)

Under "1856," for instance, Footnote compiles together three different Chicago directories. (Note -- to use these links you must either be a subscriber or use a library that subscribes.)

Hall's Business Directory of Chicago (Chicago: Hall & Company, 1856), published 1 November 1856.

Business Card of John Gager & Co. Being a Mercantile Record of the Business Men of Chicago (Chicago: Solis, Zeller, Dow & Co., 1856), published 1 October 1856.

John Gager, comp., Gager's Chicago City Directory for the Year Ending June 1st, 1857 (Chicago: John Gager & Co., 1856), published 1 December 1856.

For any given page being viewed, the careful user can tell which book s/he is looking at by checking under "publisher" in the "About This Document" sidebar that Footnote thoughtfully provides. Careful researchers will be alert to this because they know that there is no such animal as the "Chicago City Directory for 1856." The careless user may not know this, or may not notice -- and may search the year for a target surname, get one result or none, and go away satisfied -- but without having viewed the comparable pages in the competing directories. I don't know of a way to search any one of these three directories by itself.

This was a competitive business with a short time horizon, not a public utility. I'm sure Mr. Gager would be astonished to know that we are still using (and misusing) his ephemeral compilations in the 21st century.

Midkiff's Online Directory Finder!

Blogger Miriam Midkiff has done more than have a great idea, she's implemented it in the Online City, County, and Rural Directories Website, and the accompanying blog. Find 'em by state and county; today US & Canada, tomorrow the world.

If you [heart] city directories as much as I do, and you know an online city or county or rural directory that's not linked there, let her know from the website main page.

Digital Book Index

Do you need more books than you can afford? Check out the Digital Book Index. I like to browse by subject (even though some headings are idiosyncratic), but it's all good. (Hat tip to Kathleen Lenerz on the APG Rootsweb mailing list.)

Under the subject heading "Local-Regional: Mid-West: Wisconsin," four pages of books are listed (in small font) including the 1889 Plat Book of Outagamie County Wisconsin (via the University of Wisconsin), Juliette Augusta Magill Kinzie's 1873 Wau-Bun: The Early Day in the North-West, (via the Library of Congress), and Albert Hart Sanford's 1908 The Polish People of Portage County (via Harvard).

Under the subject heading "Economic Hist: City Business & Commercial Directories," you can find city directories from Cincinnati, Cleveland, Columbus, Dayton, Fond du Lac, Milwaukee, and Steubenville, as well as quite a few from Pittsburgh and Hannibal (not necessarily listed together, however -- you have to do some work!).

All online. Almost all free. You may go down and not surface for a week or two, but it'll be worth it.

Cincinnati city directories online

I don't get to Cincinnati nearly often enough. But now their well-reputed library is coming to me...and to those of you lucky enough to have ancestors in the lower left-hand corner of Ohio. The Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County has PDF images of Cincy city directories 1819-1894 in their Digital Library. As far as I can tell, they have done everything right: reproduced a steady run of directories so that researchers can cross-correlate finds from one to the next; made images rather than transcriptions; and carefully distinguished between different directory publishers and date styles.

More Midwestern city directories at Internet Archive

Besides Indianapolis, Internet Archive's best midwestern city directory holdings are in Fort Wayne, Indiana (overlapping the Footnote collection) and Urbana-Champaign, Illinois.

Once again, I didn't find a good way to get the results in order, but for Urbana-Champaign I found directories for 1878-9, 1883-4, 1885, 1890, 1893, 1895-6, 1898, 1898-9, 1900, 1902-3, 1906, 1908, 1910, 1916, 1918, 1919-20, 1921, 1922, 1925, 1927, 1935, 1936, 1937, 1938, and 1940. Most also cover outlying areas of Champaign County. They also have a 1916 directory for the University of Illinois, said to include all 35,000 people ever associated with it up to that time.

For Indiana's second largest city, Internet Archive has 1858-9, 1860, 1862, 1864-5, 1866-7 (Williams), 1867 (Bailey's gazetteer), 1868-9, 1870-1, 1873-4, 1875-6, 1876-7, 1877, 1882-3, 1883-4, 1885-6, 1888 (called "v. 11 pt. 2"), 1898, 1902, 1903, 1906, 1910, 1912, 1915, 1916, 1917, and 1919. Again, many cover more of Allen County.

In the less-ideal-but-still-useful category, IA has a scattering of other directories. In Michigan, there's Saginaw (1915). In Illinois, they have Chicago (so-called 1855 and 1856, which are actually 1855-6 and a May 1856 supplement), Shelbyville (1909), and Galena (1854). In Indiana you can check out Valparaiso (1893), Kokomo (1910-11), Lafayette (1909-10), and Michigan City (1909-10). I'm not personally acquainted with all these towns, but you can pretty much expect to find many more directory years for each one in the right physical library.