22 January 2009

Visiting Libraries, Pt. 1

I'm making an effort to get out from behind the computer and get out to the physical resources. I'm planning visits to multiple libraries, some that I've visited before and others that I haven't.

Today I visited two local libraries: Lawrenceville Public Library & Five Forks Public Library. Both are part of the Gwinnett County Public Library System. Gwinnett County Libraries, in general, offer HeritageQuest and Ancestry.com Library edition for their members.

The Five Forks branch has a microfilm readers and offers the AJC, Gwinnett Daily Post and NY Times on microfilm. They only have one reader, so I have had to wait to use it on occasion. The reader is brand new and now features a 'save to disk' option. I've yet to remember to bring my flash drive, so I haven't tried that function yet.

The genealogy section at the FF branch is rather small:

Collins Hill

It consists mainly of advice books, but does have some Gwinnett County Census Index records. I was unaware that this branch carried Everton's Genealogical Helper, which is chock-full of great information. It doesn't look like it's possible to reserve copies though, so it might be hard to get ahold of the new issues as they are released.

The Lawrenceville branch is the central branch for the county. It's older and doesn't have as much room. However, it does have a larger genealogy section than Five Forks. The selection seems somewhat random - there are a lot of books on Crawford County, which is 120 miles away. Many of the books have stickers or stamps that indicate that they were donated to the now defunct Lanier Library, just a little north of us.

There are a few really nice volumes, such as Georgia Interstate Records, Georgia Bible Records, and (for my research purposes) Hart County Marriage Records. Here's a look at their books:

Lawrenceville

I hope to visit the Decatur Public Library in neighboring DeKalb County tomorrow. From the look of their website, they have an even larger genealogy collection.


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