<p>Some of the information, or at least indexes to them, is available on-line, although I don’t remember if there was a site dedicated to it or if some of their collections had simply been included in databases like ancestry.com. There are also, however, LDS family history centers at various locations throughout the country that give you somewhat more extensive access, I believe, though I’ve never been to one myself. </p>
<p>The LDS church has family research centers( at the stake centers) all over the place.
You probably need an appt.
For instance these are the centers in Washington.
<a href=“Washington Genealogy | WA Family History Centers & LDS Records”>http://www.archives.com/genealogy/records-washington.html</a></p>
<p>You can call and go to your local LDS church, but depending upon the size of it, they may or may not have a lot of data locally. They are VERY welcoming to genealogists of any persuasion.</p>
<p>Familysearch.org is run by the LDS church and is free. It has many genealogy records from many countries. </p>
<p>“I’ve heard that the Mormons have kept extensive records–how does one gain access to them. Do you have to go to Salt Lake? Can anyone have access to the records?”</p>
<p>This is quite some time ago, but I used a local LDS family research center in my area - no need to go to Utah. I used microfiche. These days, I’m sure a lot more is digitized.</p>
<p>I also want to put in a plug for Jewishgen for those of you who are Jewish. I used the JRI-PL (Poland) database and from there was able to order tons of source records, which I then had a Polish speaker translate for me. Since I have twins, it was pretty cool for me to find, as I researched my great-grandfather’s family, that he and one of his brothers were indeed twins themselves.</p>
<p>Depending on the country, the records are either terrific or abysmal. Any Jewishgen records require a lot of squinting and a “that’s close enough” - I’ll never know exactly what year my grandfather was born, for example. OTOH, when I hired a researcher in Germany to track my pure maternal line from Bavaria – those records were spot-on, everything matched exactly, and like I said, I only stopped because I had determined I was only going to spend $X on this venture. </p>
<p>My cousin now works for ancestry.com and I have a goal of getting everything digitized and on there one day - my records are all paper at this point, which isn’t a good thing. </p>
<p>“My mom’s dad is a Romani from what was then Austria-Hungary (not sure what it is now but we say we’re Hungarian)- those records are pretty much non-existent and I haven’t been able to get past my great-grandparents.”</p>
<p>FYI, anyone can get the social security number of anyone who is deceased - go to the SSDI (social security death index) and search. For our generation, our social security numbers were assigned at birth, but for older generations, they had to apply, and you can order their application forms which will contain their (handwritten) parents’ names and dates of birth.</p>
<p>“My Irish side is a lost cause because my Irish immigrants both had SUPER common names and they came from Cork Co.”</p>
<p>Ha - same thing here! County Tyrone, represent! LOL. </p>