Is there a free Government sponsored Genealogy Website?

Sabra Roers: Some state and county governments do have websites with free online databases and/or indexes of certain historical records, such as birth and death records. You won't find family trees on these websites (there's no army of government employed genealogists diligently tracing everyone's ancestry); but you may find records that are helpful in piecing together your family tree.Illinois has some good free databases:http://www.cyberdriveillinois.com/departments/arch...Cook County (Chicago) has some:http://www.cookcountygenealogy.com/Missouri has some:http://www.sos.mo.gov/archives/resources/deathcert...Visit Cyndi's List and see what's available for your state of interest:http://cyndislist.com/...Show more

Lilli Kochel: Government sponsored? Heaven's forbid! The Government is interferring way too much now!So, try all of these (don't forget the Mormons and your local public library, search engines, and Yahoo! Genealogy answers!!!):You should start by asking! all your living relatives about family history. Then, armed with that information, you can go to your public library and check to see if it has a genealogy department. Most do nowadays; also, don't forget to check at community colleges, universities, etc. Our public library has both www.ancestry.com and www.heritagequest.com free for anyone to use (no library card required).Another place to check out is any of the Mormon's Family History Centers. They allow people to search for their family history (and, NO, they don't try to convert you).A third option is one of the following websites:http://www.searchforancestors.com/... http://www.censusrecords.net/?o_xid=2739... www dot usgenweb dot com/ www dot census dot gov/ http://www.rootsweb.com/ www dot ukgenweb dot com/ www dot archives dot gov/ http://www.familysearch.org/ http://www.accessgenealogy.com/... http://www.cyndislist.com/ www dot geni dot com/Cyndi's has the most links to genealogy websites, whether ship's passenge! r lists, ancestors from Africa, ancestors from the Philippines! , where ever and whatever.Of course, you may be successful by googling: "john doe, born 1620, plimouth, massachusetts" as an example.Good luck and have fun!Check out this article on five great free genealogy websites:www dot associatedcontent dot com/article...Then there is the DNA test; if you decide you want to REALLY know where your ancestors came from opt for the DNA test. Besides all the mistakes that officials commonly make, from 10% to 20% of birth certificates list the father wrong; that is, mama was doing the hanky-panky and someone else was the REAL father. That won't show up on the internet or in books; it WILL show up in DNA.I used www.familytreedna.com which works with the National Geographics Genotype Program....Show more

Arlen Hamper: There'd better not be - waste of my tax dollars.

Tommy Durrenberger: I don't know anything about a free government sponsored genealogy website. However, I do know about many other websites that are free, in that, the! y don't require anything you don't already have, like your computer and your service provider. A plan for someone just starting to research their family tree including links follows.First, start by asking all your living relatives about family history and get any documents or pictures they are willing to share with you for your files. You can photocopy or scan these and return them to their owner. Your public libraries will most likely have both Ancestry.com and Heritage Quest.com free for anyone to use while at the library and with a library card you can use Heritage Quest at home.Another free online resource is U.S. GenWeb at: http://www.usgenweb.org/ they have a page for every state and everything is free. Then there is Rootsweb at http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/, a free site hosted by Ancestry.com where you can search for surnames and leave queries on the message boards. Additionally, I would be remiss if I didn't mention FamilySearch.org they have many free online ! records and are digitizing more every day, all free. Their website is: ! http://www.familysearch.org/. Be sure to check each state that you need information from as many have their own projects, for example, the state of Missouri has a great website that has many free source documents online at: http://www.sos.mo.gov/mdh/ and South Carolina has many free wills at http://www.archivesindex.sc.gov/onlinear…Also, do not forget to check Cyndi’s List at http://www.cyndislist.com, which has many links for both free and paid sites.I’m sure I could come up with many more websites but these should keep you busy for a while and there should be lots of family history to be found for free with all these websites....Show more

Vickie Clampett: yes, but they are "modified" so you don't know the real truth