Georgia Archives and Libraries

United States     Georgia     Archives and Libraries

To Do: describe digital collections at Georgia Virtual Vault/Georgia Archives

The following archives, libraries, and societies have major collections or services helpful to genealogical researchers:

Archives

• The Georgia Archives
  5800 Jonesboro Road
  Morrow, GA 30260
  Phone: 678 364-3700
  The Georgia Archives identifies and preserves Georgia's most valuable historical documents.

Georgia's Virtual Vault provides virtual access to historic Georgia manuscripts, photographs, maps, and government records housed in the state archives. It includes Colonial will books, Confederate pension appplications, County maps, County tax digests, Georgia death certificates, headright and bounty plats, marriage records, Spanish-american War service summary cards and more.

Two helpful guides to the collection are:

• Georgia Department of Archives and History.A Preliminary Guide to Eighteenth-Century Records Held by the Georgia Department of Archives and History. Atlanta, Georgia. The Department, 1976. FHL fiche 6100334; book 975.8 A3pg
• Davis, Robert Scott, Jr. Research in Georgia. Easley, South Carolina: Southern Historical Press, 1981. FHL book 975.8 D27d.

• The National Archives at Atlanta
  5780 Jonesboro Road
  Morrow, GA 30260
  Telephone: 770-968-2100

Libraries

• Georgia Historical Society Library
  501 Whitaker Street
  Savannah, GA 31499

• Washington Memorial Library
  Middle Georgia Regional Library
  1180 Washington Avenue
  Macon, GA 31201

• John E. Ladson Jr. Genealogical and Historical Library
  119 Church Street
  Vidalia, GA 30474

To learn more about the history and record-keeping systems of Georgia counties, use the nine inventories of the county archives published by the Historical Records Survey around 1940. Eight of these inventories are available at the Family History Library. Inventory of the County Archives of Georgia

Societies

• Georgia Genealogical Society
  P.O. Box 38066
  Atlanta, GA 30334

Web Sites

The following sites are important gateways:

The USGenWeb Project

A cooperative effort by many volunteers to list genealogical databases, libraries, bulletin boards, and other resources available on the Internet for each county, state, and country.

Roots-L

http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/roots-l/

A useful list of sites and resources. Includes a large, regularly updated research coordination list.

FamilySearch™

www.familysearch.org

FamilySearch is a good place to begin your research. Some of the records come from compiled sources; some have been automated from original sources.

See Also

A resource for locating archives in Appalachia is:

• Archives in Appalachia: A Directory. Boone, North Carolina: Appalachian Consortium Press, 1985. (Family History Library book 975 A3a.) The record covers the states of Georgia, Kentucky, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia. The record is arranged alphabetically by state, then by the name of the repository. Each entry lists the archive, its address, phone number, inclusive dates of the collection, the records of the collection, what subjects are covered by the collection, and the size of the collection. There are two indexes: Record type, and Subject, with reference numbers corresponding to the repository. Also included is a list, under “Coming Attractions,” of agencies that do not currently collect manuscript materials but plan to do so in the future.