This week I was thrilled to see the addition of 987,415 U.S. Naturalization Records to the site. These are images of the original documents, which are loaded with great information. This release includes records from the states of New York, Pennsylvania and California.
In an effort to get these records out to you sooner rather than later, Ancestry released the images with a light index including name, state, record type, court type, court, court location, naturalization number, roll description and archive series. To capture the remaining rich information (birth date and place, country of origin, parents, occupation, residence, etc.), these records will soon be released to the World Archives Project. You can learn more about the World Archives Project at www.ancestry.com/worldarchivesproject.
Here’s a sample from the naturalization collection for Eugene Razler who was living in New York. (Note, this is only one of the pages. There are actually four pages of documentation for Eugene.) Click on the image to enlarge it.
Click here to search the U.S. Naturalization database.
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Don’t forget to remind people that the types of information available will vary greatly over time! The records of some of my ancestors who naturalized in the 1860s contain only the name, country of origin, date, and sometimes the place of residence–unlike the extensive details in your example.
I was pleased that the Western Pennsylvania original records have been added to this database, and the copies are better quality that I was able to get at the National Archives, but I have a few concerns about the filming and indexing. First, I’m disappointed that the ability to report alternate spellings is not available for Comments and Corrections, at least not for the original records I mentioned above. I knew from having seen the original films at the National Archives that my great-grandfather had two separate listings. But although I was able to report an erroneous transcription for the index, I could not do so for one of the original documents. Please give us the ability to correct transcriptions there too!
Second, when I tried advancing through the images to find the second document–which was supposed to be just a few pages past the first one–it didn’t seem to be there! After I found it by searching on the incorrect spelling, it turned out to be a few pages BEFORE the earlier date instead of after it. Is it possible that one or more films may have been copied in reverse order?
Finally, what happens if we find an ancestor listed in the index, but that name is nowhere to be found in the original documents for that court–not even under several spelling variations? Even clicking through hundreds of images on the correct “roll” didn’t help. It would be nice to be able to browse the transcriptions for each roll, which would be quicker than browsing the images.