Land Records Research

Key Web Sites

Look who signed the record — and any other document.
Look for your ancestor in the census of 1870.
- This census lists the Township. This alone will put you without SIX SQUARE MILES of your ancestor.
Look for Maiden Name in the area.
Look at Related Documents.
Look at churches in the area. The cemeteries are most likely to be full of relatives.
Go to the Courthouse and find when and to whom land was sold.
- It may give you clues to wills and minor children or heirs and outstanding debts.
- Remember court records are about money not people.
Look online at Random Acts of Kindness, https://raogk.org/. Click on State Guides in the NAV menu. Then the county in which the land record was recorded.
- Note from a genealogy presentation 10+ years ago: If looking at “a current county map with road, streams, churches, and cemeteries as they are today. In the margins of these maps are listed the townships and Ranges … this [can] get [you] very close to the cemeteries [where your] ancestors are buried …”
- From the same presentation, the speaker strongly encouraged to research the evolution of the county.
  - The ROAGK site has maps of each state from the oldest map available.

Posted: 1/22/2022