Saturday, September 15, 2012

Research Location - Long Beach Public Library


Long Beach Public Library


Address:
101 Pacific Ave.
Long Beach, CA 90822
Located at the corner of Ocean Blvd.  There is a parking for a fee structure behind the library on Broadway.  There is also metered street parking, limit 2 hours.

Phone:
562-570-7500

Website:

Hours:
Sunday, Monday – closed
Tuesday – 10 AM to 8 PM
Wednesday, Thursday – 10 AM to 6 PM
Friday, Saturday – 10 AM to 5 PM

The Genealogy Collection at the Long Beach Public Library is under the oversight of the Questing Heirs Genealogy Society and is open to the public whenever the library is open.  They have a small but nice collection of books.  One of the things I found to be somewhat unique in this library was the fairly large collection of military registers.  There are long runs of: US Bureau of Naval Personnel Commissioned and Warrant Officers, US Coast Guard Registers, US Department of the Air Force Registers, Official Army Registers, and more.  They also have periodicals, books on Black research, general genealogy books, books on Cherokee research, references grouped by state, published genealogies, and even a small collection of books that can be checked out.

Some of the things I spotted that were specific to California research were Los Angeles Co. Marriages from 1851-1877, the 1890 Great Registers for Los Angeles and Orange Cos., a northern CA marriage index for 1850-1860, the 1850 Census of LA City and Co., Old Santa Ana Cemetery Records, and Spanish/Mexican Families of Early California, 1769-1850.

The Genealogy Collection just happens to be located next to the History Collection of the main library.  Here’s what I found for California counties in that collection  – at least the following county histories:  Mendocino, Humboldt, Lake, Napa, Tuolumne, San Joaquin, Contra Costa, Marin, San Luis Obispo, Santa Cruz, Fresno, Kern, Santa Barbara and Ventura.  There were lots of books on Los Angeles City and County and on San Francisco.  There were various regional topics, such as: Lake Tahoe, Sierra Nevada, Central Valley, Sacramento, Death Valley,  Anza-Borrego.  Among the many general California histories were The Works of Hubert Howe Bancroft, a number of his volumes on California history.  Also, adjacent to the Genealogy and History sections is the Travel section with lots of books on California.

This library also has the several newspapers in its collection: The Long Beach Press Telegram, The Los Angeles Times, and the New York Times.  They also have Long Beach city directories and old high school yearbooks.  There is a history of Long Beach Special Collection.

Submitted by Susan M. Hillier Roe

Saturday, September 1, 2012

ArchiveGrid


ArchiveGrid connects researchers with catalog records and finding aids for unique or rare materials (such as diaries, letters, photographs, scrapbooks, and bible records) from the collections of historical societies, museums, public libraries, universities, and other archives around the world. This database, developed by OCLC Research, was formerly available by paid subscription only, but now is offered as a free site.