I hate to say it, but my wife is right...I'm cheap! Scrooge has nothing on me! Needless to say, genealogy can be quite a pit for funds. I think the only time I've really spent money on genealogy was when my wife bought me Family Tree Maker 7.0 about 7 or 8 years ago. Other than that, it's all been freebies. I've learned places to and places NOT TO look. I'm the guy who took the free Ancestry.com trial for I think it was a month and took several days of vacation from work to get the most out of my research time. I think you get the picture... These are a few of the good links I have found on my travels on the internet this past ten years.

There is only one way to go here. Personal Ancestry File by the LDS church. As seen in my "Genealogy-on-the-Cheap" Episode 1, this is all I use. Why? Pure Unadulterated POWER! Every other software package I've ever tried bogged down under the weight of my 50,000 plus person database. Also, it can generate decent (7.5 out of 10) web pages. I wish they'd do something to streamline the index, downloading a 5Mb file of all the people to find 1 individual is a pain in the keester. But, it embeds photos, audio and even video into the finished web pages! It also, in the entire time I've used it, NEVER CRASHED ONCE!

There are a few places that come to mind to do "General Searches" at. The first is Familysearch.org again. Their database is HUGE! The only problem is that you cannot always count on the validity of the record. The IGI is almost all submitted by other genealogists, some of whom are not so good about their record keeping and source checking. They are fine to use, but always find a second source for the information. I demonstrate this search on Genealogy-on-the-Cheap episode 2

The next is a part of Rootsweb, the "Worldconnect Project". I LOVE Worldconnect! It has helped me immensely with putting together the Abbe / Abbey descendant tree. The problems with Worldconnect are the same as Familysearch, they are submitted records. But, when you are going "downhill", towards the present, they tend to be much more accurate. I demonstrate this search in Genealogy-on-the-Cheap episode 3

Then, the simplest one of all, good old Google! I was doing a video for Genealogy-on-the-Cheap episode 4 for using Google, and in the middle of it found a bunch of new information on the Abbe line. I spent several days typing it into PAF and totally forgot about the video. I'll try to have it up later this week or this weekend. But, in a nutshell, Google, when used properly, is a genealogical cornucopia of useful information.

In addition to the Ellis Island records, Castle Garden has a large, free database of immigrants. If you want to see the actual passenger manifest, you have to pay, but those can be found elsewhere.

Anyone who has had an ancestor in the military knows how much information these records can provide. A good starting point is the Soldiers and Sailors website. This is for Civil War veterans only, but the nearly 2 million records here are a must see for any researcher.

Another site network I've been using for years is US Genweb. These are a network of State and County level genealogy websites that cover the United States. Some of the counties are very sparse with information, but I'm lucky that Richland county, Ohio (My home county) has one of the best sites in the state! (Thanks Amy!).

Captain Cheapo strikes again with this one. Heritage Quest is a pay site that has census record images from 1860 to 1920, digitized Revolutionary War records, and a few other nifty resources. I found that if you are a resident of Ohio you can apply for a Columbus Library Card over the internet and access these resources for free from home. People from outside of Ohio should check the websites of their local libraries. I also noticed you I could have done it from the Mansfield/Richland county Library's website, too, but I was bad a few years ago and ran up one heck of a fine. :(