The purpose of this directory is to pull together information about Lutheran churches from various synods together into one spot for the express purpose of helping genealogical researchers to more easily locate the records they seek. Reformed and UCC churches will also be listed here since there is such a close tie, at least historically, with Lutheran churches.

The initial directory is for the United States, initially including all 50 states, but excluding territories and other possessions. Information for the territories and possessions may be added later.

All known churches will be listed under both an alphabetical index and a geographical index. These indexes should be your starting point in searching for information about specific churches.

• Alphabetical Index
• Geographical Index

Ultimately the goal is to have a separate webpage for each church, including many different kinds of information:

• Whether the church still exists, and if so:
  • Current contact information
  • Current synodical affiliation
• Photo(s) if available
• Historical information
  • Founding -- when, where & by whom
  • Changes in buildings/locations over the years
  • Changes in synodical affiliation over the years
  • Any special historical events associated with the church
  • Surnames known to be affiliated with this church
• Cemetery information
  • Location of associated cemetery/cemeteries
  • Scan of plot map if available
  • Current source of information for cemetery records
• Church records
  • Location of & contact info for current church records, if known
  • Location of & contact info for older church records, if different
• Sources of information for the church
  • Any published books that contain records of this church
  • Microfilm number(s) for church records if filmed by LDS
  • Any online sources of information, such as birth, baptism, marriage, death or burial records
• List of researchers
  • Contact info for people who have access to the records and are willing to do lookups
  • Contact info for people who might not have access to the records, but are researching ancestors associated with the church, perhaps listing the name(s) of the ancestor(s).

Also, if someone has records to publish, but they don't know where to publish them, these individual church webpages would be an ideal location. Please contact me if you have records to publish that you would like to add to one or more of these pages. No records that are copyrighted will be published here, unless the copyright holder gives permission.

This is an ambitious goal which is a long way off from being realized yet. Therefore, this site will be under construction for the foreseeable future. If you would like to offer your help in creating and maintaining the webpages in the directory, please send an e-mail to me (Mary D. Taffet) at mdtaffet@syr.edu.

Links to my other web pages:

• Mary D. Taffet's Genealogy Page at Rootsweb Freepages
• Mary D. Taffet's Genealogy Page at Rootsweb Homepages
• Mary D. Taffet's Home Page (at Syracuse University)
• Mary D. Taffet's Genealogy Page (at Syracuse University)
• Mary D. Taffet's Family Page (at Familytreemaker)

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This page was last modified: Wednesday, 20-Oct-2004 00:46:35 MDT