genealogy and local history

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All resources are available for use within the Library. Resources marked with require a Resident* Library Card.

*Resident areas include Iowa City, Hills, University Heights, Lone Tree, and rural Johnson County.

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Contemporary news content from national and Iowa newspapers including The Gazette, Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier and the Quad-City Times.

In-Library Use Only

Search the US Federal Census from 1790 to 1940 as well as immigration, vital, military, court, church, and ethnic records. Explore city directories, the Social Security Death Index, and more. Remote access has ended, use is now in-Library only.

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Full-image access to historical Cedar Rapids newspapers and city directories spanning 140-plus years. A partnership between The Cedar Rapids Public Library, The Cedar Rapids Public Library Foundation, The Gazette, and Advantage Archives.

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In-Library Use Only

FamilySearch's mission is to help people connect with their ancestors through easy access to historical records, it has the largest collection of genealogical and historical records in the world.​

The world’s largest digitized and searchable collection of Freedmen's Bureau and Freedman's Bank records. This addition of more than 3.5 million records can help descendants of previously enslaved people in the U.S. learn more about their families. Requires a free Ancestry.com account to view the records.

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Search or browse full-image views of the Cedar Rapids Gazette from 1932 to 2022 via NewspaperArchive.

Full-text news coverage for Iowa City, Cedar Rapids, and 24 counties in Eastern Iowa from 1992 to present via America's News.

In-Library Use Only

The Gazette and area public libraries have partnered to provide library patrons with free, unlimited access to thegazette.com inside the library building.

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Formerly known as America’s Obituaries & Death Notices. Explore genealogical records from 1704 – today, including hard-to-find obituary content from the mid 1900’s, coverage from all 50 states, and original obituary images from historical newspapers.

A source for U.S. census records, books, periodicals, Revolutionary War service records, and Freedman's Bank deposit or records.

This full-image archive covers historical newspapers in the Iowa City area from 1840 to 1924, previously only available within the library on microfilm. Examples of included titles: Iowa City Daily Press, Iowa City Republican, and Iowa City Press Citizen. Visit our resource for a full list of searchable titles.

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Full-text results from Iowa City's local newspaper with coverage from Sep 15, 1999 to present, via ProQuest.

Full-page images from Jan 2, 1965 - Dec 31, 2008 provides cover-to-cover access to historical newspaper content from Iowa City's local newspaper. Every page is full-text searchable.

Full-text access to Irving Weber's 850 Iowa City Press Citizen articles on Iowa City and Johnson County history.

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Index to information in local newspapers and magazines such as Press-Citizen and The Daily Iowan. Press-Citizen indexed from 1961 to current.

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Search the National Archives for genealogy resources by topic or type of record.

Historical newspaper database online, contains tens of millions of newspaper pages from 1607 to present.

Full-image archive of a wide variety of Iowa newspapers covering 1817 through 1977.

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Access image-based newspaper coverage of the Des Moines Register (Jan 1, 1871 to Dec 31, 2008) and the Iowa City Press-Citizen (Jan 2, 1965 to Dec 31, 2008).

Full-text recent regional news content, as well as archives back to the 1980s. Covers news sources from Colorado, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, North Dakota, Nebraska, South Dakota, and Wyoming. Includes the Star Tribune, Dubuque's Telegraph Herald, Iowa City Press Citizen and Des Moines Register.

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Where to find birth, death, marriage and divorce records from all 50 states and territories.