Genealogy Databases

Unless otherwise noted, these resources are available at all Chicago Public Library locations and from home, school, or work with a Chicago Public Library card.

Ancestry Library Edition »
Ancestry Library Edition contains U.S. and U.K. Census images and indexes, the Social Security Death Index, World War I Draft Registration Cards, Civil War Service Records, Immigration Records, and many more sources for genealogical research.
Available at all Chicago Public Library locations.

Chicago Defender Historical Archive »
The Chicago Defender Historical Archive allows one to search the complete text, including classified advertisements and death notices, of this nationally-significant African-American newspaper. The database covers the years 1910 to 1975, and work continues to incorporate earlier issues back to the paper's beginnings in 1905. (To search for articles appearing in this paper from 1999 to the present, use Black Newspapers or Illinois Newsstand.)

Chicago Tribune Historical Archive »
This database allows one to search the entire text of the Chicago Tribune, including classified ads and death notices, from 1849 to 1986. (To search for articles and death notices appearing in this paper after 1986, use Chicago Tribune (1985-present).)

HeritageQuest Online »
HeritageQuest is a collection of digitized images and indexes that provide genealogists, historians, and other researchers a huge array of materials for exploring family and local history. The database contains images of all available U.S. census schedules (1790-1930); scanned images of the complete text of over 25,000 books on family and local history; PERSI, an index to magazine articles in the field of family and local history; images of selected records from Revolutionary War pension and bounty-land-warrant application files; images of the registers of the Freedman's Savings and Trust Company; and selected Congressional documents and reports from the American State Papers and U.S. Serial Set.