It’s being reported all over the place, and it’s a Big Deal – the US National Archives, in an quiet update monday (that’s still in “test mode”), has made it much easier to access their online records. One of the biggest changes – you can search all databases at the same time, rather than searching each one, one at a time. This is going to be a boon for genealogists. The records/databases that updated/improved, were picked because they contain information on specific people, areas, organizations and dates (Yahoo/AP).
Excerpt from a Yahoo/AP Article:
Photos of natural and manmade disasters. Lists of combat air missions flown during the Vietnam War. Rolls of those who fled Irish famine for the United States in the 1800s.
And much more, all newly accessible.
The National Archives and Records Administration has made it easier to search online through tens of millions of the electronic records it holds.
The revamped Access to Archival Databases site — http://www.archives.gov/aad — allows the public to search for free through 85 million documents in 475 files amassed by more than 30 federal agencies.
Full article here – Yahoo/AP.
An interesting note, and one I’m not sure of what to make, according to the Archives, the World War II Army enlistment database was used the most often.