WWII

Burned Records — The “B-file”

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As genealogy researchers, we have often heard the statement, “The records were burned.” The statement usually involves the records that should be on file in a courthouse. But there is another type of record search that often gets that response: Army records from WWI and WWII. That’s because in July 1973, a disastrous fire broke out

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Sisu and the 1939 Winter War between Finland and the Soviet Union

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I have just finished viewing Fire and Ice : The Winter War of Finland and Russia, a documentary video on YouTube. I was interested in viewing this because of my Finnish ancestry–my paternal grandparents emigrating from Finland in 1902 and 1903. My grandfather had many siblings and half-siblings who remained in Finland, so I probably

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Handy Feature of Online Catalog at Western Reserve Historical Society

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I have done a good bit of research into finding World War II service records leading up to Veterans Day (11 Nov 2014, yesterday). In the process, I looked for guidebooks available at Western Reserve Historical Society (http://www.wrhs.org/)  on such research. I used the WRHS Research Library’s new catalog search page at http://catalog.wrhs.org/collections/search. I have provided a screen

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For Genealogy Presentations, Turn on Closed Captioning for YouTube Videos

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Last evening, I presented a talk, “Digging for Data on Your WWI and WWII Ancestors,” at the October meeting of the Cuyahoga West Chapter, Ohio Genealogical Society, at the Westlake Porter Library. As part of my presentation, I decided to present a YouTube video on “Veterans Personnel Records at the National Archives, St. Louis.” When

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