Hamilton County, Ohio Probate Records Online

It's always good news when new documents come online, especially those at the local level, as opposed to online subscription services. A recent article, "Documents -- some from 1791 -- now online," on Cincinnati.com reports that over 1 million Hamilton County, Ohio documents are now available online from the Probate Court. "These are probably some of the oldest records in the state," Probate Court Judge James Cissell said. "These records are part of history." 

The newly available documents, some 219 years old, include birth, death, marriage, estate, naturalization and other records, the article said. To see what's available, see the Hamilton County Probate Court Archived Records search page.

The National Road, Gateway to Ohio

The National Road served as one of the primary migration routes for thousands of settlers migrating west in early history the United States; it also represents one of first improved highways in the U.S., built by the Federal Government. In his article, "The National Road, Gateway to Ohio," Alan Smith reflects, "Genealogists can appreciate the date coincidence in many family migrations with the building of roads, railways, and canals. Suddenly we find entire families moving by leaps and bounds across America, instead of a few counties."

Ohio county histories online

Those with Ohio ancestry will no doubt be interested in a web site highlighted recently in The Norman Transcript,featuring local area histories for Ohio counties. The site, "Heritage Pursuit The Place For Historians And Genealogists," hosts two separate home pages, each offering different Ohio counties and databases. Most, if not all, of these county histories were published by W. H. Beers of Chicago and offer information about the townships within the counties, as well as biographical sketches of some individuals who lived in those counties at the time they were written. The county histories can be accessed by surname or other choices the researcher may make. The entire site can be searched or you can make a selection which includes individual counties, some specific databases within some counties, and various family trees that are applicable to the lineage of the webmaster. If you have Ohio ancestry you may want to check out this site to see if your ancestor is listed.