The 'Old Kentucky' Home



KY-LyleKentucky has a long history, first as a pioneer region for those who wanted a new area to settle, away from the Atlantic coast. Most early settlers were along the Ohio River, which borders to the north.

If you has ancestors at any time born, raised or lived in the territory or state of Kentucky you will need to review this site, ‘Kentucky Digital Library‘. This online site has amassed a large collection of family and individual related materials. There are newspapers, maps, books, photographs, oral histories and individual collections such as yearbooks, Lincoln papers and family letters. All together, about 1.5 million items. All of the items are in digital format so you can search and view on your computer. The material is held by numerous universities and museums in or serving Kentucky. By making the items digital it then become accessible to many people around the globe.

Taking each category, such as ‘Images‘ there is a search box at the top to investigate if anything related to an ancestor is in that section. Find an image of interest, click on it to enlarge. You can make it larger by clicking on the plus (+) to the upper left corner.

KY-newspaper 1891Saving an image to your computer is a bit harder. You need to do a ‘screen print’ – hold the ‘ctrl’ key and the ‘screen print’ key – both at the same time. Then paste the saved image into to a photo software program to save as a jpeg image to the computer. View the ‘details’ tab on the image to learn any additional information.

The newspaper collection has papers going back with Kentucky news to the 1830s. Again do a search to see if there was a business or a news article done on an ancestor.

One of the best sources in doing family history research are maps, especially those where streets, homes and businesses are marked. If you find of of an ancestral hometown in Kentucky, even close to the time frame the relatives lived there, do save it. KY-Map 1905

The book section can have books possibly by your ancestors, or histories of specific hometowns or book about your family. Any selected here will have each page of the book in digital format so you can read over each page and enlarge as needed.

Any Kentucky relatives, this site is worthwhile reviewing.

Photos: Lyle Family gentleman, 1891 newspaper advertisement and map of Adairville, KY in 1905.

Related FamilyTree.com genealogy blogs:

Kentucky Digital

State Archives

Digital Denver, Colorado

 

< Return To Blog