Sign up for Genealogy Pointers »

If you are tracing your German-American heritage, the German-American Research Set will be invaluable. The Encyclopedia of German-American Genealogical Research is regarded as the best book for surveying "the material available to the genealogist seeking to link American lineages with their origins in German-speaking Europe." The emphasis of the work is on German genealogical research in America, with special focus on immigration records, German ethnic religious bodies in America, and manuscript and published source materials, both in America and Germany.

Since names and name changes are bound to figure in your research, you will also want to have access to George Jones's German-American Names, our highly regarded A-Z dictionary consisting of the spellings, meanings, and variants of about 15,000 Germanic names. In addition, this unrivaled publication deals with the Americanization of some of these names, explaining the social and historical matters that contributed to the distinctive character of German-American names. Included also are a number of names that many of us would never have thought of as German.

You'll find that these two reference items will have dogeared pages from frequent use in no time at all.