Genealogists look for information – mostly old information – having to do with our family history. We collect that information, try to figure out what is fact, and try to assemble a true history of our family.

But information can be hard to find. We often have to pay and sometimes that is worth while. But what I really like is when I find information for free. My favorite free site is family search and I try to help keep records free by doing some volunteer transcribing for them as I have time.

But yesterday I was looking for some information and a new website (for me, anyway) was in my search results. I’m still not sure if the information found will be useful but it gives me some ideas of subsequent searches.

This new-to-me site is Genealogy Trails. From a bit of reading on the site it appears it is a website that started providing free records in one area (Illinois) and then decided to expand to cover the United States. The volunteers are providing free information by transcribing record and adding new data. They are free and plan to stay that way.

I suspect they have more information in some areas than other. The organization seems similar to US GenWeb with state and county sites. The areas I was interested in had relatively little but I did find something of interest. I suspect more will be added and I plan on checking back periodically.

So give Genealogy Trails a look. You have nothing to loose and you might find something important.