New
Visitors...Read This First:
This website is unusual in
that all
of the available official county records directly related
to genealogy (births, marriages, deaths and
burials) are posted here. The only exception is
that we are preserving privacy by not posting
births and marriages newer than 100 years old or
the data has not been released by state or
county officials.
The only "sets" of data related to
official records left to post are yearly updates
of the county births and marriages to
accommodate the privacy issue and newly released
data such as the Iowa Delayed Certificates of
Birth.
In
addition to the county records, we have
transcribed and posted every Federal Census from
1850 through 1930 and every Iowa State Census
from 1849 through 1895. Every gravestone has
been photographed and posted and a team is
dedicated to photographing new burials as they
occur. We have attempted
to post every obituary (over 33,000 on line)
and have a continuing project to make the
collection complete.
As
you peruse the "What's New" section
below, keep in mind that with the exception of
the marriage and birth records we post each year
the data we are adding is based on research by
the Madison County team aimed at enhancing the
official county, state and federal data already
on line. |
What's
New
Daily
Updates: The County Coordinator, along
with several members of the Madison County Genealogical
Society are working daily on obituaries, cemetery
records, marriage records, birth records, headstone
photos, newspaper gleanings, the Madison County Family
Tree, and other research
pertaining to Madison County. This results in many daily updates of this
website. If we were to list each change we have made
over the past six months, you would have to plow through
well over 100 pages of change documentation. However, we
have elected to post complete data sets for your perusal
as they are generated. See "1917 Madison County
Marriages", "1917 Madison County
Births", and "New Birth Records Project"
below to access new data sets.
If you visited this
website before and didn't find your relative's
information, we urge you to look again and to look each
time you visit here. In the period from Apr 2018 thru
Sep 2018, we have posted 488 new obituaries and added
alternate obituaries to about 100 already on line. New
birth records added since the completion of the Birth
Record Project mentioned below number 29. Finally, cemetery
records were updated to reflect burials within the past
6 months. Listed
below are some of the highlights of What's New in the
past year.
Divorces
- In
early 2015, a dedicated group of Madison County
Genealogical Society members went through the records of
Madison County court proceedings at the County
Courthouse and extracted 868 divorce records.
These records were put in file folders within archival
quality file boxes devoted exclusively to divorces so
they can readily be retrieved. The records reside
in the Clerk of Court's office along with an index which
we have published herein under "Divorces".
20-Jan-2019
Composite
Census Index Now On Line
- If
you've been frustrated by having to open census after
census, looking for your relative, there is now an
easier way to find them. We have created a master census
index for Madison County, combining the indices from all
of the censuses we have transcribed. This index includes
all federal censuses from 1850 through 1930 and all
state censuses from 1849 through 1895. You can access
this index here
or through the Census Records link on the left.
06 Dec 2018
Funeral
Cards Added - An updated list of Funeral
Cards held by the Winterset Library was submitted for
posting by Pat Hochstetler. The list contained 461 new
records and those records are now integrated into the Funeral
Card Records. A list of the 461 additions can be
found here.
Copies of specific cards can be obtained by contacting
the Madison
County Genealogical Society. 17
Dec 2018
1917
Madison County Marriages - The complete set of
Madison County marriages for calendar year 1917, comprised
of 254 records, have
been posted to our Marriage List as of September 30, 2018. To
see the list of 1917 marriages, click here.
To see them integrated with all marriages, select "Marraige
Records" on the left.
1917
Madison County Births - The complete set of
Madison County births for calendar year 1917, comprised
of 319 records, have
been posted to our birth pages as of March 31, 2018. To
see the list of 1917 births, click here.
To see them integrated with all births, select "Birth
Records" on the left.
Madison
County Family Tree Issue: - The
Madison County Family Tree is hosted on the RootsWeb
website that was taken over by Ancestry a few years ago.
Because of some kind of security issue, Ancestry elected
to take all of RootsWeb down in November 2017. Although
the Family Tree availability has been restored, our
ability to update it has not. A large backlog of changes
to the tree are being held until we again have access.
Also note that Ancestry quit indexing new uploads over a
year ago so new additions and other changes do not show
up if you do a tree search but can be accessed if you go
to the surnames list of the individual data base.
Recommended
Reading - Recently added to our County
History page is a link to the November 01, 1906
edition of The
Winterset Madisonian which was their
semi-centennial edition including an extensive history
of the early years of Madison County and its people.
Birth Record Project Completed - As of 10 May
2018, all of the available Iowa State Birth Records
(ISBR) and Iowa Delayed Certificates of Birth (IDCB)
have been integrated into our Birth List. At completion,
2177 previously unlisted births had been added. Specific
changes can be seen here.
Current
Contributors: Maintenance and
improvement of this website would be impossible without
the continued support of volunteer contributors. Special
thanks go to Pat Hochstetler who has worked tirelessly
in finding and transcribing older obituaries. Over the past year, Eileen Reed
has submitted many obituaries and family photos which
are greatly appreciated. And finally, thanks go to our
team who works on current obituaries and gravestone
photos, Ida Morse, and Shirley Keating.
Gravestone
Photos: All gravestones in Madison County
have been photographed and posted at the Iowa Gravestones Project.
One hundred seventy nine newly placed gravestones in the period 01 Apr 2018 to
30 Sep 2018 have been photographed and posted. A list of
the new postings can be seen in
a separately compiled list
of new Gravestone Photo postings.
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