Athens-Clarke County Library Heritage Room

United States Georgia  Clarke  Archives and Libraries  

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Contact Information
E-mail: [mailto:heritageroomref@athenslibrary.org heritageroomref@athenslibrary.org]

Address:


 * Athens-Clarke County Library Heritage Room Athens Regional Library System 2025 Baxter Street Athens, GA 30606

Telephone: 706-613-3650 ext 350

Hours and holidays:


 * Monday-Tuesday closed.
 * Wednesday 10:00 a.m. - 8:00 p.m.
 * Thursday 1:00 - 8:00 p.m.
 * Friday 9:00 a.m. - 6:00 p.m.
 * Saturday 9:00 a.m. - 6:00 p.m.
 * Sunday 2:00 - 6:00 p.m

Directions, maps, and public transportation:


 * Driving directions
 * Google map: Athens-Clarke County Library
 * Public transportation:  Athens Transit bus routes: 5 Beechwood/Baxter, 6 West Broad/Atlanta Hwy, and 7 Prince Avenue all stop near the Athens-Clarke County (ACC) Library.

Internet sites and databases:


 * Athens-Clarke County Library events, online library, services, books and more.
 * Heritage Room News hours, news, classes, events, blogs, genealogy links, databases, films, and vertical files.
 * Georgia Pines Catalog online. Search by keyword, title, author, subject, or series. Also available in WorldCat.
 * Genealogy databases such as Ancestry, Digital Library of Georgia, Fold3, HeritageQuest, Sanborn fire insurance maps, and the Voyages slave-trade database.

Collection Description
This book, map, microfilm and archival collection spans the southeastern United States and up the East Coast, with limited holdings pertaining to New England. Local history holdings include vertical files, surname files and newspapers. The Heritage Room serves guests of all ages and experience levels researching into local, regional and state history and genealogy.

The Georgia collection includes newspapers, county and state histories, censuses, the Madison County Cemetery Book, colonial records, Revolutionary War, Indian Wars, Civil War, indexes to deaths-divorces-marriages, WWI draft, and historic maps. The Civil War collection has card files from Georgia Confederate Pensions, some Presidential pardon "Amnesty Papers" 1865-1867, Georgia compiled service records (120,000 Confederate and 4,000 Union), and an index of Confederate POWs who died in prison. Local Athens records include property taxes, budgets, city and student directories, Clarke and Oconee County Confederate pension applications, deeds and mortgages 1801-1960, wills 1802-1955, marriages 1805-1956, and Sanborn fire insurance maps 1885, 1888, 1893, 1898, 1903, 1908, 1913, 1918, and 1926. They also have Freedmen's Bank, Freedmen's Bureau, AAHGS News  and Journal, several sets of Cherokee records, the Passenger and Immigration Lists Index, and 1,000 pedigree charts from The Southern Genealogist's Exchange Society, Inc.

The Heritage Room is a department of the Athens-Clarke County Library, part of the Athens Regional Library System, and the Reading Room maintains separate hours of the rest of the Library.

Research Guides

 * African American
 * Athens
 * Civil War
 * Georgia
 * Native American
 * Other Genealogy Materials

Tip
Each Heritage Room visitor is asked to register and show a government-issued photo ID.

Alternate Repositories
If you cannot visit or find a record at the , a similar record may be available at one of the following.

Overlapping Collections


 * National Archives I, Washington DC, census, pre-WWI military service &amp; pensions, passenger lists, naturalizations, passports, federal bounty land, homesteads, bankruptcy, ethnic sources, prisons, and federal employees.
 * National Archives at Atlanta federal censuses, Ancestry.com, military, pensions, bounty-land, photos, passengers lists, naturalizations, Native Americans, African Americans, and workshops.
 * Federal Records Center, Ellenwood, GA., receives federal agency and court records of Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee.
 * Georgia Archives, Morrow, is the best place to start family history research in Georgia. Genealogies, county histories, newspapers, tax digests, private papers, church records, cemeteries, Bible records, municipal records, census, maps, land plats, photographs, Georgia Confederate service and pension records, colonial, headright bounty land grants, land lottery, and Georgia county records.

Similar Collections


 * Ellen Payne Odom Genealogy Library, Moultrie, emphasizes Scottish immigrants to America, but also has a good basic American genealogy collection.
 * Gilbert H. Gragg Library, Bainbridge, has very good book, surname folder, genealogy, newspaper, and oral history collections.
 * Ladson Genealogical Library, Vidalia, primarily a book collection, but their genealogical sources cover the entire Atlantic seaboard. Also has historic photos and school records of Toombs and Montgomery counties.
 * Washington Memorial Library, Macon, one of the best collections in Georgia for genealogy, African Americans, and local history. Emphasis on the 13 colonies, American Revolution, and Great Britain.

Neighboring Collections


 * Athens Historical Society meetings, membership, and publications.
 * Clarke County Health Department, Athens, birth and death records since 1919.
 * Clarke County Clerk of the Probate Court, Athens, marriage and probate records since 1801.
 * Clarke County Clerk of the Superior Court, Athens, divorce, court, and land records since 1801, and military records since 1922.
 * Clarke County Coroner suspicious deaths.
 * U.S. District Court, Middle District of Georgia, Athens, recent civil, criminal, and bankruptcy cases.
 * University of Georgia Main Library, Athens, largest collection for early Georgia settlers. Also, they hold county histories, county records, family records, biographies and newspapers.
 * Repositories in surrounding counties:  Barrow, Jackson, Madison, Oconee, and Olgethorpe.
 * Atlanta-Fulton Public Library Central Library, large collection with good coverage of the southeast USA. They have county histories, family histories, will indexes, deeds, military rosters, passenger lists, Atlanta city directories, Georgia censuses 1820-1930, local histories, and newspapers.
 * Atlanta History Center, Kenan Research Center, extensive Georgia family and county histories, Sons of the American Revolution library, holdings for North and South Carolina, Tennessee, and Alabama genealogy.
 * Afro-American Historical and Genealogical Society, Atlanta, members, meetings, newsletter, surname queries, links.
 * Coweta County Genealogical Society Research Library, have the best set of family folders in Georgia. They also have Civil War records, DAR and Revolutionary War records, pension and bounty land records, immigration indexes, censuses, church records and histories.
 * DeKalb History Center, Decatur, subject files, biographical files, cemetery index, maps, manuscripts, photographs, rare books, memoirs, yearbooks, and Atlanta City and suburban directories.
 * Georgia Historical Society, Savannah, 4 million manuscripts, photos, papers, military, diaries, plantation records. They have almost as many genealogical sources as the Georgia Archives.
 * Georgia Genealogical Society, Atlanta, events, meetings, membership, publications and index, and research tools, but no library. They provide advice, but do not conduct research for you.
 * Georgia Salzburger Society, Rincon, histories, journals, genealogical records, and church histories.
 * Huxford-Spear Genealogical Library, Homerville, their genealogical collection covers the Southeast United States well, including 14,000 files on families from south Georgia and north Florida.
 * Jewish Genealogical Society of Georgia, Atlanta, family histories, immigration, East Europe, Georgia, North America.
 * Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Atlanta baptisms, confirmations, marriages, deaths, parish records.
 * Thomasville Genealogical, History and Fine Arts Library good collection of southern states family history material such as immigration records, marriages and deaths, Internet access, censuses, and state and county histories.
 * Repositories in other surrounding states: Alabama, Florida, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee.
 * Family History Library, Salt Lake City, 450 computers, 3,400 databases, 3.1 million microforms, 4,500 periodicals, 310,000 books of worldwide family and local histories, civil, church, immigration, ethnic, military, Mormon records. Many Georgia Archives  microfilms are also available at branch FamilySearch Centers  in local LDS churches, and described in their online FamilySearch Catalog.
 * Dallas Public Central Library 111,700 volumes, 64,500 microfilms, 89,000 microfiche, and over 700 maps, marriage, probate, deed, and tax abstracts in book form, or microfilm of originals for some states, and online databases including Georgia and other Southern states.