Eppersons — Family history research, one record at a time.

Most family trees stall for one of two reasons: the researcher runs out of relatives to ask, or runs out of ideas for where to look next. This site exists for the second problem.

It takes its name from a family surname — fitting, because everything here is written the way an actual family gets researched: one question at a time, one record at a time. The centerpiece is a record-type table that works like a reverse index. Instead of starting from a source and wondering what is in it, you start from your question — when did she die? where did he come from? what was her maiden name? — and the table points you toward the record types most likely to answer it, where those records usually live, and what tends to go wrong with each one.

Around the table are short guides to the problems that stop most beginners: starting a tree from scratch, interviewing older relatives, reading census records, tracking down maiden names, and telling two same-named people apart. None of it requires a subscription, a road trip, or special software — just patience and a system.

Which Record Answers Your Question?

Start from what you want to know — a death date, a maiden name, an origin town — and scan the second column for it. The table shows which U.S. record types are most likely to hold the answer, roughly when they exist, where they are usually kept, and the standard pitfalls of each. It pairs with the guides below, which cover how to actually read and request the major record groups.

Record type ▲	What it can tell you	Typical U.S. time span	Where it's usually kept	Watch out for
Cemetery records and grave markers	Birth and death dates, family groupings by plot, plot purchasers	1600s onward	Cemetery office or sexton's books; town clerk for older burying grounds	Stones are sometimes carved years later from memory; plots hold in-laws under unfamiliar surnames
Church and parish registers	Baptisms, marriages, and burials from before civil registration; godparents and sponsors	1600s onward, wherever congregations kept books	The congregation itself, its denomination's archive, or a regional historical society	Registers move when churches merge or close; some are in the congregation's original language
City directories	Street address, occupation, employer, spouse's name; a widow listed alone signals a death	Annual volumes, mid-1800s to late 1900s in most cities	Public library local-history rooms and state historical societies	A missing year may just mean a missed canvasser, not a move or a death
County deeds, wills, and probate	Land ownership, heirs, married daughters' new surnames, approximate death dates	Colonial era to present	County recorder, clerk, or probate office; older volumes often moved to state archives	Burned counties; index-only searching misses the loose papers where families hide
Federal census	Household members, ages, birthplaces, occupations; relationships and parents' birthplaces in later years	Every ten years from 1790; open to the public through 1950	National Archives; microfilm and copies at large libraries and state archives	Ages drift, spellings wander, and the 1890 schedules were almost entirely destroyed by fire
Military service and pension files	Birth date and place, physical description, and family members named in pension claims	Revolutionary War through the twentieth century	National Archives; state records for militia and guard units	Service and pension files are separate requests; a major fire destroyed many twentieth-century Army personnel files
Newspapers (obituaries and notices)	Death dates, survivors' names and towns, marriages, anniversaries, reunions	1700s onward; thickest coverage after the mid-1800s	State archives, historical societies, and local library microfilm collections	Small-town weeklies are often unindexed; obituaries flatter and omit
Passenger lists and naturalization papers	Arrival year, ship, port, and — on later lists — the origin town and relatives left behind	Federal passenger lists from 1820; naturalization standardized in the early 1900s	National Archives and federal court records; pre-standardization naturalizations in any local court	Names were recorded at the port of departure, not changed on arrival; families often crossed more than once
State vital records (birth, marriage, death)	Exact dates and places, parents' names, maiden names, causes of death	Statewide registration mostly begins late 1800s to early 1900s, varying by state	State vital records office; older entries often at the county or the state archives	Recent records are privacy-restricted; death certificates repeat whatever the informant believed

This table is a general orientation to U.S. record types, not a statement of what any particular office or archive holds. Coverage, access rules, and privacy restrictions vary by state and county, and recent vital records are typically restricted — confirm details with the office that keeps the record. Nothing here is legal advice about record access or eligibility.