RESEARCH · GENEALOGY

Tracing families through the Society’s records.

The Library & Research Center holds the documentary substrate of family history in St. Louis, Missouri, and the 19th-century American West: city directories from 1821 forward, probate and vital records, church and cemetery indexes, photographs, oral histories, and subscription databases for on-site access.

Where to start Plan an in-person visit

WHAT YOU’LL FIND

The records that anchor a family search.

Four categories the LRC holds in depth — most are on-site only, most are uncopied, all are free to consult during reading-room hours.

DIRECTORIES
City & county directories, 1821 to present
A near-continuous run of Gould's, Polk's, and successor directories — occupations, addresses, neighborhood, and changing household composition year over year.
VITAL RECORDS
Probate, deeds & cemetery indexes
Probate dockets, recorded deeds, and cemetery card indexes (including the Washington Park Cemetery name index, 1920–1989) for tracing inheritance, property transfer, and family movement.
CHURCH & CONGREGATIONAL
Baptismal, marriage & burial registers
Records from Catholic, Lutheran, AME, Jewish, and independent congregations across St. Louis and the surrounding counties — where civil records fall silent, congregational books often speak.
PHOTOGRAPHS & MANUSCRIPTS
Studio portraits, family correspondence, ephemera
Studio portraits from the major St. Louis photographers, family-paper accessions, and one-of-a-kind ephemera — the visual and personal record behind the name on the page.

WHERE TO START

Three steps, in order.

What a reference librarian walks every first-time genealogist through.

STEP 01
Tonight, online
Begin with the digital collections search and the LRC's research guides. Free, no appointment. Familiarize yourself with the directory runs, the finding aids, and the named collections that overlap your family's geography.
Online research tools →
STEP 02
On-site at the LRC
Plan a reading-room appointment. The subscription databases (Ancestry, Fold3, HeritageQuest, NewsBank) are available on-site only, and the original directories, probate, and church registers don't circulate.
Plan an in-person visit →
STEP 03
Ask a librarian
When the trail goes cold, the reference desk routes by department. Documents & Archives for manuscripts; Photographs & Prints for visual identification; the Library for printed sources. Email or remote request if you can’t travel.
Request remote assistance →

POPULAR STARTING POINTS · 6 RECORDS

Records other family historians have used.

Vital-records cards from the Washington Park Cemetery name index — the kind of one-line entry that anchors a generation of follow-on research.

Document · 1940s