Volunteer Spotlight
RootsWeb.com values each individual and organization that volunteers their time and talents to making our site one of the best on the Internet. We hope you enjoy meeting some of these outstanding volunteers whose dedication have made a difference to RootsWeb.com and other researchers.
Immigrant Ships Transcribers Guild
Volunteer Organization Dedicated to Simplify Your Immigrant Research
As RootsWeb.com users know, a new culture and process for genealogical research was shaped with the development
of the Internet. Rather than spending hours in a genealogy library, researchers are now able to search
a variety of records from the comfort of their own homes. However, it is only through the efforts of many
volunteers that much of this information is available for free. The Immigrant
Ships Transcribers Guild (ISTG) is an example of an organization that strives to do just this.
The ISTG was created in September of 1998 out of a growing need to easily access ship passenger lists. Because passenger lists were not widely available, and could be difficult to use, the founding members began the process of obtaining and transcribing passenger lists. Once transcribed, they were then uploaded to the ISTG website. Nearly four years later, this process has continued, and more than 500 volunteers are now involved. The efforts of these volunteers have resulted in a website that has currently completed the transcription of more than 4,000 ships, and has had nearly 3 million visitors.
In addition to the transcribed records available on the site, ISTG has created a feature called "The Compass." Because there are countless passenger lists that are not yet available on the ISTG site, one of the main purposes of "The Compass" is to compile a directory of websites on the Internet with passenger lists. Before being directed to each site, users are given a synopsis of the ships'information, then links directly to the transcribed lists to make your search as easy as possible.
Additional information as emigrant and ethnic databases, resources such as archives, letters and diaries written by immigrants, and articles that were published about their experiences are also available to give a glimpse into the lives of the people that are being researched.
The dedication of this organization in the hard work of transcribing ships passenger lists and making available this valuable easy access of genealogical information makes ISTG a valuable asset to RootsWeb.com users, as well as others in the genealogical community.
On behalf of RootsWeb.com and the entire genealogical community, we thank you.