MARSHALL COUNTY GENEALOGICAL

AND

HISTORICAL SOCIETY, INC.

Housed in the COUNTY ARCHIVES
Located in the Basement of the
Marshall County Courthouse

Phone: (270) 527-4749      Email: marcoky@ky.gov

Open Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday

9:00 AM until 3:00 PM

Bimonthly meetings will be held on the first Wednesday
of January, March, May, July, September and November
10:00 AM in the County Archives

Come by for a visit.  We think you will be pleasantly
surprised.  …You may find a long lost cousin!

HISTORY AND BACKGROUND

In September 1976, a group of people interested in learning to do family research in an organized way met at the Marshall County Library.  Thus the Marshall County Genealogical Society was born with seventeen charter members.  Meetings were held on the first Wednesday of each month in the conference room at the library.  In 1982 the Society became a non-profit organization.

After determining what records and resources were available in the Marshall County Courthouse, we decided our first major project would be organizing and preserving the marriage records.  Everyone helped with abstracting the records.  Then each member made a personal contribution toward the expense of printing our first county marriage book.  In 1981, Marshall County Marriages Volume I was released.  We subsequently published nine more books of marriage records and a book of marriage consents, a reprint of the 1894 Lemon’s Handbook of Marshall County, a reprint of the 1933 Freeman and Olds History of Marshall County, and our most ambitious project – the publication of the 1984 History of Marshall County.  Since then, the Society has published several other books of various county records that could aid researchers.  We also publish a quarterly newsletter (past issues are available for purchase), which we are glad to exchange with newsletters from other societies.

In 1985 the Marshall County Fiscal Court gave us permission to renovate the old county jail which is located in the basement of the county courthouse.  This allowed us to establish the County Archives .  The county assigned some people who were doing mandatory community service to work alongside us as we painted.  One young man thought that we were doing this work for our own community service sentence!

Since we were now “custodians” of the older county records, we took our work seriously and began the tremendous task of cleaning, sorting and filing records, some of which had not been touched since the courthouse fire of 1913.  We are proud of the continuing work we do for our “community service.”

About two years later, we realized that genealogy and history go hand in hand.  So we changed our name to the Marshall County Genealogical and Historical Society.  We are still organizing and preserving county historical papers in order to make them easier to access.  All files are cross-indexed in a large card index file as we clean, flatten and place them in acid-free folders.  We recently completed the organization of the marriage licenses from 1842 to 1940 that have been placed into heavy mylar sleeves and stored in acid-free archival boxes in numerical order.

The fiscal court has been generous to us in many ways when we have needed assistance in purchasing items such as filing cabinets, acid-free folders and boxes, and shelving.  The County Court Clerks and the Circuit Court Clerks have also been instrumental and supportive of our projects during the past fifteen years.  Locally in the community some funeral homes have been helpful by allowing us to create a card index file of their early funeral records that complements our card index file covering obituaries.

Our society is also proud to have sponsored another recent community project in September 1999 – the erection and dedication of the newest historical marker in the county.  We did the historical research, documentation, and coordination with the state in recognizing Spout Spring as the site of the magistrates’ meeting to form Marshall County .

WELCOME, VISITORS

Visitors are always welcome.  We ask that you sign our register and include your contact information and the surnames of families that you are researching.  This information is placed in another card file so that any visitor can more easily identify and contact someone who is researching a mutual surname.  Society volunteers staff the County Archives , which is open Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday from 9:00 AM until 3:00 PM, provided the courthouse is also open.

MEMBERSHIP BENEFITS

Of course visitors are welcome, but we invite you to become a member of the Marshall County Genealogical and Historical Society.  Our membership roster currently totals over 150 regular members ranging in age from 11 to 87 years and includes not only local and regional residents but also persons from across the United States .  Annual dues are $12 per person or $18 per family; renewal for multiple years at a time is available and guarantees the current dues rate over that future period.  This includes a subscription to the Society’s quarterly Newsletter that is printed in January, April, July, and October.  We encourage you to contribute to the newsletter by sending family sheets, pedigree charts, old letters, pictures, short family sketches or anything you would like to share with fellow researchers.

Other benefits of membership include photocopying at the discounted rate of $.10 per page, the privilege of locally checking out circulating resources for loan from our genealogical library on Thursday afternoon and returning them on the next Monday morning, a 10% discount on books that the Society publishes, and the publication of queries or other personal materials in the Newsletter free of charge.

Honorary lifetime memberships in the Society is conferred on long time members who reach the age of 80 years, in recognition of their years of support, participation, and contribution to the Marshall County Genealogical and Historical Society.  A complimentary lifetime membership has been bestowed on six honored members to date.

LIBRARY RESOURCES

We are proud of our library collection of over 2200 books of general reference research sources, periodicals, and family histories.  Over 1000 of these books are relating to Kentucky counties (many covering the eight counties comprising the Jackson Purchase), southern Illinois , and middle/northwest Tennessee as well as numerous other states.  In our collection you will find a large number of old photographs and school pictures, all well organized.  We also have a small collection of school records along with personal papers, Civil War records, census data, tax lists, cemetery records, newspaper abstracts, Circuit Court records including estate settlements, and early county and city maps.  The Society’s library collection even includes a few instructional videos covering research techniques.

We have microfilm and microfiche reader/printers for use with a variety of microfilm and microfiche collections including Kentucky state births (1911-1988) and deaths (1911-1995).  Our computer provides access to a selection of CD-ROMs, family files, and Internet resources.  A photocopier is available for assisted use at a nominal charge per page.  Research within the county Archives is provided by volunteers with suggested donations for service going to the Society’s general fund which will be used to buy more research materials.

POLICIES

The primary goal of the Marshall County Gealogical and Historical Society is making data from various media, especially older documents, available for easy and safe public access for use in research and education. Thus we, as custodians of the oldest records in our county, have developed a policy for access.

It took several years to finish cleaning, filing in archival folders, and sequencing all of the records. The records had previously been publicly available but were so disorganized and not indexed that access was hindered. We also realized that it would be the most beneficial to have researchers use an index to identify the proper storage file for a desired document which a society worker would retrieve for them. The researcher could then read or copy the record as needed. A worker would then replace the file in the proper storage location.

We also have records from deceased individuals, brought by their families for use by researchers, with some limitations such as they are not to be put on the public shelves with other books and that only Society workers will retrieve and re-file materials requested for use by researchers. A collection of delicate books from the Health Department and a collection of county histories which are out of print and not replaceable have the same restrictions.

We are happy to assist all researchers in accessing our records safely and easily. Our Society exists to promote interest in genealogy, family histories, and county history as well as preservation of county records. We are fortunate to have most of our county's original records here rather than sent to Frankfort where they are not always available for convenient access. Our stated access policy helps prevent documents, many of which are fragile, from being damaged, disorganized or lost. We must all recognize that this is a priority as the records do not beling to us, but to the county. We appreciate your cooperation with the access policy.

We also realize the need to protect the privacy of personal data regarding Marshall County Genealogical and Historical Society members. This data includes identifying information such as a person's name, address, telephone number and email address. We include an option on our membership form to indicate your preference to limit distribution of your personal data. Upon request, the Society will not make available your identifying data to other organizations or individuals through electronic communications, the newsletter or the research/surname file. If you have any other privacy preferences, please advise us.

FUTURE AND GOALS

The Marshall County Genealogical and Historical Society has come a long way since organizing nearly twenty-five years ago.  Throughout this time we have continued to pursue our goals of education, preservation, collection and publication of resources that all people can freely use during their exciting search for their family “roots” and “branches.”

We regularly add to our acquisition of Kentucky death certificates (currently 1911 through 1955) on microfilm, with printing available.  We just completed sorting, archiving and indexing our obituary clippings.  Our next goal is to do the same for our anniversary clippings.  As a non-profit corporation, Marshall County Genealogical and Historical Society accepts all donations with sincere appreciation.

CURRENT OFFICERS

President:                Latricia Cavitt

Vice-President:       Virginia Smith            

Secretary:                Clara Creason

Treasurer:                 Virginia James

Committee Chairpersons

Newsletter: Frances Farmer

Membership: Virginia James

Surname File: Evelyn Dismore

Click here to see a list of publications available for purchase.

Click here to download a membership form.