Kansas Genealogy Resources

Many families settled in, or at least passed through, Kansas sometime during the western migration in the United States. Neither my husband nor I have any direct lines who lived there, but there are some collateral Stufflebean families who left Missouri for new opportunities in Kansas.

Here are some of the resources I’ve found online that helped track them down:

FamilySearch has the largest collection of links, some of which tie into subscription sites, but many are free and online. Researchers can find everything from vital records to military lists to land records.

Kansas Historical Society – There is a large searchable database online of Kansas newspapers going back as early as 1854.

You need to click more than once to navigate some areas of their website, but there are three digital collections, Kansas Memory, Territorial Kansas Online and Western Trails that cover much of Kansas’ history.

Online Kansas Death Records and Indexes – Lots of links here, sorted by counties. Some are pay sites; others are free and online.

Kansas Genealogical Society & Online Library – Multiple links are on this page, including a large set of obituaries, a button to search their online catalog and links to other resources, including the Kansas Soldier’s Home in Fort Dodge and the Kansas DAR Library.

Kansas Interactive Genealogy – a ton of links to records, forums and misc. information

Kansas Family History Databases on Genealogy.org – This collection is heavy on Leavenworth data, but does have links to Kansas history.

Kansas Source List for Genealogy Research – Links to Kansas sites and other more general sites, like Ellis Island

Kansas State Library – Some, but not all, of the links on this site require a Kansas IP address. There is a History and Genealogy category on the menu page.

Random Acts of Genealogical Kindness – There is a list of links at the bottom of the page. The top portion is a narrative with suggestions for research.

Lawrence Public Library

Crawford County, Kansas

Ancestor Hunt – free Kansas newspaper search engine

Kansas Genealogy Links

McPherson County, Kansas

McPherson Public Library

Genealogy Trails – Butler County, Kansas

Access Genealogy – covers all 50 states, but this is the link to Kansas resources.

Kansas DAR Library – no online collection or research service available, but if you are in Dodge City, KS, they have over 4,000 books in their collection

Kansas GenWeb – The GenWeb is an under used resource, but has some great information and records

There appear to be many local libraries in Kansas that have good genealogical collection and records available online. If you don’t see your county of interest in this list, don’t despair! Search yourself to see what is available. There are too many counties in Kansas for me to search each one. The collections in this list just happened to come up in my general search for Kansas records.

If you are an experienced Kansas researcher and know about some sites that I haven’t included here, please leave a comment.

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