PERSI Access Update
For many years, PERSI was one of the most heavily used components of the Heritage Quest. In 2016, Ancestry.com absorbed Heritage Quest into its family of genealogical databases. When the time came for licensing renewals with ProQuest which works in conjunction with Ancestry, PERSI was discontinued due non-renewal of licensing.
Access is now available through subscription to the Find My Past database which serves as the sole subscription distributor to consumers and libraries. PERSI is compiled and maintained by the Genealogy Center at Allen County Library in Fort Wayne. Patrons may visit the following link on Find My Past to obtain the most current profile at https://www.findmypast.com/persi. Patrons may contact the Genealogy Center of the Allen County Library with content questions at http://www.genealogycenter.org/Contact.aspx.
For those unfamiliar with the importance of PERSI, it serves as a comprehensive index of most genealogical and family-history oriented periodicals. PERSI enables researchers to locate key information about people and places. It contains over 2.5 million entries from thousands of historical, genealogical and ethnic publications, making it an invaluable, comprehensive family history resource. Researchers may access articles, photos, and other materials that may be difficult to locate using traditional search methods. This can help to build the historical context around personal research, and the world that our ancestors lived in. This information often provides leads for follow-up investigation.
Most articles are from periodicals covering the United States and Canada, but also include thousands of genealogy and local history entries (in both English and French) from Britain, Ireland and Australia. Articles fall under twenty-two different subject headings, or record types. These include biography, cemeteries, census records, church records, court records, deeds, institutions, land records, maps, military records, naturalization records, obituaries, passenger lists, probate records, school records, tax records, vital records, voter records, and wills. Articles covering three or fewer specific families are arranged by surname.
PERSI is updated annually. The most common type of search is by surname. Once you type search for the surname, you can also narrow the search by locality. Each citation provides the following information:
- Name of periodical
- Title of article
- Author of article
- Volume number and page number
- List of libraries that have the periodical in their collection
PERSI enables researchers to locate key information about people and places. It contains over 2.5 million entries from thousands of historical, genealogical and ethnic publications, making it an invaluable, comprehensive family history resource. Researchers may access articles, photos, and other materials that may be difficult to locate using traditional search methods. This can help to build the historical context around personal research, and the world that our ancestors lived in. This information often provides leads for follow-up investigation.
BLM 1/8/2018