FHL Microfilms Housed at DPL

By Barbara Ware

The Family History Library in Salt Lake City no longer loans its microfilm collection to Family History Centers. For years, however, researchers at the Dallas Public Library (designated as a Family History Center) were able to order rolls of microfilm from the Family History Library. This program allowed for long-term/permanent loans, and there are over 400 rolls of microfilm which remain a part of the DPL collection.

Do you wonder how to find the microfilm that you or others obtained on permanent loan from the Family History Library? You will find an alphabetical listing of the 400 microfilms located in the Genealogy Department of the Dallas Public Library.

In the past, the Genealogy Section stored the FHL-loaned films in a separate cabinet. They have now been inter-filed into the appropriate state drawer with other microfilms owned by the library.

Of course, some of these have been digitized and are online now, but some are still only available in microfilm format.

Examples of microfilms not online, but found at DPL are:

• The six microfilms covering the Annual Return, 1798-1810 for Warren County, Georgia Court of Ordinary (FHL numbers 219591-219596)
• Births reported in the city of New York, 1881-1965, All boroughs 1929-1930 (FHL Film# 1322471)

You probably search the FamilySearch catalog for a particular film, and to look for that film on the alphabetical listing for the loaned microfilm at DPL would be time consuming. Once you find the film you want in the FamilySearch catalog and the search results page notes it is not yet digitized, go to the Location dropout box on the search results page and check to see which locations have the film. A copy may be in a library closer to you than Salt Lake City.

By the way, the Dallas Public Library is not the only local library holding microfilm from the Family History Library. The Plano Family History Center lists 6,126 microfilms; Carrollton Family History Center has 2,363 microfilms, and Richardson Family History Center has 2,722. Perhaps one of these locations has the just the roll you need.