This section will discuss four categories of directories whose contents can be useful for genealogical research: city directories, telephone directories, biographical directories, and professional directories. All of these valuable reference sources can be found in the United States and internationally.
Business Directories
Before the telephone was invented—and for many years afterwards—the residents and businesses of most cities and towns in the U.S. were listed in annual directories. These books, generally referred to as city directories, were published by private companies and often included much information now of interest to genealogists. The directories typically date back to the mid-19th century for larger cities, but by the end of the 19th century, even relatively small towns had them. Most city directories continued to be published until the 1930s or 1940s.
A typical city directory includes an alphabetical listing by surname of residents, sometimes only heads of households, but often separate listings for each adult member of the household who had an occupation or was a student. In smaller towns, and even in larger cities for later years, the first name of the spouse often was listed with the head of household. Each listing specifies at least one address, and some directories list both residential and business addresses together. A separate section of the directory usually includes lists by occupation or profession.
Many directories also include a street list. This may be simply a list of each street with the cross streets it bisects, perhaps with house numbers at each cross street, or it may list the residents or businesses for every building, by house or building number, on each block. Usually a section of advertisements is included, and in some cases, maps of the towns are printed with wards denoted. (The ward can be useful in finding census listings.) Additions or changes received after the closing date for inclusion in the main body of the directory typically were printed in a small section near the front.
Genealogical researchers can put these directories to many productive uses. Most obviously, one can track the existence and location of family members and their occupations. For years corresponding to a state or federal census, the directory provides an address to seek in the census. This is one of the most important uses of city directories, since most state censuses are not indexed; the 1910 federal census is not indexed in all states; the 1880 census indexes only heads of households with children younger than ten years old. Spelling or coding idiosyncrasies or errors may permit an individual being sought to elude detection in soundex or online indexes.
Several cautions must be observed when using city directories as finding aids for censuses. Most important is the need to correlate the closing date of the directory with the date of the census. For example, a 1900 directory may be the wrong directory to use to locate people in the 1900 census— the directory may have closed for publication in the fall of 1899 (or earlier); the 1900 census was conducted in June 1900. In this case, the 1901 directory would be more likely to produce a match. It is important to know the exact date of each census and to look in the first pages of the directory to find its closing date, when given.
A related problem is the fact that new immigrants moved often, sometimes more than once a year, particularly in large cities. This difficulty is compounded by the fact that a given person may not have appeared every year in a directory, and the spelling of the surname may have varied from year to year. A diligent researcher must check several consecutive years and all conceivable spelling variations when looking for an individual.
Always check street listings, both to see if any possible relatives lived in the same building or nearby and to acquire a sense of whether the resident may have owned the building, a possibility if they and their family are the sole occupants. Ownership of a home or business could serve as a pointer to further information in real estate records or corporate records. If a business name is given in the main listing, look for a corresponding entry under the business name (which also may be in the main body of listings), particularly if a title such as “treasurer” or “president” is specified. The business listing may reveal the names of other family members involved in the enterprise. Identification of cross streets in the street directory and of ward boundaries if a map is included, may make it easier to find the person in census documents. Some census indexes and reference tools, including online images, refer to wards rather than enumeration districts. In addition, knowing the ward can narrow the possible range of enumeration districts to seek.
If one is especially lucky, the directory will list surviving spouses as “widow of” and provide the name of the deceased. In some directories, the actual date of death is given in the first directory published after the individual’s death.
Most city directories for major cities have been microfilmed and may be found in many libraries. State or local libraries often have at least some years in original bound copies, sometimes on open shelves. Directories for small towns may be available only in the county library or the state library. Sometimes a local history or genealogy association may have copies of directories for small towns that cannot be found anywhere else. In some cases, an individual town may not have published a directory, but its residents may be included in a county directory or a directory for a large adjoining town. The U.S. Library of Congress has an extremely large collection of directories on microfilm.
Some city directories have been abstracted, indexed, and put online, particularly for the years surrounding 1890 as a substitute for the destroyed 1890 census. The best source for these listings is Ancestry.com.
City Directories Outside the United States
Outside of the United States, the most easily accessible directories probably are those for the United Kingdom. Similar in many respects to city directories published in the U.S., British directories were often published in parallel with yearly “post office directories,” which were for all practical purposes another form of city directories.
Typically the directories have separate sections for different classes of persons, with and without professions, and a street listing. The directories for London and other large cities are available at major libraries, including the LDS (Mormon) Family History Library which has microfilmed series of these volumes. These books may be particularly useful as an alternative to the 1891 census index and 1901 fee-based census index. The same caveats apply as described for U.S. directories.
Business and general directories from the late 19th and early 20th centuries from Lithuania, Poland, Russia and Ukraine are described in the countries chapters elsewhere in this book.
Telephone, Reverse and Electronic Directories
The printed telephone directory replaced most city directories in the United States by the mid-20th century. As telephone directories developed, new formats provided new tools for genealogical research. One important type of directory is variously known as the reverse directory, “criss-cross” directory, or Haines Directory. This resource is somewhat akin to the street listings in the old city directories. It contains alphabetical lists of streets and for each street lists subscriber names and telephone numbers for each address. Many directories also include a separate list ordered by telephone numbers that cross-reference the street list. Typically, the street listing shows how long the current occupant has lived there, although this information is not always accurate. Locating people who lived in the same place for a long time can be useful, as they may have known a relative who has since died or moved away. Neighbors may know where the former resident or neighbor moved and may remember information about the next of kin or surviving spouse. Reverse directories often list apartment numbers in multifamily buildings.
Electronic telephone directories are available both on CD-ROM and on the Internet. The former, often generically called “phone disc,” are sold in most major computer stores or directly from the publisher (with provisions for periodic updates). The search engines on the more expensive versions of these directories allow searches alphabetically by name, by street address, or by telephone number with cross-referencing between these items. For example, one could look up a possible relative in the alphabetical listing, then switch to the specified street address to see if a known spouse or children are shown to verify that the right person has been found.
Some published phone discs have become multi-disk products, requiring that one use different discs for each region of the U.S.; the cost of keeping them updated can exceed $100 yearly. Many libraries now have one or more computers equipped with phone discs in their business, general reference, or local history, and genealogy divisions.
In the past few years, the development of comprehensive Internet telephone directories has made the purchase of CD-ROM directories unnecessary for most genealogical research. Several web addresses provide the same search capabilities and allow searches for both e-mail and street addresses. Three good sites that offer frequently updated country-wide online directories are <superpages.com>, <switchboard.com> and <whitepages.com>. There are subtle differences in format and search screens between these, but the databases appear to be similar. Links are available to international telephone directories.
Biographical and “Who’s Who” Directories
Numerous directories around the world publish capsule biographies of people who have achieved prominence in some area of endeavor. Information for each individual typically includes place and date of birth, name (and maiden name) of spouse, and occasionally date of marriage, names of children, education, accomplishments, memberships, and residence. Because of the wide variety of specialties in these directories, anyone researching a family tree of reasonable size is likely to find one or more relatives in one of these publications.
Titles range from the well-known and prestigious Who’s Who in America, published annually by Marquils Who’s Who since 1899, to various specialized series that have appeared within the last several decades, also by Marquis, such as Who’s Who in American Law, Who’s Who in Finance and Industry, regional Who’s Who editions, and gender- or religion-focused directories. There are also directories for various entertainment and arts fields, including the multivolume Contemporary Authors series found in most libraries. Directories exist for well-known deceased individuals, including several Who Was Who series and the Biography Index, which contains obituary “who’s who” articles.
Because directories are updated either annually or every few years, people who may have been considered worth including in one edition may disappear from the next. The Biography and Genealogy Master Index (BGMI) is a comprehensive index to many of these volumes. Gale Publishing offers a multiple-volume series and also a version on two CD-ROMs. The 1980 edition of the BGMI held more than three million biographical listings in eight volumes, referencing more than 350 different biographical dictionaries. Supplements were published for 1981–85, 1986–90, and annually since then, but the easiest way to use the BGMI is through the online and CD-ROM edition, available at many libraries.
The BGMI electronic database lists all published references for each individual, although retrieving past editions of the various volumes referenced can be problematical, depending on the libraries’ policy on retaining such books. A two-disk Consolidated Marquis Who’s Who database, including all the text from 19 of the most popular directories since 1985, is widely available in libraries. The online BGMI also is available to some library members through their home computers. For example, the Brooklyn (New York) Public Library provides this service to its card holders.
Many countries have similar biographical directories. Many can be found in major U.S. libraries. Some include only one or a few volumes; others are extensive. Some international directories are current, while others are historical and may cover multiple countries, such as the 45-volume Biographie Universelle published in Austria in 1966.
There are also Jewish biographical directories including Who’s Who in American Jewry, an occasional publication first published in 1926–28 and 1938 or The South African Jewish Year Book, published in 1929. An important Israeli biographical encyclopedia, commonly known by its author’s name, Tidhar, was published in 19 volumes from 1947 to 1971 (see the bibliographic citation below).
Medical, Legal and Business Directories
The medical and legal professions are notable for their comprehensive directories, which can be found in many libraries. Officials, executives, and key managers of major corporations and businesses also publish specialized directories. The information provided for each person in these directories is not as genealogically comprehensive as that given in the various Who’s Who series, but it usually includes dates and places of birth, education and degrees, current address, and other professional details. Major libraries hold previous editions of these directories.
For the legal profession, the most comprehensive directory is the Martindale-Hubbel Law Directory, an annually updated series of some 20 volumes organized by state and locality. The index volume shows the state and city for each attorney, along with the page number in the appropriate volume. The front section of each book lists all attorneys with brief, coded information on undergraduate and graduate schools. Attorneys affiliated with law firms have their affiliation cited in this section; the attorneys may be listed also in the remainder of the book under their respective firms, listed alphabetically by locality. More detailed information is given for attorneys listed in the latter section. The Martindale-Hubbel directory is also published as two CD-ROM disks, and the company has a “lawyer locator” on the web at <www.martindale.com/locator/ home/ html>.
The equivalent series for the medical profession is the ABMS Directory of Board Certified Medical Specialists. This is a series of four large volumes organized by medical specialty. An index volume lists all doctors alphabetically, showing their specialty code plus their index number under that specialty. Information such as the year and place of medical degree, board certification, and location of practice also is available for physicians under the “doctor search” option on the American Medical Association (AMA) website, <www.ama-assn.org>.
American Medical Association files on deceased physicians, which date back to 1878, have incomplete data through 1905 and more comprehensive data on physicians who died between 1906 and 1969 when the AMA converted to a computerized system. Information includes the date and place of birth and death, medical school, affiliations, place of practice and, sometimes, an obituary. This information through 1929 can be found in the two-volume publication, Directory of Deceased American Physicians published by the AMA. Covering the years 1804 to 1929, it is available in most major U.S. libraries. The AMA files through 1969 are now in the possession of the National Genealogical Society (NGS), which will search the files for a research fee of $15 per name, prepaid.
The business world has two major directories. The Dun and Bradstreet Reference Book of Corporate Managements, issued since 1968, includes a cross-reference volume that must be consulted first for the name of the individual and the appropriate main volume and business entity under which he or she can be found. Typically, principal officers and directors are listed. Standard and Poor’s Register of Corporations, Directors and Executives, which dates back to 1928, includes similar information. Unlike the medical and legal directories, these annual publications are referenced in the Biography and Genealogy Master Index.
Address
National Genealogical Society, Attention: Deceased Physician File, 4527 17th Street North, Arlington, VA 22207-2399; website: <www.ngsgenealogy.org>.
Bibliography
American Medical Association Directory of Physicians in the United States. Published by AMA Press, annual, 37th edition published 2001. First volume is alphabetical; volumes 2–4 are geographical.
Bibliography and Genealogy Master Index to Biographical Material in Books and Magazines. Published by H.H. Wilson Co. Listings start in 1946. August 2001 edition has 26 volumes. New York Public Library electronic database includes listings through July 1984.
Biographie universelle ancienne et moderne [par] J. Fr. Michaud. (Nouvelle ed.) (Unveränderter photomechanischer Nachdruck der 1854 [i.e. 1843–1865] in Paris erschienenen Ausg.) Graz, Akademische Druk-u. Verlagsanstalt, 1966–70.
Contemporary Authors: A Bio-Bibliographical Guide to Current Writers in Fiction, General Non Fiction, Poetry, Journalism, Drama, Motion Pictures, Television, and Other Fields. Published by the Gale Group in multiple volumes each year with more than 100,000 writers listed. A separate cumulative index is published twice a year. Also available through GaleNet’s online subscription service.
Current Biography Yearbook. Current ed. Clifford Thompson. Published by H.W. Wilson Co. Annually since 1940. Cumulative index 1940–2000; also a cumulative index for 1991–2000 in the 2000 yearbook.
Entsiklopedyah la-halutse ha-yishuv u-vonav: demuyot u-temunot. David Tidhar. Tel Aviv: Sifriyat Rishonim, 1947–71.
Martindale-Hubbel Law Directory. Published by Martindale-Hubbell, a member of the Lexis-Nexis Group. Annual. 2002 edition has 17 volumes.
The Official ABMS Directory of Board Certified Medical Specialists. Published by Elsevier Science. Four volumes, organized by specialty; volume 4 has master index.
Who Was Who in America. Published by Marquis Who’s Who, 55 editions from 1899 to 2002. Currently published annually in two volumes.
Who’s Who in American Jewry. John Simons, ed. New York: National News Association, 1926, 1928, 1938–39.
Who’s Who in South African Jewry—The South African Jewish Yearbook. South African Jewish Historical Society, 1929.
Reprinted from Avotaynu Guide to Jewish Genealogy, published in 2004—Ed.
