Compiled and edited by Keith A. Johnson and Malcolm R. Sainty, directors of the Library of Australian History in North Sydney, Australia, the GRD is the largest surname query book available. The current issue contains nearly 150,000 entries from genealogists in Great Britain, Canada, United States, Europe, Australian, New Zealand and South Africa. These are more than just addresses, the entries also provide telephone and fax numbers, contact names, hours of operation, and requirements regarding access and research policy. Non-profit genealogical societies and historical societies with a family history group may be listed free of charge in the societies section of the directory. Many researchers now have e-mail addresses listed, making international contact easier and faster.
Land records are usually the most valuable genealogical proof of an American pedigree.
If you're researching in Colonial Virginia or in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, there are a couple of new publications that may be of interest. This 553-page volume begins with Land Patent Book 29 and continues through Patent Book 34. In the index, patentee names appear in uppercase allowing the user to distinguish between the patentee and other references. The index also includes place names. Many of the early pioneers who settled on the Susquehanna River area were Quakers from the Delaware Valley, but by 1723 the Germans and Scotch-Irish were streaming into Lancaster County.