Genealogical group to digitize Arizona records, post online

PHOENIX — A national genealogical group is digitizing some Arizona historical information in return for access to the documents.

It looked for a moment last month like a lot of valuable data could be lost when the Arizona Genealogical Library moved its collection to the Arizona State Archives. But Family Search, the largest genealogy organization in the world, volunteered to preserve it.

“Family Search has stepped in and is going to provide scanning and digital hosting services for 5,000 books, at no cost to the state,” Kim Crawford, communications manager for the Arizona State Library Archives and Public Records, said.

The documents are part of the Arizona Collection, which includes information about the state in addition to family histories.

The Church of Latter Day Saints-backed website will post the collection online in the public domain.

“Family Search, in return (for preserving the documents), is going to be able to use the information from the 5,000 books sent by Arizona as part of their database worldwide.”

Crawford said Family Search has made the same sort of deal with about 30 other states.

The digitizing project is expected to take about six months to complete.

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