My father has his 50 birthday this year and he wants to know about his familytree. Any suggestions / references / hints where i can get this in a A+ quality for a moderate price?

tia
-Tom-

Tom,

FYI when you speak of Austria... you need to take into consideration... the fact that the Austria of 2004 is not the Austria that existed prior to the end of WW I, after 1918. Prior to 1918 Austria was part of the Habsburg Empire aka Austria-Hungary... which inc. all or parts of the modern countries of Austria, Hungary, Poland, Ukraine, Czech Rep, Slovakia, Russia, Roumania, Italy, Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia and Serbia. So if your father's family emigrated prior to 1920ish then you may not find any info in present day Austria.

The place to begin is to determine where in "Austria" they were from, the exact village or town. Once you determine that then you may discover that there are records "readily" available for you... right where you live.

One purpose of this forum is to post queries regarding our ancestor search. There are people hereabouts who (at no charge because we enjoy the mystery and the hunt and helping others) may have some answers. You may in the end employ a "professional" but at least if you learn some basics about your family you will know if you are being given real facts of BS as sometimes happens!

Perhaps you may wish to get started this way, if so then you need answer the following:

1) Surname(s) and given name(s) of those who immigrated
2) Approximate year of immigration
3) Where did they settle when they immigrated
4) What was their ethnicity (FYI Austrian is not an ethnicity)
5) What language did they speak
6) What was their religion, this may help determine their area of origin

Best of luck with your project... I am sure you father will be pleased.

Robert Jerin
Croatian Heritage Museum
Cleveland Ohio

Thomas

www.rat.de/kuijsten/navigator
www.genealogienetz.de/reg
www.herold.at Austria's phone site
www.ihff.at

I am looking for information about my great-great-grandparents and their family. They came to America in 1857 from Aigen, Austria. They travel on the ship "President Smidt" from Bremen, Germany to New York arriving on 28 Aug, 1857. They were a family of 9, Franz (51), Josepha(53), Rosalea(21), Franz(19), Georgory(15), Josepha(14), Ann Maria(12) , Ann(10) and Johann(3) We are not certain but believe Johann was the son of Roselea. Their faith was Catholic. They were Austrian, and settled in the Milwaukee area of Wisconsin. They spoke German. We have another spelling for the town or origin (Eigen). do not know which is correct. The ship recorded list the occupation of the Franz as a weaver.

Hi,
there are two Aigen in nowadays Austria, Aigen im Ennstal, which is in Styria, and Aigen im Mühlkreis, which is in Upper Austria north of the Danube. There is no Eigen.
There exist no families Schmider or Schmieder or else (Schmiderer, Schmidinger) in or around these places, now.
I do not know, whether there are more places Aigen in other countries of the former empire of Österreich Ungarn.
In Austria there are now Schmider (12), Schmiderer (70), Schmieder (60) and Schmiederer (20), estimated.
Good luck.
L.Kneissler

In case it's helpful to your research, there was an Anna Sery (née Schmieder), who died in Aug. 1923 in Milwaukee. Her death notices were published in the local German language newspapers. There are no other Schmieder or Schmider entries listed in "Milwaukee's German Newspapers; an index of death notices and related items" (1844-1950).
For more specific information contact:
Gary Rebholz, compiler/editor
Milwaukee Wis.
gary.rebholz@gmail.com
Indexing Milwaukee's German newspapers continuously since 2007... helping to access our historic immigrant culture.