On April 17, 2001, Ellis Island opened an amazing online database of its records. For the first time, records for the 22 million people who entered the United States through the immigration center at Ellis Island between 1892 and 1924 can be accessed on the Internet at http://www.ellisislandrecords.org

What was Ellis Island?

The United States has been called the "Land of Immigrants" for a very good reason; unless an American is 100 percent Native American, they are descended from immigrants. Beginning with the colonists who established the Jamestown settlement in 1607 to the present day, people have traveled great distances and suffered serious hardships in order to live in what is now the United States of America.

Unlike the beginning of United States' history when anyone who could get there was welcome, those wanting into the United States during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries had to meet special qualifications in order to enter. To process the large number of immigrants, the U.S. opened an immigration station on Ellis Island (a 27 acre island located in Upper New York Bay) in 1892.

Immigrants arrived at Ellis Island by boat, crammed and crowded in the steerage during the two week journey. After disembarking, they were organized by ship and then were processed in the Great Hall.

After the Great Hall, they were checked for any possible diseases or infirmities. If they passed, they were allowed to enter the United States. Many of them became our ancestors.

What does the new website offer?

For decades, the only way to search for your ancestors in the Ellis Island records was through painstaking research on microfilm at the National Archives in Washington D.C. However, for the past five and a half years, 12,000 volunteers from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have been working on digitizing the records. After spending $22.5 million and 5.6 million man-hours to extract the records from 3,700 rolls of microfilm, the database has been completed.

The database of Ellis Island records can be accessed two different ways. The first, is by going to the newly created American Family Immigration History Center at the Ellis Island Museum. It costs $5 to use the database at the Center. The second way you can access the database is online -- for free! The database can be accessed at http://www.ellisislandrecords.org. Unfortunately, since the web site just opened, it is suffering from too high a demand for its resources; thus making access to it difficult. By waiting about a week, you should be able to more readily access the records.

The database holds information for the 22 million immigrants who were processed through Ellis Island between 1892 and 1924. By searching the database you can find up to 11 pieces of information:

• Immigrant's given name
• Immigrant's surname
• Ship name
• Port of origin
• Arrival date
• Line number on manifest
• Gender
• Age
• Marital status
• Nationality
• Last residence (town & country)

Soon, online visitors will also be able to request a copy of the immigration records and a photo of the ship their ancestors arrived on.

How can I find my family records?

You can start researching by going to the web site at http://www.ellisislandrecords.org and entering in a name under "Find a Passenger." This will take you to a list of people with similar names. To decide which one could be your relative, the database gives you information about when they arrived, how old they were on arrival, and their last residence. You'll have to register to get much further (the minimum includes your name and email address).

Keep looking and have patience. Though it's amazing the records are available online, it may still take some time for you to find the information you are looking for.

Good luck!

Photographs taken and copyrighted by Jennifer and Matthew Rosenberg