GENEALIB Archive

Visit http://listserv.usf.edu/scripts/wa.exe?A0=GENEALIB to access the current GENEALIB listserv.

The GENEALIB mailing list was created in August 1996 by Drew Smith (at the time an instructor with the University of South Florida School of Library and Information Science, now the USF School of Information). The creation of the list was the result of a consultation at the 1996 annual conference of the Federation of Genealogical Societies in Rochester, New York, between Smith and Curt Witcher, Manager of the Genealogy Center of the Allen County [Indiana] Public Library, and now retired librarian Pam Cooper, genealogy librarian for the Indian River County Library in Vero Beach, Florida.

Since its creation, GENEALIB has been hosted continuously at the University of South Florida and administered by Drew Smith as a forum for those librarians who serve genealogists. During much of its existence, GENEALIB has been subscribed to by more than 1000 individuals, including genealogy librarians (predominantly at public libraries), archivists, genealogy product/service vendors, library science students, volunteers at genealogy/historical society libraries, and retired librarians, among others.

In late 1998, GENEALIB was moved from its original mailing list software to Mailman, but unfortunately, its original archive was not preserved. Beginning in January 2021, the list has been moved again, this time from Mailman to LISTSERV, and fortunately the GENEALIB archive from late 1998 to the end of 2020 has been preserved and is available here.

Questions or comments regarding the GENEALIB mailing list and its archive can be directed to genealogy librarian Drew Smith (), Associate Librarian at the USF Libraries.