Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Dellibac Record Survey, part 2 - Kankakee Co., IL

After doing this for Iroquois County already, I had high hopes for what was out there on Kankakee County. Unfortunately, I didn't make much headway here. There just didn't seem to be as much that was readily available for Kankakee County, which was a bit surprising. In any case, here is what I found-

-county records begin in 1853
-birth records begin in 1877 (the Kankakee Valley Genealogical Society website says 1878) and there is an index to the birth records on the KVGS website
-marriage records begin in 1853 with the Illinois Statewide Marriage Index available on the IRAD website
-death records begin in 1877 with an index on the KVGS website
-all of the above are available from the Kankakee County Clerk's Office
-land records begin in 1851 (2 years before the official formation of the county in 1853) and are available from the recorder of deeds
-probate records begin in 1853 and are available from the Circuit Court Clerk and are also online (without an index) at familysearch.org
-the Kankakee County Clerk has naturalization records
-the Kankakee Public Library has some newspapers stretching back to the 1850s on microfilm, but none are French language
-they do have a collection of "newspaper clippings about some of the French Canadian people who settles the Kankakee Area"

-a search of Chronicling America did turn up a couple of French language newspapers in the area, but none are locally held. The nearest partial holding library is the state library in Springfield.

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