How This Project Began

I inherited the two books, "History of Wabasha County and Winona County, Minnesota" published in 1884 and "History of Wabasha County, Minnesota" published in 1920 from my mother. When I began working on my family genealogy, I searched the books and found absolutely no ancestors! But I did find hundreds of biographies. I knew these would be important to other genealogists, so I started transcribing them and publishing them on my personal genealogy site.

Soon, a woman from Minnesota, who wished to remain anonymous, found out what I was doing. She also owns the 1884 book, so she began helping me transcribe the biographies. In the process, we discovered that there were many inconsistencies in the layouts of the books and that there was an additional section in the back of my book, not included in the index, which contained my great-great-grandfather's biography!

Since we finished the 1884 biographies, I have continued transcribing the historical sketches from that book and now the Wabasha section of the book is completely transcribed and published. I have also added links and information that I think are pertinent to the era and areas involved.

The original project became so big that I finally asked for two sites on Rootsweb: one for the biographies and one for the Civil War section. I continue to transcribe biographies and historical sketches from the 1920 book on request.

There was a significant section, over 400 pages, from the 1884 book which dealt with Winona County, MN. With the help of volunteers, I have transcribed this information and published it on its own site: History of Winona County, Minnesota.

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