WELCOME TO OUR WEBSITE!

IMPORTANT TIPS TO REMEMBER as you use these pages

  1. The GRHS Search is now much more complete : We have a new search engine and we now include searches of the thousands of files on the GRHS website which are in PDF format. We also no longer require a GRHS members password to search GRHS members-only files. PLEASE NOTE that search results are not visually identified as being restricted to GRHS members-only. If a link points to a link that is members-only you will see "p-data" somewhere in the URL and if you click on the link you will be asked for a username and password. For those who wish to get access to members-only files GRHS membership information is available at this link.

  2. Our website continues place links to topics on multiple primary pages. This is done on purpose because everyone follows different logical paths when they try to relate the topic they are trying to find with the available menu items on a web page. We have tried to repeat a topic in every primary page where it has any relevance. For example the GRHS Letter Archive is found in the About GRHS, Research Resources and GRHS Library pages because these letters are a major project of GRHS, they are a wonderful resource to research the lives of our German Russian ancestors and they are stored in the digital extension of our bricks and mortar GRHS Library in our Bismarck, ND headquarters building.

  3. The next major improvement to the new website was to create a brand new idea for finding information on the GRHS website relative to your needs. The Research Resources primary page is intended to be the starting point for all research on the GRHS website. This page first gives you information on what to do if you are just starting, if you know only your ancestors surname, the region they lived in or the village they lived in. All of the resources available on the GRHS website are then listed and described.

  4. We use Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF) files extensively on this website. When you see the icon it indicates a link leads to a PDF file. PDF format files require the free Adobe Acrobat Reader to be viewed. You may also point your mouse pointer at the link and use your mouse Right-Mouse-Button and then select the "Save Target as..." or "Save link as.." option to download the file directly.
    The Adobe Reader is available at this link .

  5. BOOKMARKS: We use a new method of displaying pages on this website called Frames. We have divided each GRHS page into 3 frames :

    This method has great advantages but it also has disadvantages. One of these disadvantages is that it is more complicated to save a bookmark for information displayed in the main Display frame.
    So, here is how to bookmark the page currently shown in the Main Display frame : Another way to get a bookmark to a frame is to change the browser to display only the Main Ddisplay frame. You can do this using these instructions (but you will have to use the "Back" button to see the GRHS menu bars again) : This "Show only this Frame" method will also allow you to print only the main display frame without the GRHS header or menu bars. Those of you with IE can right-mouse-button on the main display frame you wish to print and choose "Print" from the resulting pop up menu. If you right-mouse-button click on an image you will be able to print only that image.

  6. The German villages in South Russia have always been central to learning about our ancestors. They recorded the events of their lives in the churches of these villages, taught their children in the schools and reported events in their lives to the Russian committee that ran the colonies for their benefit. We have dramatically varying amounts of information about each of these villages but for as many as possible we have created a unique page for each village which collects all of the resource materials that are available for a particular village. For example, if you are interested in the village of Hoffnungstal in the Odessa district you could look either in the Odessa/Kherson link on the Research Resources page and then find the Hoffnungstal link in the list of villages on that page. Or, alternately, you can go to the Alphabetical List of Villages link on the Research Resources page and look up the Hoffnungstal link in the list on that page. If you could not find your village in either of the above lists we have the German Russian Village List link on the Research Resources page so you can see if your village is at least known. The GRHS Village Research Project is pledged to continue to add to these village pages as new information becomes available.

  7. These pages are a complete replacement of the original GRHS web pages and we have made many changes to the locations and names of files so please be aware that YOUR BOOKMARKS MAY WELL CHANGE. We recommend you check any bookmarks may have for the GRHS website.

HOW THESE WEB PAGES CAME TO BE

In March of 2005 the GRHS Web Server committee was given a mandate by the GRHS board of directors to take over ownership of the GRHS website. We first established a team to maintain updates to our original pages and at the same time discussions started on how the GRHS website could be improved. After much discussion we decided to focus on reorganizing the website to make finding information dramatically easier and to change the look and feel to make the website easier to use. We immediately created a prototype website and began the process of taking each feature from the original pages and integrating them into the structure of the new website so that each feature can be found quickly and intuitively. We hope you agree that we have been successful at doing just that. Each of the links in the menu bar on the home page will take you to what we call a primary page. These primary pages group a particular topic on one page and numerous sub-pages branch off from these primary pages.

Suggestions and comments about our website are always welcome, Thank you.

This website is the result of the huge commitment of time and effort by a team of volunteers. Here are the members of the team and the pages that they developed or helped develop :
Murray Gauer - Chair of GRHS Web Server Committee, Home page, About GRHS, Obituaries Project, Surname Exchange Project, RIG Page, GRHS Store, GRHS HQ, Research Resources, Intellectual Property Rights, HOP RIG webmaster & Site map    Email:
Rich Aspenleiter - News & Events, Chapter Page, Chapters, Youth Page, Conventions, BDO RIG co-webmaster, GDO RIG co-webmaster & Search engine
Debbie Beick - Bessarabia, Taurien & Crimea village pages, Crimea RIG webmaster
Ed Bischoff - Heritage page, Letters Archive, GRHS Store, Library Holdings page & Obituaries project
Frances Feist - Intellectual Property Rights
Gayla Gray - Library, Research Resources, VRP, Village pages, AC, ORT, GDO RIG webmaster & Letters Archive
David Kilwien - Search Engine
Sundae Orwick - Beresan & other village pages, Library & BDO RIG webmaster
Duane Stabler - Obituaries Project, GRHS Store & Kutschurgan RIG webmaster

During the development of these new pages the GRHS Web Server committee also continued the task of keeping the original GRHS web pages running and reasonably current. The following Web Server Committee members gave the development team the support they needed to complete their huge undertaking :
Murray Gauer - Chair of GRHS Web Server Committee, Linux Server Site Administrator, Apache Web Server Administrator, GRHS News, HQ page, Home page & Heritage page
Rich Aspenleiter - GRHS Listservers, Chapter coordinator, Chapter pages & Convention pages
Ed Bischoff - Maintain GRHS Member Database and all issues related to members-only access & Liason with Letters Archive team
George Bohlender - GRHS Store pages
Gayla Gray - Liason with RIGs, Liason with VRP, Archive pages & GRHS Organization pages
Duane Stabler - Obituaries pages, Research links & Research tools

This the third incarnation of this website. This time we copied more than 77,000 pages & files from our old server to our new hosting service and then made the changes necessary for the website to operate correctly and take advantage of new features like the new search. Once again this effort was a huge commitment of time and effort by a team of volunteers. Here are the members of the team and the pages that they developed or helped develop :
Murray Gauer - Chair of GRHS Web Server Committee, Home page, About GRHS, Obituaries Project, Surname Exchange Project, GRHS Store, GRHS HQ, Intellectual Property Rights, Letters Archive, Search engine & HOP RIG webmaster
Rich Aspenleiter - News & Events, Chapter Page, Chapters, Youth Page, Conventions, RIG page, BDO RIG co-webmaster & GDO RIG co-webmaster
Gayla Gray - Library, Research Resources, VRP, Village pages, AC, ORT, GDO RIG webmaster & Letters Archive, Site map & Research Resources
Sundae Orwick - Beresan & other village pages, Library & BDO RIG webmaster

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