These are some of the best free online Illinois databases that I'm aware of.

1) http://infoweb.newsbank.com/

Login with username 'guest' and password 'guest'. There is lots of great stuff here but the best info is found by clicking on "America's Obituaries & Death Notices". This gives you access to death notices in the Chicago Tribune from 1860 - present! If you don't see this link, then you're probably using a computer from a library or school which has its own subscription to NewsBank so only allows you to see what's in their subscription package. Talk to them about adding this link or simply access the site from home or a friend's computer.

2) http://www.sos.state.il.us/departments/archives/databases.ht...

Again there is lots of great stuff here, but I particularly like to use the links for the Illinois Statewide Marriage Index (1763-1900), the Illinois Statewide Death Index (1916-1950) and the new Illinois Statewide Death Index (pre 1916).

If anyone knows of other good free online databases (Illinois or elsewhere), please share them with everyone.

Sincerely,

Bob Murphy

p.s. For newcomers to genealogy, you should also go to http://www.rootsweb.com/ for the Social Security Death Index and http://www.familysearch.org/ for an every name index to the 1880 census. To search other censuses online you probably have to use a paid service. The most popular are probably http://www.ancestry.com/ and http://www.genealogy.com/ and I subscribe to both of them, but I've heard that http://www.godfrey.org/ allows a much cheaper alternative by becoming a "Friend of the Library".

Thank you very much for your infomative posting.
For a newbie with genealogy, this is a treat!
I have Stuarts, Whitings, Harris and others in
my software that I am working on. :-)