Is the familysearch.org site being used to proselyte? One of my tbm relatives, knowing that I still enjoy family history, suggested that I check out this website. I saw that, at least on the mobile site, registration is now required. I also saw that they offer free online chat and phone help, supposedly with research. Do missionaries man those lines? Should a person who wants to discourage contact from Mormons be scared to use this site? My tbm relative went on and on about how much more user-friendly she thought this site is compared to ancestry.com.

Any thoughts or experiences that you guys can share are appreciated.

Log in and ask them about magenets. That will tell you if they are missionaries or not.

I was curious and did some investigating. I rang up the number they gave and was connected to someone in Utah. I asked bluntly are you Mormon and she answered yes, I then asked if her co workers were Mormon and again she answered yes. She became very evasive as I enquired further into the link between Ancestry.com and the Morg.I believe it was originally started by Mormons though not 100% sure.

The actual founder of Ancestry.com, John Sittner, is actually a non-Mormon.

It has ties to Utah and I am sure like any other Utah company they are full of Mormons but I don't think there is any close ties.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/20/2013 01:35PM by Thomas $. Monson.

I use both familysearch and ancestry.com. I am hooked on family history research as a hobby.

I can tell you that the online helpers for family search are SERVICE missionaries....that is to say non-paid LDS volunteers who are not proselyting missionaries.

Having said that, I am sure that they would be happy to refer a caller to the real missionaries....ha

No. I use Family Search regularly and have used the online help. They are Service Missionaries and seem to be little old ladies. I think the whole genealogy program is at least in concept a missionary "tool" but in practice is not. I think most people using it are just doing genealogy,either non-Mormons researching their history or TBMs doing their thing...I am sure if you asked them though they would hook you up with the elders..

I searched ancestry.com once to see if I could find out if temple work had been done for deceased ex-husband who made me promise that none would ever be done; he was Catholic. While I was unable to access that kind of information and have never returned to the site, a few Saturday mornings later I was visited by two visiting teachers. I have had no contact with church in 54 years and have requested several times in writing Do Not Contact. Check out Ancestry.com on Wikipedia; you'll find out a lot. Then you might want to check on the company which purchased A.c. Utah-Mormon connection can be verified. I get e-mails from Ancestry.com daily which I totally ignore.

Registration is not required to use the site. There are now online digital images of many records that they have on microfilm. Some, because of requirements by the agency that holds the original records, require that you do have an account with FamilySearch and log in to see the image.

I've never been contacted by anyone from FamilySearch or LDS by having an account, so you have nothing to fear. Many of the same images that are free at FamilySearch, are also on Ancestry where you have to pay.

For some indexed U.S. records look at these:
https://familysearch.org/search/collection/list#page=1&region=UNITED_STATES

Also check "catalog" on the drop-down menu under "search" at the top. Enter a location, and look at the records available. If there is an image of a camera next to a microfilm number as these
https://familysearch.org/search/catalog/329200
you can click on the camera and go through on-line digital images from the microfilm.