The Genealogy Room

The Genealogy Room is located on the 2nd floor of the library. The collection contains a wide variety of materials, mostly dedicated to the history of the City of Oskaloosa, Mahaska County, surrounding counties and Iowa in general. The collection of resources includes local history and family history books, old city directories, phone books and high school annuals. You will also find cemetery records for all of Mahaska County and some indexing.

We have genealogy books to help you get started tracing your ancestry and family tree and help you learn more about local Iowa history. Other materials of interest include Iowa periodicals, such as Annals of Iowa, The Iowan, Iowa Heritage Illustrated (previously known as Palimpsest) and Everton's Genealogical Helper. DAR (Daughters of the American Revolution) lineage books are also available.

The library has two microfilm readers with a printer attached. Our microfilm collection includes early Oskaloosa newspapers beginning around 1850, and federal and state census records for Mahaska County.



Genealogy Research Request

Our local history and genealogy specialist and volunteers are happy to help research topics for you for a nominal fee. The library charges $7.50 per half hour for research, plus 20 cents each for microfilm copies and standard copies, and postage. Our genealogy volunteer donates her time, and all proceeds go toward the purchase of more materials for the genealogy collection.

Our volunteer also does research at the Mahaska County Courthouse at the same fees stated above with proceeds going to the library. The courthouse charges $5.00 each for a birth, marriage, or death certificate marked "for genealogy purposes only". Births and deaths begin with 1880; marriages begin with 1844. Deeds, wills, and other documents are also available but must sometimes be copied by hand or laptop computer, entailing more research time.

Click here to fill out a form and submit a Genealogy Research Request.