Arkansas Church Records

Before 1900 the largest religious groups in Arkansas were the Baptist and Methodist Episcopal (now United Methodist). The Family History Library has many church records for Arkansas and several histories of local churches. The following directories may help you locate other church records:

A Directory of Churches and Religious Organizations in the State of Arkansas. Little Rock: Historical Records Survey 1942. (Family History Library book 976.7 K24h; film 823676 item 6.)

Guide to Vital Statistics Records in Arkansas: Volume II, Church Archives. Little Rock: Historical Records Survey, 194-. (Family History LIbrary book 976.7 K2h; film 873998 item 2.)

Many denominations have collected their records into central repositories. You can write to the following addresses to learn where the records are located:

Baptist
Arkansas Baptist State Convention Collection Riley Library Ouachita Baptist University 410 Ouachita Arkedelphia, AR 71998 Telephone: 870-245-5000 Fax: 870-245-5500

Jacynda Ammons OBU Box 3729 Arkadelphia, AR 71998 [mailto:ammonsj@obu.edu ammonsj@obu.edu] Telephone: 870-245-5332 website: http://www.obu.edu/library/baptistrecords.htm

Methodist
North Arkansas Conference Depository Olin C. Bailey Library Hendrix College 1600 Washington Street Conway, AR 72032 Telephone: 501-336-9321 Fax: 501-336-9001 E-mail: [mailto:arkmethodist@hendrix.edu arkmethodist@hendrix.edu] http://www.gcah.org/Conference/umac/arc.htm

Roman Catholic
Diocese of Little Rock 2500 N. Tyler St. Little Rock, AR 72207 Phone: (501) 664-0340

The diocese includes the counties of: Arkansas, Ashley, Baxter, Benton, Boone, Bradley, Calhoun, Carroll, Chicot, Clark, Clay, Cleburne, Cleveland, Columbia, Conway, Craighead, Crawford, Crittenden, Cross, Dallas, Desha, Drew, Faulkner, Franklin, Fulton, Garland, Grant, Greene, Hempstead, Hot Spring, Howard, Independence, Izard, Jackson, Jefferson, Johnson, Lafayette, Lawrence, Lee, Lincoln, Little River, Logan, Lonoke, Madison, Marion, Miller, Mississippi, Monroe, Montgomery, Nevada, Newton, Ouachita, Perry, Phillips, Pike, Poinsett, Polk, Pope, Prairie, Pulaski, Randolph, Saline, Scott, Searcy, Sevier, Sharp, St. Francis, Stone, Sebastian, Union, Van Buren, Washington, White, Woodruff and Yell

THE DROUIN COLLECTION:

Drouin Collection 1621-1967 at Ancestry.ca. When searching these databases, be creative in the spellings as well as the various focuses in searching for an ancestor. The French language has many possible spellings for a name, as well as there are errors in the indexing.

This French-Canadian collection has over 15 million genealogical and vital records entries; they were microfilmed by the Institut Généalogique Drouin. In Quebec, under the French Regime, there were two sets of records kept: a copy for the civil government archives and a copy for the ecclesiastical church archives. The Drouin collection is a civil copy of these entries. Please note that the cutoff date of this collection is in the early 1940s; only a small percentage of entries were covered from 1948 to 1967.

This collection is divided into six databases: 1. Quebec Vital and Church Records, 1621-1967 2. Ontario French Catholic Church Records, 1747-1967, 3. Early U.S. French Catholic Church Records, 1695-1954, 4. Acadia French Catholic Church Records, 1670-1946, 5. Quebec Notarial Records, 1647-1942, and 6. Miscellaneous French Records, 1651-1941. For details about these six databases, see "The Drouin Collection: Six Databases" at https://wiki.familysearch.org/en/The_Drouin_Collection:_Six_databases.

Early U.S. French Catholic Church Records, 1695-1954: This database only contains the French Catholic parish records from the United States; in the states of Alabama, Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, New York, and Pennsylvania. The types of records include baptisms, marriages, and burials as well as confirmations, dispensations, censuses, statements of readmission to the church, and so on. They are written mainly in French, as well as English, Latin, and Italian.