Free this week: immigration records for your PA ancestors

Hello Reader!

If you have an immigrant ancestor who landed in Pennsylvania, the arrival record is one of the most useful documents you can find. It often names the ship, the port of departure, the date, an age, sometimes a last residence or a relative waiting in the States — the bridge that carries your research back across the ocean.

MyHeritage keeps a number of these collections free to search and view. I went through their U.S. catalog this week and pulled the ones that actually matter for Pennsylvania work — the Philadelphia arrivals first, then two national sets that catch the ancestors who came in somewhere else and made their way to PA later.

Start in Philadelphia

For most of the 18th and 19th centuries, Philadelphia was the busiest arrival port in Pennsylvania — and after New York, one of the busiest in the country. These three collections are free, and together they cover arrivals from 1800 right through 1945. Search all three; the indexing differs, so a name missing from one often turns up in another.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Passenger Lists, 1883–1945 — 1,752,048 records, with images. The core collection for the era of heaviest immigration.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Passenger List Card Index, 1883–1948 — 1,153,200 records, with images. A card index that can break a name the main list mis-transcribed.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Passenger Lists, 1800–1882 — 489,486 records, with images. The pre-1883 window, where a lot of earlier German and Irish arrivals are hiding.

Then widen the net

Plenty of Pennsylvania families didn't enter through Philadelphia at all — they came through New York, or down from Canada, and only settled in PA afterward. If your ancestor isn't in the Philadelphia lists, these two free national collections are where I'd look next.

Ellis Island and Other New York Passenger Lists, 1820–1957 — 113,554,317 records, with images. Free. The single largest U.S. arrival collection; a huge share of PA families came through New York first.

United States, Border Crossings from Canada, 1895–1956 — 12,398,840 records, with images. Free. Easy to forget — many immigrants landed at a Canadian port and crossed south, leaving a U.S. record only at the border.

One research note before you dive in. A passenger list is a starting point, not proof. Names were written down by ear, ages were rounded, and ports of origin were often just the last stop, not the hometown. Treat the arrival record as a lead — then confirm the identification against what you already know from census, church, and naturalization records before you attach it to your tree.

Have you found an ancestor's arrival record in any of these? Hit reply and tell me which collection it turned up in — I read every response.

Happy researching,

Denyse Allen Founder, PA Ancestors

P.S. — These collections are free to search at MyHeritage, but a few of the record images may prompt you to sign in with a free account. The search and the index entries are open to everyone.