Genealogists, historians and seekers of family lore will have an easier time researching deaths, births and other details of daily life in New Hampshire when 350 years of state records move into a new building later this month.

For the last several decades, the Division of Vital Records has kept its 4 million birth, death, marriage and divorce certificates in the bowels of a Hazen Drive office building. Searches are usually a cinch, thanks to a volunteer corps that gives Google a run for its money, but space is limited, the vaults are gloomy and other state records, like census documents and town reports, are located elsewhere in the city.

All that will change once the records are relocated to a recently expanded building on Fruit Street, where they will share space with another repository of history: the state archives. The move means climate control for the records, offices with windows for the staff and a more pleasant place for the historically curious to discover the common, uncommon and downright weird compo-

nents of New Hampshire's family trees.

"We're probably not going to change how you access the records," said State Registrar William Bolton. "But the maintenances will be different, and the presentation will be easier to use."

The new building, which will also house a few other state offices, will offer visitors more space, wireless internet access and one-stop shopping for historical records. The move is part of a reorganization of state agencies that involves transferring vital records from Health and Human Services to the care of Secretary of State Bill Gardner's office.

Most people who come to the records want to flesh out their family tree. Others are researching books or papers. What they find varies.

"It depends on what you want," said Deborah Moore, the genealogy coordinator. "From nothing to lots."

The oldest records date back to the mid-1600s, like a birth certificate for Samuel Dow, born in Hampton on April 19, 1662. Many of New Hampshire's founding families are represented in the vault: Smith, Towle, Cram and Dow. One drawer contains slips of paper chronicling marriages between slaves. Others hold cryptic death certificates for unidentified babies, anonymous hobos and one for an "unknown man found in Ramsdell pasture."

Public records include birth certificates before 1901 and death, divorce and marriage documents prior to 1947. Anything more recent is stored in a separate vault and can be viewed only by relatives or people with a legal need for the document.

Even if your lineage doesn't reach back to New Hampshire's early days, the vital records hold plenty of interesting details. For instance, Franklin Pierce's death certificate lists his profession as "lawyer." His tenure as president of the United States isn't mentioned. You'll also learn that Samuel Morse, inventor of the Morse Code, was married in Concord on Sept. 29, 1818.

Volunteers are also busy compiling family trees of notable doctors around the state, a database cross-referencing marriage certificates by brides' maiden names and the complete lineage of the Fifields.

"We really amaze people with how fast we can come up with them," said John Martin, a 7-year records veteran who has traced his own lineage back to a bishop at the Battle of Hastings. "You pull a record and it gives you a place to start. It starts here but it doesn't take you back. You look in books, you join clubs . . . Other than that, you have depend on the old family Bible or Grammie's memory."

Yesterday, Martin and a few other volunteers and staff members picked through narrow wooden drawers, transferring yellowed slips of paper into crisp new acid-proof boxes. When they're done, they've have 1,200 containers to move across town.

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