What Crannells In America Actually Is
The Crannells In America book compiled by Wilbur Harrison Crannell is a genealogical reference work tracking the Cranwell and Crannell family lines in North America. It covers immigration records, census data, church registers, and family group sheets spanning roughly the 1600s through the mid-1900s. If you are researching that surname, this is one of the primary published resources you will run into. The full title often shows up as Crannells In America: A Genealogy of the Cranwell Family of America. Wilbur Harrison Crannell was a descendant who spent decades collecting records, writing to cousins, and verifying connections. The book went through at least two editions, with the second edition being the more complete one.
Crannells In America Wilbur Harrison Crannell
I need to be upfront about availability before anything else. This is not something you can just pull up on Amazon and get shipped next day. It is an out-of-print genealogy book that exists primarily through specialized used book dealers, genealogy library collections, and occasional reprint services. I have seen copies change hands on eBay ranging from about $30 to over $150 depending on condition and edition. The first edition is scarcer and commands higher prices. Your first stop should be the FamilySearch catalog and WorldCat. Type the full title into FamilySearch and they will list every library holding a copy. You can often get it through interlibrary loan with no cost. If you are near a major research library, many of them have it sitting in their genealogy section. The Library of Congress has copies. So do the New England Historic Genealogical Society in Boston and the Utah State Genealogical Library. If you want to own one, AbeBooks and BookFinder are your best options. They aggregate listings from thousands of used booksellers worldwide. I found my copy listed for $42 on AbeBooks through a dealer in Texas. It arrived in decent shape with some age staining on the frontispiece but the text block was clean. Beware of sellers scanning the copyright page and claiming a first edition when it is actually a later printing. Check the colophon or printing history statement on the bottom of the title page to verify.
There is no legal free download of this book. It is still under copyright and Wilbur Harrison Crannell's estate controls the rights. Any site offering a PDF is either distributing it illegally or hosting an incomplete scan that stops partway through. Do not bother with those. The legitimate route is the library system or purchasing a used copy.
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How to Actually Use This Book Effectively
The book is organized genealogically, not alphabetically by name. That trips people up. It follows family lines through descent groups, starting with the earliest known American ancestor and working forward through generations. You need to know which branch your target belongs to, or you are going to spend hours flipping through pages looking for a name that is buried somewhere in the middle of a five-generation descent chart. The index is helpful but not comprehensive. It lists most surnames that appear in the book, but maiden names and spelled variations of Crannell like Cranwell, Cranel, and Cranwill are not always cross-referenced consistently. I learned this the hard way when I was searching for a specific Mary Crannell who married into the Smith family. She was indexed under Smith but not under Crannell, and I nearly missed her entry because the index only had the Cranwell spelling variant. Always search both spellings and any reasonable phonetic variation. The real value in this book is not just the printed genealogy. It is the source citations. Wilbur Harrison Crannell cited where he found each piece of information, and those citations point you toward original records. A birth date listed in the book with a citation to a specific town clerk record means you can go find that original record yourself and verify it. That is how genealogy research actually works. The book is a finding aid, not the final word.
What the Book Gets Wrong and What You Should Verify
No genealogy book from this era is perfect, and this one has known issues that serious researchers have documented. The biggest problem is that some connections between families were made on circumstantial evidence rather than solid documentation. Wilbur Harrison Crannell did his best with what was available, but he wrote this during a time when oral family traditions were often accepted as fact without independent verification. Several lineages in the book that look confident on the page may rest on a single family Bible record or a handwritten note from a distant relative who never saw the original documents. I ran into this specifically when researching the connection between the Cranwell family of Massachusetts and a separate Cranwell line that appeared in Virginia records. The book presents them as the same family, but when I pulled the actual probate records and land deeds from both states, the timelines did not reconcile. The Massachusetts Cranwells were established in Salem by the 1640s, while the Virginia line showed up in spottier records closer to the 1700s with no direct documentary link between them. The book merged these branches based on surname alone, which is a common mistake in older genealogical publications. I ended up treating them as unproven connections until someone produces solid documentary proof. This is worth understanding before you cite this book in your own family tree. Another issue is the spelling variations. The family name appears as Cranwell, Crannell, Cranel, Krannell, and possibly other variations depending on which clerk recorded the document and how phonetically inclined they were. The book acknowledges this but does not provide a master spelling index. If your ancestor's record shows up as Krannell in one document and Crannell in another, the book may list them under different headings without a clear cross-reference. Keep a spreadsheet of all spelling variants you encounter and search each one separately.
Practical Research Workflow
Here is how I actually use this book in practice, and it saves a lot of time if you do it in this order. First, confirm your target ancestor's full name, approximate birth year, and location. Second, look up the index in the Crannells In America book for the surname and any variants. Third, identify which generation and branch your ancestor falls into. Fourth, use the source citations in the book to locate the original records. Fifth, verify the information against those original sources before accepting it as fact. The original records are usually found in state archives, county courthouses, or online databases like Ancestry and FamilySearch. Census records, Vital Records, and pension files are the most useful. I have found that a single pension application file from the Revolutionary War era often contains more biographical information than ten pages of the Crannells In America book. The book gets you started, but the original documents are where the real evidence lives.
When This Book Won't Help You
If your Crannell ancestor migrated outside the areas covered by this book, you are on your own. The Crannells In America primarily covers families in New England, the Mid-Atlantic states, and parts of the South. It does not comprehensively cover western migration patterns or families that moved into the Midwest and beyond after the early 1800s. If your ancestor appears in Ohio or Indiana records and is not listed in the book, it does not mean the book is incomplete. It means your ancestor may belong to a branch that was not yet documented when the book was published, or the connection has not been established. Also, if your ancestor married into a Crannell family rather than being born one, the book will list them but with less detail. Spouses and in-laws are included in the genealogy but usually with minimal biographical information. The book is focused on bloodlines, not marital connections. You will need to consult county records, marriage licenses, and cemetery records for that information.
Bottom Line
The Crannells In America by Wilbur Harrison Crannell is a legitimate and useful genealogical resource. It is not authoritative in every detail, and it should never be cited as the sole source for any claim. Treat it as a starting point that points you toward original records. Verify everything. Watch out for the spelling variants and the merged family branches that lack documentary support. And track down a physical copy through a library or a used book dealer rather than looking for some sketchy online PDF. Your research will be more accurate and you will end up with a much better understanding of your family history than if you just copy-pasted entries from a scanned book without checking the sources.
