A Huge Amount Of Data Being Made Available For The Public

How large a pile would 11 million pages of information make?

No doubt, the people in the McHenry County Recorders Office could give a pretty good idea. That office has indexed and imaged 100 years of documents on the Recorder's computer system. That is approximately 2.8 million documents and 11 million pages. The information dates back to 1909.

All this information is available to search, retrieve and print within seconds in the Recorder's Office, or on the Internet.

"This is a major accomplishment for our office and we are on target to reach completion of all recorded document indexes and images, dating back to 1839 to be on the computer by 2012," says Recorder Phyllis K. Walters.

At the same time, all current documents coming into the office for recording are received and returned within three business days.

While all recorded documents can be searched in the Recorder’s Office, the office offers the following  free online services at Recorders website

Here, there are four buttons to access the information desired. Indexed land records can be searched by grantor/grantee name, without images, free, by accessing the lower right hand button.

The Tapestry button on the lower left hand allows access to document on a pay-as-you go process. 

The Laredo button is a quarterly subscription service for those who access information often. Iimages can be viewed and printed;

There is also the opportunity for property owners to be notified by e-mail or telephone if a document is recorded in their name by using the upper right hand button. 

More information on any of these services can be found on the Recorder’s website or by calling the office at (815) 334-4045, or (815) 334-4109.