The U.S. Government Printing Office provides free public access to its GPO Access database. The site is searchable and detailed searching help is available on the home page.

The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) has created this handy start page to serve the needs of veterans, their families, and researchers who are looking for military records. Especially for vets, there's an information box with instructions on how to request military service records online, by mail, or by fax. For researchers, there's a page listing specific records that are...