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The setting: a tropical island during a world war. The characters: a famous writer, ambassadors, secret agents, Spanish expatriates, bartenders and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover.

The plot: While residing on the island, the famous writer cobbles together a network of bartenders, waiters, Spanish loyalists, and other local busybodies to serve as informants on suspected fascist and Nazi activities during World War II.

The suspicious Hoover turns the spy tables on the writer and the writer becomes the object of an FBI investigation.

Does it sound like a best-seller? It would be on the non-fiction list because it's a true story. Ernest Hemingway worked as an FBI informant while living in Cuba during the early part of World War II.

Hemingway's position as an informant for the FBI tottered between formal and informal, and valuable and useless, depending on whom you talked to. His FBI case file makes for fascinating reading; it's at FBI.

The FBI's Electronic Reading Room contains digital images of case files for many other famous people, including Lucille Ball, Marilyn Monroe, Roberto Clemente and Charles Lindbergh.

Gangsters, bank robbers and kidnappers come to mind when we think of FBI investigations. Even if our ancestors didn't meet the dubious qualifications for that crowd of miscreants, they still might be lurking in an FBI case file.

Founded 100 years ago, the FBI started out with a few dozen agents in an organization known as the Bureau of Investigation. Over the years as the scope of federal crimes expanded, so did the bureau's investigative reach.

If you want to see if any of your kin caught the attention of the FBI start by checking out the FBI records housed at the National Archives as part of Record Group 65. This Group includes case files, photographs, criminal data cards, and other administrative paperwork.

Also, take a look at the Investigative Case Files for 1908-1922 at the subscription site, Footnote. Footnote has partnered with the National Archives and has digital images of these files online.

If you have immigrant ancestors you might spot some relatives in the "Old German Files." These files include investigations of Germans, and other immigrants, in America during World War I, most of them suspected of anti-American sentiment or for failing to register for the draft.

Nonimmigrants were investigated as well. For example, the Old German Files contain the investigation of James Morris, a Kansas City cab driver. Alerted that Morris, an "alleged slacker," seemed well enough to be serving in the army, an FBI agent was sent to interview him in 1918.

The brief interview reveals Morris' birthplace and date, his current residence and occupation, and that he and his wife were separated.

There are other records in the Investigative Case Files as well, including files related to visa applications, investigations of activities and people along the Mexican border, and reports about suspected socialists and communists.

Viewing these records on Footnote is a bonus because you can conduct an every name search. So, even if your relatives weren't the subjects of an investigation, they may have been a witness or informant.

For more details about the kinds of FBI records available to the public and how to request copies, go to FBI.