When searching for patents I have found that Google Patents works
best for me:  http://patents.google.com/  This works fairly reliably
especially if you're looking up by patent number.

If you're looking using other keywords, I often find that using the
tab for "Advanced Search" can often yield much better results.  For an
example, searching simply for "569233" will bring you to the following
page: https://patents.google.com/patent/US569233A/en?oq=569233 

Here you'll see the transcribed text of the patent and also links and
thumbnails for the picture associated with the patent.  You can also
download the information using the "download PDF" tab.  There is also
typically information on related documents, but often that is not much
use here if you're looking at something obscure.

Kyle E. Nasman
Corvallis, Oregon