I have had several questions about the listing of letters. At that point in time,(or earlier) when people had letters or mail, particularly for general delivery, the post office would put a list of letters in the newspaper so that people would know to come and pick up their mail. When people lived in rural farming areas the post office did not deliver to the outlying areas. The farmers and coal miners would only know they had mail by reading their name in the paper. This can be used as a way of locating people at times other than census records. It can also be very helpful in the long time span between the 1880 census and the 1900 census. It is also helpful in times before 1880 to learn family member names and locations. It might help you realize how other people spelled a person's name at that time. Remember there were a lot of illiterate people or those who could not read or write in English. If your ancestor received mail, it would also indicate that there was someone else out there that was able to send them a letter. There is only a list of letters from old newspapers, there is no actual letter in the present time. I hope this helps to explain this more thoroughly. jabtillery@home.com -----Original Message----- From: ARTNFRAMES@aol.com <ARTNFRAMES@aol.com> To: jabtillery@home.com <jabtillery@home.com>; ALJEFFER-L@rootsweb.com <ALJEFFER-L@rootsweb.com> Date: Tuesday, August 15, 2000 10:15 PM Subject: Re: [ALJEFFER] List f letters - August 2, 1899, Pratt City Herald >In a message dated 8/15/00 11:08:21 PM Eastern Daylight Time, >jabtillery@home.com writes: > ><< EDWARDS, Nathan >> >What was the letter for this person? > > >Betty Rackley Taylor >Researching: Rackley, Taylor, Dudley, Edwards, Broughten, Moon, >Holladay, Adams, Williams, Bunyan, Kelly, Groce, Faulkner, Pugh, etc >