Hello Carolyn and listmembers, Thanks, Carolyn, for the excellent discourse on effective research. Several thoughts went thru my mind as I read. One thought is that field researchers do a lot of work, spend a lot of hours, pay a lot of money, walk miles and miles of cemeteries and courthouses and other record repositories. This is for as long as the records last, and someday they will deteriorate, be stolen, be lost, and otherwise cease to be available. This will also last only so long as there are folks who are willing and able to make these sacrifices to get at that information. Here's my main point. After the field researcher does their part, doing their work and putting it all together as best they can, they usually share the product of their work with non-field researchers. These folks then circulate the data to others who then circulate it some more. This helps by utilizing the brainpower and resources of a large group of people to come up with credible conclusions on these mysteries of ours. In all these transactions, many times, esp. now with the internet, the data becomes corrupted. Sometimes it is still credited to, or blamed on, the original field researcher. Sometimes it has been claimed by a succession of folks who believe that since they "discovered" it on the internet, in a book, or from talking with other folks, that it is now theirs so their name gets attached. Sometimes someone adds their opinions as fact before passing it on. In any case, inquiring folks get shortchanged by incorrect data and this has all kinds of consequences for them. My guess is that a lot of this happens because documentation is not fun and is time-consuming. However, without it, one should never be thought of, or think of themselves, as genealogists. Someday, not too far off, this will be all we will have to use as documentation. It is imperative that folks who do know how to document, and those who care about the truth, use documentation effectively, and talk to other researchers about its importance. Some good folks like the thrill of gallopping with their information, adding, combining, and ultimately corrupting their own, and others' research. Fast is more fun. It reminds me of the play and movie, "The Little Shop of Horrors" where the plant keeps demanding more and more food from the hero, Seymour, "Feed me Seymour, feed me!". The plant isn't particular about what kind of meat he eats. Please note that I am not speaking of anyone or any particular family. I've been plagued by these realities for years now. I have found inaccurate files submitted on the internet on my families, checked the submitter's source and found they'd listed me. Huh? I didn't give folks permission to use that material or share it with anyone and now it is outdated with my name still attached. Always, the submitter is someone I have never talked with. That old junk is still making the rounds. I have some suggestions to make that would sure help me out a lot. Maybe others, too. But this is now too long so I'll start another message so anyone who is really getting bored, or out of time, can just delete the rest. I'll understand, folks do want to find actual genealogy info on these lists. Thanks, Barb Temple