Dear Eve, I've been saying (and writing) for some time now that newspapers are the next "big thing." For many genealogists, having acquired the primary source documents for birth, marriage and death, various census returns, military records and naturalizations and passenger manifests (where they impact some of our relatives), there is still the huge amount to be discovered from researching newspapers. These provide even more clues or solve exiting mysteries - or create even more mysteries to solve! There are national, regional and local newspapers. There are "ethnic" (think Jewish Chronicle, Manchester Telegraph) newspapers. Even foreign newspapers can provide breakthroughs. A couple of years ago I was helping someone research a family in San Francisco. The son placed a notice in the San Francisco newspaper regarding his father who had passed away in his home town in Eastern Europe. So you never know where you might strike lucky! You simply have to check them all! Happy Hunting! Jeremy -- Jeremy G Frankel ex-London, England now Folsom, CA Searching for: FRANKEL: Plock, Poland; London, England GOLDRATH/GOLD: Praszka, Poland; London, England KOENIGSBERG: Vilkaviskis, Lithuania; London, England; NY, USA LEVY (later LEADER): Kalisz, Poland; London, England Pinkus, Poland; London, England PRINCZ/PRINCE: Krakow, Poland; London, England; NY, USA

I too have been using the newspapers now on line for historical research. Be aware however that not all local papers are on line in the British Library newspaper archive site - Some titles are not there because they are subject to copyright, or the archive has been put on line by the newspaper itself, on a pay by view basis, similar to that adopted by the Jewish Chronicle. My family come from Rugby. But the Rugby Advertiser is not on line. However, you may can still read missing newspapers at the British Library, at local libraries - and possibly at other libraries too. Evelyn Wilcock Genealogy site at http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~wilcock/

> > I've been saying (and writing) for some time now that newspapers are > the next "big thing." Dear Jeremy, You're absolutely right. It's having them online and searchable that's making all the difference. I've often wondered what having a collection of BMDs really means - they tell us nothing about a person's life. For me, much of the value of the articles I've stumbled on hasn't been the the addition to those, but the welter of events that contribute to the picture of their daily lives: one family member (or his daughter and son) was frequently called to court, either because he was the victim of theft, or because petty thieves tried to flog him their stolen goods; my 3xgr grpa's place of business burned down; my other 3xgr grpa was brought to court for abusive behaviour of his wife (his second, not y ancestor), who was so afraid of him that she wouldn't come to schul on a holy day (she was living apart from him), and the whole of his threatening letter was published; Benjamin Disraeli was claimed to have come from Exeter and the brother of my two Lazarus 3xgr grpas was quoted as saying he could remember Disraeli's father, who was a general dealer. As for more mysteries - yes, those turn up, too! And some are solved. Eve