Hi Everyone, Now that I am close to halfway through the genealogy cards [594 cards/1112 entries complete], my next big transcription may be the "First Admitting Census of the County Hospital of Monterey County" [if the original database is no longer available]. "PREFACE — The following material was made available from the Monterey County Historical Society for the express purpose of indexing the patients, or inmates, … for use by genealogists and family researchers." There are a total of 2,541 admissions ["This includes 17 trips to the hospital from 1894 to 1902 for one patient"]. The information was compiled by Bettyann Lockwood Hedegard in 1996 "for the express use of the Monterey County Historical Society." It is a gem. Along with the page number from the original document, this database includes Age, Surname, Given Name, Date Admitted, Status of the individual, Nativity, when they came to California, Date Released, whether or not they were released, and Time Died. The Nativity column reads like a United Nations directory;. The standard problem with transcriptions from handwritten documents applies. Surnames "… were often entered as they sounded to the recorder from patients with heavy accents. Also, spelling of names did not become standardized until after the 1900s." As for the Given Name — "While a lot of names list only an initial, the title Miss has been left out for a female name, but the title Mrs. has been retained to show the difference between husband and wife. Given names for women were not listed until the later years of the census. Note also, that there is no gender asked or stated in the original document." ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- I'm willing to do lookups at the present time and will post the results as a group. FYI, I looked up my Monterey County ancestors and none of them showed up. They were either very healthy, or didn't go to the county hospital for treatment. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hope this helps, Anita C. Monterey County