I found something last week - on microfilm at the IL State Archives - that helped me learn more details about a mother & her 2 young sons. In the (regular) 1880 federal census - they were enumerated in an Alms House, simply as "paupers". At the Archives, I found microfilms titled "Miscellaneous Schedule of Handicapped, Dependent & Delinquent Inhabitants of Illinois", 10th Federal census, Roll #30-2169. Schedule D of this Miscellaneous census was titled "Pauper and Indigent Inhabitants in Institutions, Poor-Houses or Asylums, or Boarded at Public Expense in Private Houses" - and in THIS census, it not only gives the "residence when at home", but who paid the bills (city, county, State or institution; whether the patient/inmate was able-bodied, "habitually intemperate"; epileptic; convicted of any crime; if disabled, the nature or form of disability; the date of admission; and whether or not any other immediate family members were also in the establishment [i.e., son(s), daughter(s), parent(s), spouse, brother(s), sister(s)] The final columns ask if each person is blind, deaf, dumb, insane or idiotic, and entries in these columns were to be carried on to other Special Schedules. It's fascinating -- and contains information I'd not seen before. molly Molly Kennedy P O Box 5785 Springfield, IL 62705 www.mollx.com Genealogy - Confusing the dead, and annoying the living. _________________________________________________________________ Get a FREE Web site, company branded e-mail and more from Microsoft Office Live! http://clk.atdmt.com/MRT/go/mcrssaub0050001411mrt/direct/01/