Joan, That's a good idea ... I think actually what she did was use the exact wording of the deeds (as well as she could read them) and put " ...." in between what she thought were the important parts for genealogical purposes. Thinking of it that way, I might be safe just because she's quoting the deeds. I don't think she used her own words at all (except in the case of mistakes). I would like to quote the entire abstract, but I guess it's not really necessary. Thanks Debbie If the exact wording is narrative -- then just extract the genealogical information from the abstracts. I'm assuming since you say they are "abstracts" that they do not contain a transcript of the entire deeds and court orcers--but facts may be copied. I think if it was me I'd probably make and Excel spreadsheet and create fields for the genealogical information--name, date, type of record...etc. and in that way you are not taking the exact wording -- just the facts. ************************************** Get a sneak peek of the all-new AOL at http://discover.aol.com/memed/aolcom30tour