Hi all, Roy's story was hilarious and Stan's correction illuminating. "Ye Olde ..." is such a cliche in the USA. As for the USA, rule number 1 for tracing your ancestors back to the UK is to learn the names of the immigrants. The resources are pretty good here with ship manifests and the 1850 and successive censuses. So perhaps Vivian's correspondent could do some preliminary work in the USA to find someone born in the UK. Carol Bradford Syracuse, NY