Hello FERGUS list of 33 subscribers! Please read through this information which was posted by Dick Eastman in his newsletter and consider if you would purchase this and do lookups for this list? Already someone has volunteer for a different CD and lookup - so watch for the news to the list. If this interests you why not share in researching the FERGUS folk and any branch lines with the help of Everton's - an important genealogical publisher. Cynthia - Everton's Roots Cellar 1640-1990 on CD-ROM Everton Publishers has been producing genealogy books and magazines for more than fifty years. They are best known for Everton's Genealogical Helper, a bimonthly magazine with more than 50,000 subscribers. Every edition of the magazine includes genealogical queries, letters to the magazine asking, "Who were the parents of ..." and similar queries. In later years these were referred to as Everton's Computerized "Roots" Cellar. Everton's has now created a CD-ROM disk with all the queries from the Computerized Roots Cellar. Everton's Roots Cellar 1640-1990 is an alphabetical listing of more than 200,000 individuals who were the subjects of queries. I had a chance to use the Roots Cellar CD-ROM last week. The CD-ROM itself is a joint effort between Everton's and Broderbund, makers of Family Tree Maker. The front label on the CD-ROM jewel case credits Everton's, but the label on the back of the case clearly identifies it as produced by Broderbund. The same back label says that the CD-ROM disk requires Family Tree Maker (for Windows or for Macintosh) or Family Archive Viewer for Windows. Version 3.02 or later of any those programs can be used. I used Family Tree Maker version 5.0 for Windows. Quoting from the introduction to the CD-ROM: Everton's Computerized "Roots" Cellar is an electronic database of family history queries. The purpose of a query is to find information on ancestors by making contact with other researchers seeking information on the same family line. This Family Archive includes information taken from queries originally collected by Everton Publishers and published in "Everton's Genealogical Helper Magazine." The name of the individual who was the subject of a query is indexed on this Family Archive. From this Family Archive, you can learn about an event in each listed individual's life. Information includes the individual's full name as well as an event type (such as birth or death), date of that event, and location of the event. You can also learn the name and address of the person who contributed the original query to Everton Publishers. With this information, you can contact the contributor and obtain or exchange even more detailed family history information. Each record in the database includes: 1. Name -- the individual's given name and surname, as well as any titles that were included in the original index. 2. Event -- the type of event referenced in the family history query. If an event is marked "Unknown," Everton Publishers did not provide information about the specific family history event to Broderbund. However, in such cases, it is safe to assume that the individual resided in the location noted during the year noted. 3. Date -- the year in which the event occurred. 4. Locality -- the city or county in which the event took place. 5. State/Country -- state or country in which the event took place. The CD-ROM is very easy to use. First I launched Family Tree Maker; next I selected VIEW and then selected FAMILYFINDER. After a copyright screen, the data appeared in the form of a book with tabs down the right side, labeled Introduction, Contents and Records. After reading the Introduction, I jumped directly into Records. All 300,000 records are listed alphabetically on one screen. However, you can type in a surname followed by an optional first name and the display jumps to that listing almost immediately. If that exact listing is not in the database, the closest listing is displayed. I searched for my own surname and found quite a few entries. Here is a typical record showing the information available: Eastman, Enoch Event : Died Year : 1829 Locality : Bennington State/Country : Vermont Submitter : Mary Jo A. Robertson Street 1 : 32 Westbury St. City : Thousand Oaks State / Country : CA Zip : 91360 In this case, Mary Jo A. Robertson is looking for more information about Enoch Eastman, who died in Bennington, Vermont in 1829. Ms. Robertson's address is provided so that you may contact her directly. This database is very simple but also very effective at finding others who are researching the same lines that you are. You can copy a record from the CD-ROM to the Windows Clipboard and then insert it into another program, such as a word processor. That's how I copied the above entry. This capability can also be used when writing letters to the submitter. You can copy just one record, or you can click on any number of individual records to "select" them and then copy all of the selected records at once. You can also print them to paper in the same manner. The Everton's Roots Cellar CD-ROM software also has the capability of copying the data directly to a Family Tree Maker database. I wouldn't recommend copying the data to your main database without verifying the integrity of the data. However, you might want to keep a separate database of "information that I am looking for." If so, copying the record to that secondary database can be very useful. Everton's Roots Cellar 1640-1990 is available from Everton's, from Broderbund, and from many of their dealers. It is Everton CD#18 and sells for $19.95 U.S. funds. For more information, look at: http://www.everton.com or http://www.familytreemaker.com/018facd.html