I have many of those stories in my family. The one that comes to mind is the story of how my great grandfather's brother died. The story is that the family had been living on the local reservation in the 1890s and the boy (5 years old) had appendicitis but because the river was flooded they could not get him to a doctor and he died. This was a REALLY difficult story to research. I first looked to see if I could find where they were living. I had no luck - they did not own land on the reservation and were most likely renting land and few, if any, records were kept for rentals. So I felt like I was never going to be able to do anything with this story. Then I realized I could look at the river conditions. I did not think it would be likely for that river to flood that time of year but I looked anyway. Sure enough the river was flooded. Which leads me to believe parts of the story are true. However, the story went further and we will never know if this part is true. A few days after the boy died Indians came down the river in boats with food and clothes for the family to wear to the funeral. Just shows that there are some stories (or parts of stories) that you can research and prove and some you can't. Dusty sharkelady@gmail.com On Thu, Jan 5, 2012 at 7:03 AM, marilyn E B <marilyneb@gmail.com> wrote: > If you have those stories that have been passed down through the years; do > you take them as they are or do you validate the facts? > > I spent time yesterday looking for the answer to a friend's dilemma. Family > said that a ggg grandmother was one surname and some online information > gave another surname. She insisted she was right because that was what the > family said. Actually they were both right and it all boiled down to how > exact she wanted to be. The person in question was raised by her maternal > grandparents and the only place this was found was on the 1860 census. A > legal adoption was unlikely in that time period but every step needs to be > documented as thoroughly as possible. > > In my own family I have made some members unhappy because I proved we are > not direct descendants of a certain Civil War General. Hey, the man never > had any biological children. Much less a son. > > Have fun with family lore and tell us about some that you have either > validated or debunked. > > Marilyn > > -- > "If you don't get outside every day, even for a minute, you have not > appreciated what God has done. It makes you grateful for our surroundings, > and it starts your day differently." > > Johnny Cash > > ******************** > > Gen-Newbie's website: > > http://www.rootsweb.com/~newbie/ > > > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to > GEN-NEWBIE-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the > quotes in the subject and the body of the message >