>>> <snip> >>> >>> Bob- >>> >>> It may seem HARMLESS until you are confronted with thousands of >>> Newbie (and some not so Newbie) genealogists searching for years in >>> vain for the LNU ancestors. I even had one gal tell me she never >>> realized she had Mandarin Chinese ancestors until she found FNU LNU >>> and figured it was a Chinese ancestor. For about a year (until the >>> board was eventually put out of its misery) I adminned the LNU >>> message board at RootsWeb and dutifully wrote to all the posters >>> letting them know they were probably searching in vain for their >>> wild LNUs. >>> >>> Joan <JYoung6180@aol.com> >> >> Believe me, I do understand that human stupidity has no limits - I >> learned the hard way while doing tech support at IBM in the early >> '90s, I won't regale you with my favorite stories, however; suffice >> to say they amply illustrate the point. >> >> But the present case seems to me to be somewhat otherwise, given the >> lack of consensus on the right and proper way, however you wish to >> define right and proper, to indicate unknown name elements. In many >> ways, it seems to be a High Church/Low Church or big-endian/ >> little-endian argument with no hope of resolution. The lack of >> consensus is clearly illustrated by the article you originally >> cited, with no one method clearly favored. >> >> What do _I_ use? I leave the unknown portion of the name blank. >> Why? Because I don't like any of the other alternatives, including >> FNU. That said, methinks the right answer to the OP is "whatever >> works for you, but be ready to explain yourself". >> >> Swell Ol' Bob Melson <amia9018@mypacks.net> > > I thought it was Sweet Ol' Bob, nevertheless... > > I recognize the use of "Unknown" so all of them wind up in the "U" > section of an alpha listing BUT > > in your personal opinion why would you not use ? or ??? for unknown? > > I deplore filling the blanks with "good intentions". > > Don't hold back - I'm used to comments from Sweet Ol' Bobs! 8-) > > Hugh <Eagle@bellsouth.net> (J. Hugh Sullivan) OP: This was the point of my original question. The use of any standard characters puts all of these people in the same place in the index, whether it is at the beginning of the index as ?? or Unknown. I was trying to find an acceptable way to tie these people to the family they belong without knowing their name. Some times when doing research you find Mary "mother of James Jones" in other documents, Having them in an index quickly identifies whether you have previously found James Jones's mother's first name. What every you do, you need a place to start collecting information, birth place, date of birth, etc., about Mary "Mother of James Jones" even though you don't know her maiden name. One of those place where you find information on unknown parents is in the US census. In the census for several years the place of the parents birth is shown without names, It would be nice to have this information easily available. (James's birthplace may not be his parent's birthplace.) Keith Nuttle <keith_nuttle@sbcglobal.net>