I was so glad to see a response from Dr. Brian Leverich regarding the genealogies posted to WC and other similar sites. Long ago when I started my research, tracing ancestry was very difficult. I was lucky to get a good start for my husband's family because both his grandmothers and his mother were savers of family documents & letters. After their deaths, no one else in the family wanted that "old junk" (or the two Bibles with entries for several generations of births, deaths & marriages) so I took it. I wasn't so fortunate with my own family. All four of my grandparents died long before I was born, and the only information they left were names and dates & some places of birth as far back as my great-grandparents. For you kids: in pre-internet times, most census records, county history books, land, birth, death & marriage records, etc. were available only in each separate locality. Extensive genealogy libraries were few and far between. Research required a lot of correspondence, phone calls, and time, or travel and money. Census records were not indexed. Old county records were often in some dusty storage place. If you sent for information, the response might take weeks. Just finding a library with a book you wanted was almost impossible. I look upon the Gedcoms, & all other posted genealogy information, not as places to find a ready-made family tree, complete with sources, but as a tool. Finding a new name, place or branch for one of my surnames very often leads me to new sources and a lot of new information, now verified. After we retired in 1982 (I'm 87) my late husband and I traveled the U.S. for four years to do research in the towns where all of his and my known ancestors had lived. I am a librarian, and like to think I'm a pretty capable researcher. I was satisfied that I had found just about everything possible in the sources available during those years. As soon as it became possible I expanded my search to the internet. Rootsweb was the site that outshined them all in those early days -- a free service where we could look for other people researching the same families. I like to think the missiion continues with WC. I had at least four "brick walls" that I could never have penetrated without the genealogies I found posted there, and the on-line cousins I contacted. Most people who post on-line have no intent to deceive, and welcome corrections [documented, I hope]. For those of you who resent having their hard-won data re-posted by someone else: Why are you posting things you don't want passed on? My on-line cousins have been very generous with me, and I am only too happy to "pay it forward". When I send my data to a cousin I include all the sources and notes. As a librarian I have no problem giving others information I have located or confirmed. In return I often receive new information not available from any other source. Virginia "Virginia Beck" <[email protected]>