In the National Genealogical Society Quarterly Vol 89 No 4 December 2001, Tony Burroughs has an interesting article explaining why some names cannot be found in the Census Soundexes. I think this problem was discussed several years ago on GENMTD or on GENCMP but I have not seen Burrough's findings mentioned on a list. He could not find Burroughs B622 per NARA coding instruction in the Soundex. He found that Burroughs was coded B620 in the Soundex and in other places. Soundex was invented by Robert Russel and licensed by Remington-Rand who did the coding for the 1900 Census. Soundex is/was a R-R trademark. The original Soundex rules include: The letters h and w are not coded; vowels are separators of letters with equivalent numbers and h and w are not considered separators. The current NARA rules are: The letters h and w are treated that same as vowels; neither type is coded and both types are separators of letters with equivalent numbers. Name NARA Original Burroughs B622 B620 Ashcroft A226 A261 bob gillis bob gillis <rpgillis@bellatlantic.net>