In a message dated 4/20/2006 5:09:29 AM Mountain Standard Time, Hushala6@wmconnect.com writes: she was an Austrian born under the Austrian Empire yet she and her whole family before her were German. Gloria Austria is also an ethnic German nation. One of the problems that genealogists have is that so many of the US census takers and clerks in court houses who handled naturalization papers did not know that it was different from Prussia. The result is that just because someone spoke German the censustaker often wrote that they were from Germany on the census forms. Likewise many Austrian immigrants who were illiterate have naturalization papers that say they gave up their allegiance to the king of Prussia!! Genealogists who have used naturalization papers as a starting point may find that they have been looking in the wrong land. I know that the first census on which my great grandparents are listed says they are from Bohemia. I wonder how many statisticians looked at that as their country or origin and did not bother to look at the fact that they spoke German --- so they were not counted as ethnic Germans. Karen