At 07:10 PM 10/12/99 -0500, Jewel wrote: >What archives, what library and what newspapers was Mr. Jones supposed to >have checked out? From 1870 to 1910? Come on now, be fair. >Mr. Jones says that he had made 2 trips to Washington and 4 trips to >Raleigh, and searched all records to find out about the Hamrick families. >Jewel How dumb of me!! I didn't realize that North Carolina didn't have libraries until after 1910. And stupid, stupid me - no newspapers in North Carolina between 1870 and 1910 either!! I never realized. And I was totally unaware that there were no courthouses in North Carolina that had marriage records or deeds or wills or probate records. And even though the University of North Carolina claims to be the oldest state university, founded in 1795, heaven help me for ever implying that research could have been done there!! (We were just there in May when my niece graduated - beautiful campus.) How dare I question the marvelous works of Mr. Jones!!! Of course all the people he interviewed gave him 100% correct information - and knew all about all their ancestors, never mixing up any families, getting all the children's names and spouses correct (something I'm positive now, after reading about how great a man he was, Mr. Jones verified carefully, using every resource available to him...ah, but I temporarily forgot, poor Mr. Jones didn't have any resources available to him). It was so terribly rude of me to imply that Mr. Jones' book misled me - had me looking for people who didn't exist and for records that never existed. That was so apparently my own problem and no fault of anyone else. FYI (not that it matters or any of you care because we rally must not let facts get in the way of a good family legend), there was in fact a fire at the Rutherford County courthouse - in 1907. Fortunately for genealogists and family history buffs the loss of records and original wills that dated back to 1822 was slight; probate records are even older. Tyron County, from which Rutherford was formed in 1779, housed it's probate records in Lincoln County. And, incidently, in Rutherford County alone records still - to this day - exist from the Carolina Gazette (1836), Democrat (1896), Mountain Banner (1848), New Regime (1876), North Carolina Spectator (1830), Republican (1844), Rutherford Banner (1886), Rutherford Star (1866), Rutherfordton Enquirer (1860), Rutherfordton Intelligencer (1841), and Western North Carolina Republican (1847) among others. And since Raleigh was mentioned, extracts from the Raleigh Register exist today from the period 1799 to 1886. Some day, when I'm really bored, I'll have to count to see how many roles of microfilm exist from North Carolina newspapers. Pat