I had a similar experience at a local museum. I saw a book from the Clerk of the Courts office in a mock up of the office. I asked to look through the book and found my great grandfather's cattle brand registered as well as his son's (my grandfather) mark for pigs (it had a drawing that showed how they notched the ear) when he was eight years old. It does make for a special day. You want to grab a stranger and tell them about it, which I did. HA! TW Scott -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] Date: 04/16/2009 08:04 AM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [HESSE] All related In a message dated 4/15/2009 11:03:20 PM Central Daylight Time, [email protected] writes: > Sorry, I should have qualified that. I was referring to American sites. > It > is not unusual to come across a clerk in America who will say there are no > local records, because the courthouse burned down. S-o-o-o-o-o-o true. While researching my Hessian forebear, I got the explanation that an earlier researcher had borrowed the book, never put it back, and it had been lost for years. But they let me into the storage vault anyway. I looked up on the top of the book cabinet in the vault and saw a dirty old book...the ORIGINAL that she had described as lost. In it I found that my forebear had signed his will dated 1832 in a clear hand. Now THAT was special. ************** Access 350+ FREE radio stations anytime from anywhere on the web. Get the Radio Toolbar! (http://toolbar.aol.com/aolradio/download.html?ncid=emlcntusdown00000003) ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message