I do understand this and I fully agree, but what got "my goat" to phrase it" was this line. "I don't know who" seemed a little demeaning. I don't ever remember reading the rest of the message or even who sent it. I know Ronda and myself as well as the rest of our volunteers, saw a need to get these cemeteries read. When we first started the Jersey County Genealogical Society there was NOTHING. I mean nothing! In all those years of the Jersey County Historical Society, they had done absolutely nothing in as far as recording the cemeteries. Elaine Witt had read and recorded the abandon cemeteries but she did it on her own as well. The Historical Society as always was more interested in things and things of the rich and famous as too the poor and common people of Jersey County. Us few and there was only about 9 of us in all, who would go out and read and record the cemeteries. We never could 9 all at one time either. It was Ronda and I or Bob and I, our Bob, Gary, Gene and I or Ronda, Me and Edith or Grace and Wayne or Ted. It was never 9 at one time. We all did it because we knew it was much over due. When we offered our work to the public, the very first day we offered it, people would walk by our table at the County fair and stop and make the remark, we heard about this work but was told that it was full of mistakes. We had never even sold, gave or had even offered it to any but already "it was full of mistakes". So I guess we are a little sensitive too. Later as it became aware to more that we were offering it for sale, just to recover our expenses, we became know as the scabs who where taking away from the Historical Society. The Historical Society had been around for well over 150 years and I said before had done nothing and we were the scabs. Finally in 1999 the two societies joined and we thought our problems and "axes" would be buried and they were for a time. Then before you knew it, the genealogical people were all forgotten and the Historical people again held all the officer positions and the genealogical people were step children. I know others will disagree with this, but this is how we of the genealogical charter group felt. Even when it came to running the genealogical department at the Society, we were pushed out. So yes our feelings were hurt so we quit for the most part and started the Tri County News. Here again we were immediately known as scabs and all our work was known to contains hundreds and hundreds of mistakes and the idea of charging for our work as stealing from the Society. So yes, I guess we are sensitive to the wording of the emails and I do apologize for it. But we few, have worked long and hard to make these materials available and it seems to us that we just continue to scrutinized and belittled, when all we done was saw a need and tried to make it happen. Thank you for your email and I hope that I have explained mine and the volunteers who help me and Ronda at little bit. Marty Crull -----Original Message----- From: Debbi Geer [mailto:dgirth@yahoo.com] Sent: Sunday, April 10, 2005 1:08 AM To: ILJERSEY-L@rootsweb.com Subject: RE: [ILJERSEY] Bertha Rowden's husband George Smith Marty I'm not trying to find fault. I'm just trying to figure out if the George Smith buried in Rosedale Cemetery is the same person as that who married Bertha Rowden. Bertha was living in Rosedale Township. With her marriage to a George Smith and with the burial of a George Smith in Rosedale Cemetery, I couldn't help but consider that it is one and the same person. With two common names (George and Smith) I'm also considering that there were two George Smith's living in the area and were a couple of years difference in age. I have found where gravestones can be in error but also have found where inventories can be in error primarily due to the weathering of the stone material. If I hurt anyone's feelings, it was not my intention to do so and I apologize. Debbi Geer __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com ============================== View and search Historical Newspapers. Read about your ancestors, find marriage announcements and more. Learn more: http://www.ancestry.com/s13969/rd.ashx

Just to let everyone know, I handle corrections/additions to data on the Jersey County ILGenWeb website by adding a "researcher note" to the orginial data provided from a variety of sources. However, the orginal data submitted to the website remains unchanged. List members should feel free to send me corrections/additions. Thanks, Marty, for letting us know how the burial index was developed. It is a remarkable amount of information and has been very useful to me in researching my Jersey County ancestors. And best of all, I don't have to travel to Jersey County for this initial part of my research. I can't imagine how much time it would take me to do this research in person, I have a large number of family members who were in Jersey Co. for a very long time. As is hopefully acknowledged on the website, a great deal of information on the Jersey Co. website came from Marty Crull and his volunteers. We all owe Marty a big debt of gratitude for his dedication to preserving Jersey Co. history. There are a number of others who have also generously contributed material, hopefully they are all acknowledged on the website. BTW, my mother, born and raised in Otter Creek Township, will soon be 93. We often talk, unfortunately long distance, about her memories of Jersey Co. Judy Griffin, in Wisconsin, Jersey County ILGenWeb coordinator