on another list that i belong to, a post was made about an old history book being available for sale.... if you have not thought of ebay as a source for information regarding genealogy, its time to rethink........ there are many items that could help in your search and in providing you with illustrations for your own personal history as well as history of your elders.... maybe you used milk form a milkman...there might be a pic of the milk bottle on a sale that is occurring... maybe you visited olsen rug waterfalls in chicago... you might find a postcard that they used to sell there for sale in ebay... maybe you had a cookie jar that greatgrandma used to use all the time...and wow, one might be for sale....and a photo is there just for you.... all these things that you might be able to use to illustrate your family history book or use in research.... and you would be very surprised to see the number of postcards where the person sending and receiving is cited in the description of the postcard.... you just might find your own family person sending a postcard or letter to someone... just go to ebay - or any other auction site - and enter in your surname and see what comes up.. get into a routine and do it every 7 days... and check all of the info out.... you might be very pleasantly surprised.... then start adding place names... like buffalo or hamburg or chicago or escanaba... use the same rules as with google...... quotes + and - and lower case.... use titlesANDdescriptions and then select what special interest you have after you have an idea of what is presented... do i sell on ebay,? Nope... don't buy either, but I clip things of interest like a crazy person and paste them into running documents...(i cut off at about 20 pages in case i want to send it to someone...some email systems will not allow huge documents to be attached, so keep your application of your clips in mind when you create your files....)... i use ebay just like i might make a photocopy of a picture in a book at the library... i'm just using the ebaymedia as a tool in research! and oh, sometimes the person selling has a real good handle on history (antiquers do know history and the whys and wherefores just like we know the dates and places!) and often describes an item in quite good detail, providing you with OTHER leads... valentine