I've "rescued" an old photograph of Ida SIMPSON LOWRY taken at the Wallace Studio in Decatur, Illinois. The photograph appears to have been taken in the 1870's or 1880's with Ida appearing to be in her late teens or early 20's at the time. Based on limited research I believe this may be a photograph of Ida SIMPSON b. 1869, the daughter of William G. SIMPSON and Elizabeth SIMPSON who were living in Niantic, Illinois during the 1880 census. The SIMPSON family included six children in addition to Ida including, Rebecca, Anna, William, Jacob, Edward, and John all born in Illinois between 1852-1862. I'm hoping to be able to find someone from Ida's family so that this wonderful old photograph can be returned to the care of family. If you are a member of this family or know someone who might be, please contact me. Thanks, Shelley

Here's a permanent calendar when you need to check a day, figure out what day of the week a date fell on or whatever you can find it at: http://www.calendarhome.com/tyc/ Another useful calendar is this one designed to calculate the birth date from the death date or the age at death given in months, days and years: http://longislandgenealogy.com/birth.html There are other birth date calculators including this one: http://www.progenealogists.com/birthfromdeath.htm which does the same thing and has some other links of interest. I chose these because such web sites come and go but, hopefully, these genealogy based versions will be with us for awhile. Cheryl Rothwell logancty@mindspring.com Logan County, IL, Coordinator, ILGenWeb www.rootsweb.com/~illogan Central IL Regional Coordinator, ILGenWeb Clark, Downing, Harding, Lucas et al

My old email address HeartSweetNana@cs.com has been changed to HeartSweetNana@adelphia.net. I have aske the list manager to change this in my lookup areas but it has not been done yet so if you need me to lookup something use my new address: I am listed as several different names in the lookups.... Helen in Idaho; Helen; Nanaest Thanks, sorry for the inconvenience. Helen in Idaho

Thank you all for that overwhelming reply. I received a copy. I really appreciate all the help I got from everyone. Tori

Can someone point me in the correct direction on trying to locate an obituary for Alfred Mills who died in Decatur (according to death index)? He died on Feb 13 1942. I am trying to confirm parents and siblings. Thank You... Tori

Does anyone have any information on the SMITH DAIRY that operated in Boody, Illinois in the 1930-40's ? Helen in Idaho

The following article is from Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter and is copyright 2003 by Richard W. Eastman. It is re-published here with the permission of the author. Information about the newsletter is available at http://www.RootsForum.com. - Were You Victimized by This Genealogy Scam Artist? I have written a number of times about GenSeekers. This site is owned and operated by Mr. Elias Abodeely of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Mr. Abodeely is a 21-year-old who has operated a number of Web sites, using various business names, including genealogydevelopments.com, familydiscovery.com, genealogyfinders.net, genlocator.com, genseeker.com, genseekers.com, genealogy-express.com, and probably many others. Most of these are Web sites that remain online for a few weeks while the owner collects money from would-be customers. The sites then get shut down as the complaints mount, but new ones appear with similar wording. Elias Abodeely has advertised his Web sites with thousands of spam e-mails. These messages claim to offer access to millions of online genealogy records for about $60.00 a year. (The price varies a bit from one ad to another.) Once signed up for this "service," the hapless victim is given access to a few pages of menus that point to other Web sites, all of which are free of charge for everyone. The links on Abodeely's sites point to FamilySearch.org, RootsWeb, and lots of other sites that you can access right now at no charge. Your sixty dollars buys access to a list of links, nothing else. And those links are not nearly as complete as those on Cyndi's List, a free site. Elias Abodeely has accepted credit cards and checks by various means. For a while, he used a PayPal account. However, clicking on the link in an old spam mail from GenSeekers now displays a PayPal page that says, "This recipient is currently unable to receive money." PayPal apparently shut down that account. In the spam mail ads, GenSeekers and the other names being used all offer a five-day, money-back guarantee. GenSeekers' online check acceptance form at https://fs6.formsite.com/genseekers/form093061282/secure_index.html says, "The 5 Day Trial is 100 % Free for the First 5 Days Cancel Before End of Trial and Nothing will ever be billed." (That is an exact quote with the original grammar errors left intact.) A customer service e-mail address to be used for cancellations is supplied when you subscribe. However, e-mails sent to that address bounce back as "addressee unknown" Or "mailbox full." Once charged, there is no method for the victim to cancel or obtain a refund. To read my past articles about this scam, look at: http://www.rootsforum.com/archives/news0310.htm, http://www.rootsforum.com/archives/news0320.htm, http://www.rootsforum.com/archives/news0237.htm and at http://www.rootsforum.com/archives/news0129.htm. The Better Business Bureau's report is particularly strong. The BBB is usually rather conservative in its reports, but this time says, "It has come to the bureau's attention that consumers are unable to unsubscribe through web site and email correspondences are not returned by company. Credit card users who have been unable to obtain a refund from the company may wish to contact their credit card company." You can find many more references on Google. You can also find quite a few messages about this on the Discussion Board for this newsletter. When I started writing this article, the Web page at http://www.GenSeekers.com was in operation. However, before I finished the article a few days later, that Web page seemed to have disappeared. An attempt to go to that page now generates the common error message, "The page you are looking for is currently unavailable." In the meantime, you can see Google's cached copy. Copies of other now-defunct Web sites operated by Elias Abodeely are also available at: http://www.archive.org. Some months ago, the spam mail messages listed a telephone number, but later e-mail ads do not. That number was disconnected and later re-assigned to someone else (who reportedly is really angry at all the phone calls they have received from unhappy people looking for GenSeekers.com!). When looking at the domain registrations for Abodeely's Web sites, I found several addresses and telephone numbers used. The registration for FamilyDiscovery.com lists a Technical Contact of Elias Abodeely at 9843 Cambridge Drive, Cedar Rapids, IA 52404 and a different telephone number. I called the number but was connected to an answering machine that gave no clue as to the current owner's name. I searched several online telephone directories for a current address and telephone number. Most of the searches came up empty, except for AnyWho at http://www.anywho.com. That online service does show a listing for a Mr. Elias A Abodeely at still a different address in Cedar Rapids and with a different phone number. There is no way to tell if this is the same person or not. A search on USSearch.com turned up references to two men of the same name in Cedar Rapids. One is listed as being 92 years old, obviously not the same person. By the way, you can see a five-year-old partially obscured picture of then 16-year-old Elias Abodeely. Look at the Cedar Rapids GazetteOnline at: http://www.gazetteonline.com/special/neighbor/mmhp/mmhpp003.htm. Have you been a victim of one of these scams? You may be able to get your money back. Even better, you may be able to help stop this operation now before others become victims. If you have been victimized by GenSeekers or any of the other names being used in this operation, please do several things: If you paid by credit card, contact your credit card company now! Your credit card is insured against online fraud. The phone number to call probably is on the back of the credit card. Ask for a refund. Credit card companies are very experienced at these scams and are quick to refund a victim's money if they receive such a request promptly. The credit card companies then go after the business owners for reimbursement. (Sadly, many people paid by checks, at the suggestion of Mr. Abodeely's various spam mails. Personal checks should never be used for online purchases as they do not have fraud protection. Credit cards are fully insured against online fraud, but personal checks carry no protection at all. If you paid by credit card, you can get your money back! If you paid by check or money order, you probably are out of luck.) File a complaint with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the National White Collar Crime Center (NW3C). You can easily do this at http://www1.ifccfbi.gov. File a consumer complaint form with the Federal Trade Commission. Selling on the Internet constitutes interstate commerce, so the FTC has jurisdiction. You can do this easily at https://rn.ftc.gov/pls/dod/wsolcq$.startup?Z_SUBMIT_FLAG=Y. Download and fill out an Iowa Attorney General Consumer Complaint Form. You can obtain this form at http://www.state.ia.us/government/ag/forminfo.htm. You can also send e-mail complaints to consumer@ag.state.ia.us. However, I suspect that a written complaint form sent via regular mail will be more effective. Contact the Cedar Rapids Police Department. The department's Web page at http://www.cedar-rapids.org/police/ and the department's Financial Crimes division page at http://www.cedar-rapids.org/police/financial_crimes.asp lists Lieutenant Ken Washburn as the contact person for any financial crimes. You can reach him at (319) 286-5413 or at k.washburn@cedar-rapids.org. The time to act is now. If victims do not take speedy action to shut down this operation, how many more people will be victimized?

I am trying to locate a milk bottle from the Smith Dairy, Boody, Illinois. It was owned by my Uncle Lynn J. Smith. It was in operation I believe in the late 1930's - early 1940's. Thanks, Helen in Idaho

Do you have living relatives in Illinois? You need them. Here's the latest from the State Archives thanks to the budget crunch. Effective July 1, 2003, the Illinois State Archives is required to receive, from all out-of-state or non-Illinois residents, a $10 fee, prepaid and nonrefundable, along with all research requests before those requests may be honored. That fee will entitle the requester to up to 2 unofficial, non-certified copies of the records requested if those records exist. We hope to have a means to accommodate payment for out-of-state or non-Illinois residents on our Web site in the near future. Until an online form is available, out-of-state or non-Illinois residents should mail requests along with the appropriate fee to: Illinois State Archives Reference Unit Margaret Cross Norton Building Capitol Complex Springfield, IL 62756 Checks and money orders should be made payable to the Illinois Secretary of State.

From: "Laura Gottesman" <lgot@loc.gov> To: "Multiple recipients of list" <web4lib@sunsite.berkeley.edu> Sent: Thursday, July 03, 2003 4:27 PM Subject: [WEB4LIB] National Digital Library: The Stars and Stripes: The American Greetings: This announcement is being sent to a number of lists. Please accept our apologies for any duplicate postings: The Library of Congress' Serial & Government Publications Division is pleased to announce the release of a new addition to the National Digital Library - the online collection The Stars and Stripes: The American Soldiers' Newspaper of World War I, 1918-1919, available on the American Memory website at: http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/sgphtml/sashtml/. At the direction of General John J. Pershing, The Stars and Stripes newspaper was published in France by the United States Army from February 8, 1918 to June 13, 1919. By early 1918, American forces were dispersed throughout the western front, often mixed at the unit level with British, French and Italian forces. The primary mission of The Stars and Stripes was to provide these scattered troops with a sense of unity and an understanding of their part in the overall war effort. The eight-page weekly featured news from home, poetry, cartoons and sports news, with a staff that included journalists Alexander Woollcott, Harold Wallace Ross and Grantland Rice. On borrowed printing presses, using a delivery network that combined trains, automobiles (including three Cadillacs) and one motorcycle, the staff produced a newspaper with a circulation that peaked at 526,000 copies. This new online collection presents the complete run - 71 weeks - of the World War I edition. The collection also includes special presentations that discuss the newspaper's content: its illustrations and advertising, its publication of soldiers' poetry, its coverage of women. Brief biographies of editorial staff members and their later careers hint at the level of journalistic talent within The Stars and Stripes. A timeline and map place the newspaper within the greater historical and geographical context of the war. The collection was processed with optical character recognition (OCR) software to allow users to search the full text of the newspaper for a word or phrase. This feature expands the collection's usefulness to historians and genealogists researching names and details that do not appear in the headlines. The Stars and Stripes collection served as a pilot project in the development of search and display capabilities to be utilized on future releases of historic newspapers. Please direct all general inquiries to: http://www.loc.gov/rr/askalib/ask-contactus2.html

Does anyone know if Decatur had City Directories in the early 1900's? If there are directories, what years are available before 1919? I had many relatives living in the area during that time. Joyce in Florida

The following article is from Eastman's Online Genealogy Newsletter and is copyright 2003 by Richard W. Eastman. It is re-published here with the permission of the author. Information about the newsletter is available at http://www.RootsForum.com. New SSDI Search Engine Another free Social Security Death Index online database has been announced. This might appear to be "ho-hum news" as there are already several such databases available. However, a closer examination shows that this one is different. Family Tree Legends is a genealogy program for Windows that I reviewed in the November 11, 2002 edition of this newsletter. You can read that article at: http://www.rootsforum.com/archives/news0245.htm. Cliff Shaw, one of the developers of Family Tree legends, has now announced the newest and most powerful SSDI search engine yet. It has all the features of every other SSDI search engine, plus 4 entirely unique ones: Name Prefix Search - Enter from 3 to 5 characters for the last name and select the Prefix option... it will search on that last name prefix. Year Range Searches - For both the Death Year and Birth Year, you can select to search a range of years instead of the year needing to be exactly right. Age at Death Search - You can enter the age at which the person died. This is really effective if you don't have any idea what year they were born or died but you do know their age at death. You can click on the places that are returned in the results and get latitude and longitude, region information, aerial photos, maps, and more. I tried the new database and can confirm that it works well. I really liked the feature that will automatically generate a letter to the Social Security Administration asking for a copy of the deceased person's Form SS-5, an application for a Social Security number. You can directly print the letter, stuff it into an envelope, along with a check, and mail it to the address indicated. In a few weeks you will receive the copy of the original SS-5. The Family Tree Legends Social Security Death Index will also automatically search the millions of records on GenCircles, looking for any records of the same individual. Cliff also states, "I want it to be known that this SSDI search engine will ALWAYS be free." That is an important statement in this day and age of formerly-free services disappearing into for-pay sites. You can access the free Family Tree Legends Social Security Death Index database at: http://www.familytreelegends.com/ssdi

I don't know how many folks this affects but here's the information thanks to Dorothy Falk: > > The Immigrant Ships Transcribers Guild has moved, > > and our 3 million plus visitors need to know where we have gone. > > > > We currently have nearly 6,000 passenger lists transcribed and still > > have totally free access to our data. If you wish to visit us, again > > or for the first time, please do so at: > > > > http://immigrantships.org > > > > Be sure to also stop by the ISTG Compass - a source for many links > > to help > > you in your research: > > > > http://immigrantships.org/newcompass/pcindex.html > > > > It will take google another month to catch up with us, so if you are > > so inclined, please spread the word! Thanks! > > > > Sincerely, > > Don Schmalbeck (also at: ShipLists@aol.com) > > Archives Research Coordinator > > Immigrant Ships Transcribers Guild http://immigrantships.org > >

Also looking for Myers Dawson, father was James Oliver Dawson, mother Leota Myers. All I have on Myers b abt 1913 d abt. 1964 a tractor he was riding ran over him. Myers first wife was Goldie Jackson, they had children but have no names. He is my fathers stepbrother. Thank you once again Linda Dawson Alvey

Hello - I am trying to find the parents, siblings (cousins???) of my great great grandparents. My gr gr grandfather was John William Salters, born 1839. He married Minerva Elender Watson in Macon County in 1860. He and Minerva's brother, A.J. Watson, were Civil War veterans from Company D 116 IL US Infantry. Both listed Friend's Creek as their residence at the time of enlistment. A.J. and Minerva may have had a brother, Martin, who was killed at Boliver, Tennessee (his residence is listed as Piatt county). They must have had more family - and who were their parents? John William Salters lived in Macon county until about 1885 when he and his family made a covered wagon move to Kansas. (My great grandfather was born in Argenta). An old letter from a cousin researching this line many years ago mentioned correspondence with an Emery Goken who was grandson of Thomas Salters who may have been the brother of John William Salters. Thomas had 4 daughters - One named Alveretta who married Iseberend Goken and one (Emma) who married a Matthew McCammon. The State archives do not agree with speeling or names of these people - but they are close!! Does any of this look familiar to anyone? Does anyone have any suggestions where to go next. My next stop is the census records!! Debera Tredennick

In 1900, my grandmother lived at 674 E. Wood St., Decatur, and in 1905 she lived at 522 Morgan, Decatur. Can anyone tell me if these houses are still standing? And is there anyone who could describe them to me and/or send me a picture? I would be happy to reimburse reasonable expenses Thank you, Glenda in Phoenix gmckenz@earthlink.net

Hello everyone, I am needing some help, I am trying to locate what happened to Sarah Ray and her neice Minnie L. Bennett(t). The last record I have of them they were living in Decatur in April 1907, but I can not locate them in the 1910 census. so not sure if one or both married or died in between 1907 and 1910. They could have moved away also but I've search the entire online 1910 census, with no luck findig them. Both were born in Indiana Sarah was born about 1863 and Minnie was born about 1891, according to the 1900 Decatur census Sarah was divorced, she may have also had two children, she didn't have any children living with her in the 1900 census but it looked like it said she had two children and both were still living, but the census was hard to read, poor writing. I am mainly needing to know about the marriage and death records in between 1907 and 1910, but any help would be appreciated. Thank you Jean Rowcliffe

I am trying to locate the death date and burial of John GEHM. He was born in Apr. 1866, in Lostant, IL and died after 8 Apr 1930 (the date of the 1930 census enumeration). He lived in So. Macon Twp. I would also like to know where his wife, Lucy Belle (Traughber) GEHM, who died 6 Dec 1933, is buried. Some of their children may also be buried with them: Cleo, female, b. Aug. 1894, died ? Lennie, female, b. Nov. 1896, died ? Herman, b. about 1903, died ? Lucy, b. 19095, died Dec. 1984, never married. Buried? I have checked the Illinois State Archives online database and John and the children are not listed, just Lucy. Thank you, Ms. Dale Amann

You definitely want to check their web site and get their hours so you can plan to get there while they are open. Their hours are limited. Cheryl Rothwell logancty@mindspring.com Logan County, IL, Coordinator, ILGenWeb www.rootsweb.com/~illogan Central IL Regional Coordinator, ILGenWeb Clark, Downing, Harding, Lucas et al -----Original Message----- From: Bob Goeller [mailto:bob@goeller.us] Sent: Sunday, June 01, 2003 10:09 PM To: ILMACON-L@rootsweb.com Subject: RE: [ILMACON] GODEJOHANN/ 1850's Rich The first place you may want to try is the Decatur Genealogical Society - http://www.rootsweb.com/~ildecgs/ I was in Decatur last year and the people there were very knowledgeable and friendly and they have a large collection of information. Bob Goeller

I would also suggest that anyone in the area visit this Society as they began very early and have information on the surrounding counties. I have a link to them on the De Witt County page under "other resources" For those of you that have been waiting so patiently for me to get back at my jobs, I am easing in there. My health is improving and I can manage more computer time. I have folders with all the questions etc. and will start from now and work backwards. For the Macon County list, I love volunteers and will need some to help with transcriptions, such as Census readings. I can sent the information in CD form so that there is no cost involved except the mailing fees and I can do that. Please remember that Obituary's can only be re-drafted if they are after 1930. We need to stay within the Copyright laws. I will add Macon counties own copyrights as we get the information on-line so that we are at least protected against those who would profit from our work. I will let you know what resources I do have for Macon County, while I wait for volunteers. Earliene Kaelin Coordinator for Macon and De Witt County, IL 1118 156th St. E. Tacoma, WA. 98445-2324 earliene@att.net -----Original Message----- From: Cheryl Rothwell [mailto:LoganCty@mindspring.com] Sent: Monday, June 02, 2003 9:01 AM To: ILMACON-L@rootsweb.com Subject: RE: [ILMACON] GODEJOHANN/ 1850's You definitely want to check their web site and get their hours so you can plan to get there while they are open. Their hours are limited. Cheryl Rothwell logancty@mindspring.com Logan County, IL, Coordinator, ILGenWeb www.rootsweb.com/~illogan Central IL Regional Coordinator, ILGenWeb Clark, Downing, Harding, Lucas et al -----Original Message----- From: Bob Goeller [mailto:bob@goeller.us] Sent: Sunday, June 01, 2003 10:09 PM To: ILMACON-L@rootsweb.com Subject: RE: [ILMACON] GODEJOHANN/ 1850's Rich The first place you may want to try is the Decatur Genealogical Society - http://www.rootsweb.com/~ildecgs/ I was in Decatur last year and the people there were very knowledgeable and friendly and they have a large collection of information. Bob Goeller ============================== To join Ancestry.com and access our 1.2 billion online genealogy records, go to: http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redir.asp?targetid=571&sourceid=1237