Hi all,   I'd like to chime in on the name change subject.  My surname, DALY has been through many changes for many reasons.  My original immigrants were James and John Daly, who arrived in Ohio by 1833.  James seemed to be able to read and write...and he did the land-buying, etc.  On the 1840 Ohio Census, he is James DALY.  John, who lived in a neighboring community handled by a different census worker, ended up as DANLY.  My next immigrant, my GrGf, Lawrence, could not read or write.  He first appears in Ohio in 1850, and dies after the 1900 Census.  Through those Census years we were: DAILEY. DALEY, DAILY and finally DALY in 1900.  This became the standard spelling for my line, as well as the MO and MI lines.    In 1859, a Michael DALY arrived in Ohio, and he was always shown on the Cenus as DA-ILY.  I don't know whether he could read and write, but by the 1900 Census, he claims that he did.  He had many children...all except one maintained the DA-ILY spelling.  This one son changed it to DAIL-EY.   I've found a living cousin from this line and asked why they started using the -EY.  He told me that the spelling was deliberately changed by this son because he didn't want to have the same spelling used for "Daily Newspaper".  Why he did not go with DALY still remains a mystery.   Regards, Trish