Glenda writes: Does anyone know the Allen or Henry Lawson listed below? Thanks for any info. Glenda >From Surry Co NC marriages: 3/28/1870 Henry LAWSON s/o Allen Lawson + Martha Fry d/o Jolly FRY Suggestion: There is a FREE transcription [you cannot access the image without paying Ancestry.com] of the 1880 census for the whole USA available on _www.familysearch.org_ (http://www.familysearch.org) (When you type in the URL given above, remove the punctuation which rootsweb adds at the beginning and end of the URL) When you get the opening screen on Familysearch, skip the *fill-in-the-blank* stuff--you will be led astray. Look in the lower right corner for the word census, which may not be immediately visible. Check [several times if necessary] that you want the US census for 1880. Now, without giving the search engine too much information, type in the surname you want and the state--North Carolina [from the drop-down menu of states]. You will find over 400 listings for Lawsons. Get more specific if you wish, but sometimes the persons who made the indexes could not read the old handwriting. Furthermore, the census-taker made some atrocious mistakes in the original. The 1880 US census is of interest to genealogists because the census-taker was to ask each enumerated person where each of his parents was born. Be sure to read the far right side of the census. Again, you will not get the image of the actual census page. When you find a person of interest, click on his or her name, then look at the upper right of the screen for a word *Household*. Click on that. You are going to find more Lawsons than you bargained for!!! What if they are all related? Wow! I think I would look for the Fry family first. I believe they were of German background, possibly Moravian, but that is only a hunch on my part. The more you study the neighbors and the in-laws, the more you will understand your families--flaws, crimes, etc. But, the hunt is fun!! Good luck! E.W.Wallace who is now collecting my grandmother's English ancestors ************************************** See what's new at http://www.aol.com