Legacy has an even better way of dealing with unknown maiden names: you can customise it so that married women appear in the names list under both their maiden and married names. To do this in Legacy-8, go to {Options} - {Customise} - {2. Data entry} - {2.8 Rule for generating default married names}. I know Legacy isn't one of the favourites, but I think it's great. Good luck! Regards, John Francis At 13:08 28/04/2014, you wrote: >Hello, I am not a FTM user, but do use Legacy and learned of a great hint >recently re surnames - when I don't know them! This may work for you >within FTM! > >Use double square brackets [[ ]] and enter within them the husband's >surname where you would normally enter the wife's maiden name. Once you >discover the wife's maiden name you can go back and replace the surname in >the square brackets. This at least ties the wife in on the name's list >rather than have her as simply Mary / Jane or whatever in the name's list.