Dear Friends, I'm sharing a few excerpts from "The Irish Roots Guide" by Tony McCarthy. When I visited County Kildare, the local parish priest gave me a copy. It is an invaluable, down to earth guide to finding your Irish ancestors. [I have no personal interest or gain by sharing this book.] Page 5 l) Look at your ancestors in terms of their "social position." "...a person's class had a great bearing on weather or not he figured in particular types of records." 2) If your ancestors were Roman Catholics, look in Church of Ireland records anyway. It is possible that your ancestors changed religions to survive/eat as an act of desperation. "Few will consult a Church of Ireland register in search of a Catholic baptismal entry (although in some Donegal and the midlands registers, many such entries are to be found). Searching the Registry of Deeds for a small tenant farmer's lease is almost as fruitless an occupation as searching nineteenth-century newspapers for a cottier's death notice." I'm offering this information to researchers, not to debate, but to open your search boundaries. Sometimes you just have to think outside of the box. Barb