I'm finding all sorts of genealogical information for non-relatives as I go through my pension records! >From a Civil War pension record I received (for Jeremiah Raner, claim # 525927, widow's cert # 681907): On 7 Feb 1888, Philip Brown swore: my age is fifty two years and I am a farmer by occupation, my Post office address is Moravia, Cay. Co., N.Y., that previus to the last two years I have lived within about a mile from the claimant, Jeremiah Raner, and have employed him for seven or eight years to work on my farm, that he has workd for me from ten to twenty days during each of said years, that I do not consider him more than one half of a man as far as being able to perform labor on account on Chronic Diaharea, that I first became acquainted with his condition while overseer of the poor in the year 1875 and from that time down untill (sic) about two years ago I know that he ... that during the two years of that time I was Overseer of the Poor of said town of Niles and had to render assistance as such overseer to said Claimant twice of about a month on each occassion on account of such disability... (file was typewritten and signed) [didn't know they had typewriters in 1888!] cheers jeanette -- ---Researching ancestors in Mclean Co, Woodford Co, Ford Co, or Livingston Co IL? Try "The Fort," the Lexington Genealogical & Historical Society http://www.lexingtonillinois.org/fort/ ---Towanda Area History will be ready at the end of June: http://towandahistory.org