I grew up in Clinton & Warren counties and now live in Bergen County, NJ, which borders on New York City and Upstate New York. It took me a while to realize that when they talked about "Upstate" NY -- which is really in southern NY -- on the news, etc., they were not referring to Northern NYS. Anyone searching for ancestors who came from Upstate NY should be looking in Westchester, Rockland, Orange, and perhaps Putnam and Dutchess counties. As Mac stated, Northern NY is not really a specific area of NY; I would consider anywhere north of where I lived in Warren County to be Northern NY, but that's just me. Michelle

Going back some 40+ years when I worked for the NYS Health Dept, doing research with vital records, we considered "Upstate NY" as anywhere other than New York City. We would have labeled even Long Island as "Upstate" because the vital records were filed in Albany instead of NYC. Public Health Laws applied to all buy NYC. Today, casual talk would probably exclude Long Island, but officially Albany still keeps VR for Long Island. In Clinton/Essex we commonly call it "North Country", which is very imprecise. Burlington VT paper today used it to refer to northern Vermont. I would not know what Northern New York referred to, but would certainly not rule out Rochester and Buffalo. Bob Bob & Dee Carroll Westport on Lake Champlain, NY. Bob@shipstore.com www.westportmarina.com Ancestors of Bob and Dee: http://worldconnect.genealogy.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?db=rcarroll > Westchester, Rockland, Orange, and perhaps Putnam and Dutchess counties. As > Mac stated, Northern NY is not really a specific area of NY; I would consider > anywhere north of where I lived in Warren County to be Northern NY