I have exhused ancesty.com and some other things. I can promise that in the ss application a foster mother of my dads sisters was used. (not positive they are sisters, I think cousins) valid reasoning here won't go into it. Found a letter that mom let me read said somthing about his parents died when he was young, came from a good family and that's why he was in the system. Was written by a parol officer that he stayed with once he was old enough to leave the orphanage. Mom has decided to shread all, because the letters are private. I have a call into brooklyn community services (Brooklyn Childrens Aid Society). I am sure that they will tell me after 76 years all of the records have been destroyed (and if not they will tell me what they want me to know.) BTW the arcive guy at New York CAS was very nice, but asured me that his records were not there, and they were at this time shreading all that are over 50 years old. I did find his childhood friend at the orphanage that joined the service with him. I needed a name and it gave some closure. This is probably the only thing I can document. I have a company picture when he was in the service. This was only one name that matched the orphan census, dad had not arrived there yet. So could be iffy but was an odd name so maybe its right. You see they joined the service on the buddy system, with the consideration they would stay together through out their time in the service. His friend saved my dads life at Normandy by giving his. The problem here again is that I am sure the records are gone, and I have to wait for the 1940 census to even look at dads name at the orphanage. Am going to try to send for dads complete file and hope they will share something about his friend that might give me something to go on. There is a letter from a parol officer he stayed with that says both his parents died and that was why he was in the system. I saw it one week after dad died. I wanted to see it again to see if I read how it was worded correctly and see if there were any other hints. I was upset when I read. No way to do that now my mom has decided to shred all the letters she has. I just figured that maybe I could find out something else through where he worked. A shot in the dark at best. Theres a ton more that doesn't fit but I won't go into it. Just pray that CAS will have pity and just send me the entire file, and it will have pictures and everything. I know no way. :) Everyone that was involved is now dead can't figure why they would care. Politics and control I guess. I think I will probably drop everything doesn't seem like there is a point to it all anyways. I hope that your research is going better than mine. I think that we are looking for two different things. I think yours probably has a happier note to it. Sorry if I have aired dirty laundry, I know my dad wouldn't be happy with me telling anyone. Thanks for listening any ways and best regards, Pat -------- Original Message -------- ==> From: "Elizabeth V Cardinal" <evc1369@comcast.net> ==> Date: Mon, 1 Aug 2005 10:20:21 -0400 Asking questions is not imposing....we all have asked them time and time again especially when we were "newbies". I have to ask, why you are trying to find his employment history? Employment records, if they still exist, will not provide much information....you would find more personal information by following him/them on the census. I can't say I know for certain that all men over a certain age had to register but do know a goodly number of them did. It will give you a physical description, an address and employer and sometimes the name of his next of kin. Have you looked for him on the SSDI (Social Security Death Index)? If he is there you can send for his Social Security application. I need to know, just what you are looking for before we can give you constructive help and we also need to know just what information you have so we are not duplicating information. Elizabeth V. Cardinal evc1369@comcast.net ============================== Census images 1901, 1891, 1881 and 1871, plus so much more. Ancestry.com's United Kingdom & Ireland Collection. Learn more: http://www.ancestry.com/s13968/rd.ashx