This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/an/2RB.2ACE/8478.1.1.2 Message Board Post: keep in mind, that this is an optical search engine. a e o may all look the same. wrinkles, ink smears, fading, etc, all are confusing. your ancestor may not have gone by frederick smith but maybe as f.e.smith or freddy. maybe the typesetter erred. maybe the text reads fred and bob smith. be creative in your searching and , (and believe me, i know this is hard because we are out in the sticks with the slowest dial up ever) get a cup of hot tea, a book u can read if u need, and just type in smith and scan all 1500 entries. u can see the date of the paper , but even a current paper may have something in those "blast from the past" sections. each time u get a hit, make note of the people mentioned in the article relating to your person and type their name in. if they have a farm name, town, dog, etc., or u know of an event u can type in fred smith house fire, etc to narrow it down. we are all so used to computers, and instant access, and this is much more like the old wa! y, when we waded thru pages of microfilm - the same headache, blurred print, time consuming - and the same excited feeling when u found what u needed -and sometimes more than u expected. good luck!!