breakthrough came because a second cousin wrote to say she'd found grgrgrandma Melissa Pier's tombstone in Corning, NY, just where I thought she must be. And she sent an obit at well. The obit said she'd been living w grandson Erastus S. Pier in Knoxville. My cousin had asked the historian who told her it was just over the PA border. But I looked in French's 1864 Gazetteer which said there was a tiny village just "opposite Corning." But the PA mention made me remember I'd found on a PA County list (which is actually not far) a death notice for a 7yr old Harriet Pier (Harriet is an often repeated name in my family), dau of Erastus P. Pier. Well, in looking thru the email in the Pier folder (boy, am I glad I print them out and keep them!) I found I'd written a note in 1998 to the author of the Pier book, and I said: "I'm really curious about the mention of Harriet Stevens who m George Stewart (your book p 214) and resided in Waverly in 1885 with a daughter." Well, in 1998, I knew nothing more about Harriet Stewart. But one of the first things I did 2 yrs ago with the 1880 Census CDs was to put in a search for Harriet Stewart, found her with Eleanor Philips in Barton, Tioga County. And by then I knew she had a dau. Eleanor. Checked the county web site, which had an 18878 Tioga Gazeteer for Barton OUTSIDE WAVERLY. There was Harriet, widow of George H. Stewart!! So now I saw Waverly in that old email message! Bingo! Rockets! Explosions! And talk about connections within connections Her father was Oliver Stevens who came to Pierstown with his broinlaw, Solomon Pier. And later came the other Pier brothers, including my Abner who had married Oliver's sister Lucy! Sheesh. What a day!