Thank you very much to all who answered me on the Rootsweb list as well as privately. I am now so eager to go to Ohio on my next trip "home" (not since 1968, though) to Charleston, WV, I am just thrilled with anticipation. I am going to try to learn more about my Rand ancestors who came from Worcester, MA by way of Rutland and Bennington, VT to Hocking Valley at almost the same time my Gates ancestors came from CT to Marietta. Their next generation married each other in Charleston during the War Between the States. I am wondering if Hocking Valley was part of Washington County about 1800? If it was, as I believe, then it would seem I can still do the research through Washington County sources, right? Isn't it so, that if a place was in a county when one's ancestors were there, one would not search in a new county name if they had already left there before the new county was formed? This is a good genealogical question and it has plagued me with the Olde Virginia counties, too, which were much changed and added to between 1776 and 1850, with all the southern and westward movement. Sharon Lee Gates b 9/18/1949 Charleston, Kanawha, WV now of Apopka, FL