Sherry, I certainly agree with you completely, that is why I depend on more than one piece of documentation to try to connect two members of a family. It is good search in as many places as possible to try to connect links. If you have the same family in four consecutive census reports...with the correct ages or dates of birth...years married and so forth...with the children following along plus a death certificate and maybe a baptism certificate or birth certificate then you can safely connect this family even if you find some variation of the spelling of the last name or as in the census reports...the first name. I think the thing we have to do is try to document our sources as much as possible, but you are right...even with all this we still make mistakes....that is what I like about computers...it is so easy to fix the mistake! Linda Sherry wrote: > > > Although one may very often find out differently, I have learned that it is not > a good idea to assume that a family with a similarly spelled surname, or even > the SAME surname, living in the same area is related. -- Linda Gallentine, Fayette Co., PA Researching: Franklin, Kollar, Fleichman, Kregel (Kreckel), Core, Grattan, Murphy, Barthen, McGinnis, Gallentine