Since sourcing has become an open item on this list I'd like to take a few lines and talk about it. The main question is why do we source? There are various reasons but I'll touch on three. 1 - Shows credibility. When other people look at your work they can tell that you have done your homework instead of just grabbing info online, or from wherever, and tossing it into your database. When I check family trees online I can easily identify the genuine researchers from the "copy cats." 2 - It helps you to retrace your steps. Eventually we all screw up somewhere on our lines and have to retrace our steps to figure out why and how we reached the conclusion we did. The earlier we screw up in our genealogical "career" the better as we learn an important lesson early on. 3 - It helps others to easily retrace our steps. Eventually one might be confronted by another genealogist as to why we picked a certain couple as the parents of our ancestors as opposed to another couple that looks equally promising (as an example). When we send them our records with our sources they can retrace our steps and follow our line of thinking. If we do not have good sources we will not look very credible and it will be a longer, and probably costlier, process to prove our point. So how do we source? Remember those writing classes we took in college (or high school)? We had to write down the author's names, the book title, page, and paragraph #'s. With internet articles we add date article was written, date it was accessed, and web address. The point being if the professor wanted to know where you got the info he could do it easily, otherwise you could count on a failing grade. Same goes for our genealogical research. In addition to the above items we can add edition #'s, if applicable. With newspapers add column, paragraph, and line #'s. With microfilms add the item # as different items may have the same numbers, and film # and title. When deciding exactly what to source don't ever think that you will remember exactly where you got the information from, chances are you will either eventually forget or confuse it with another similar record. Instead, think ten years from now which information you would like to have written down in case you have to find that record again. So how do I know these things? Been there done that!!! Have a great day. Luis "Not to know what happened before we were born is to remain perpetually a child. For what is the worth of a human life unless it is woven into the life of our ancestors." Cicero, Roman orator ____________________________________________________________________________________ Need a vacation? Get great deals to amazing places on Yahoo! Travel. http://travel.yahoo.com/