Ruth and Rockers, I've had a couple days like that, too. I have a stack of new cousins to enter into my tree, and I sit here just staring at all the papers. That's the least interesting part of this hobby to me. I have a low tolerance for tedium. Anyone else getting anywhere? Sharon

Hi all, I thought I was the only one with this insidious epidemic. In a way, I was keeping it a secret.....I thought I was the only one who hated the "data entry" part of the fun Genealogy part!!!<smile> Kate ----- Original Message ----- From: "Sharon Workman" <workman@dreamscape.com> To: <ROCKINGCHAIR-ROOTS-L@rootsweb.com> Sent: Monday, June 09, 2003 6:24 PM Subject: Re: [RC-ROOTS] doldrums > Ruth and Rockers, > I've had a couple days like that, too. I have a stack of new cousins to > enter into my tree, and I sit here just staring at all the papers. That's > the least interesting part of this hobby to me. I have a low tolerance for > tedium. Anyone else getting anywhere? > > Sharon >

did just get a DSL line as a belated "Mothers' Day" present and lo and behold, I can now access Ancestry.com, FamilySearch.org, and much more of Rootsweb (my previous dialup would toss me offline every 3 to 5 minutes, and sometimes the download would be at 85 bytes per sec; that's AWFULLY slow for graphic-intensive sites) so I now have found the presumptive parents (the immigrant generation) for my Catherine Close .... and apparently her name WAS Close and not Clouse or Clauss, as some researchers have guessed; without that highspeed access I'd never have had the patience to wait through many aborted start-ups to find that this from my Elizabeth Hopkins line; that brick wall finally fell, back about Christmastime. Don't knock it when people say they were serendipitously "led" to their ancestors, for I kept looking at Eldridge Hopkins of Kentucky, who moved to Indiana, but his children were just the wrong ages, and married other people ... and the transcription I had was that his wife was "Zerrah" wasn't until another researcher uploaded to WorldConnect at Rootsweb, that I found it was a mis-transcription, her name was actually ZILLAH (Morris) Hopkins; she was my Elizabeth's aunt (Elizabeth's mother Asenath/Aseneath Morris was Zillah's sister, her father Joseph S. Hopkins was Eldridge Hopkins' brother !!! ) and my Elizabeth went by (variously spelled) Zilla, Ziloh, Zellah from the 1900 census on; that's what her grandson called her too ... it would seem she assumed that name after her aunt Zillah died ... then Elizabeth Hopkins married George Eldridge, in another odd coincidence of names ... though he is no known relation of Eldridge Hopkins' ... so don't despair, she is my greatgrandmother, and I spent five years nearly fulltime on the internet and at the FHL for five intensive dawn-to-dark days, looking for her it also illustrates the technique of searching the siblings or presumptive siblings of your direct line -- after all, when I was just starting out, I was looking for George Eldridge -- have you any idea how many of that name there are? (don't even think of searching on Google ! ); luckily I knew he had a sister named Lucy, who married Abner Fugate (at last, an unusual name ! ) and I was fortunate enough that one of the Fugates later joined the LDS church and had submitted an Ancestral File; backed up by census data and family Bibles ... George would have been difficult to find by census alone, as he was listed as "Ger" and "Ged" ... probably from a mistaken transcription of the common (then) abbreviation Geo_ ; in land records his name is spelled Elrige ... so a Soundex search might not have found it now I'm off to tackle Nathaniel Smith of Maine, born "about 1775" who married Priscilla Milliken in 1800 there's a real dearth of Smiths named Nathaniel (or Nathan) during that period, though it's quite possible he was from MA or CT or RI or elsewhere, since that branch of the family mostly follows the sea ... anyway, no fair having the doldrums, wait until August ... Candy

Candy, Thanks for the story. We can find our folks in all kinds of odd ways, and no clue should be tossed out as too far-fetched. Close - Both my mother and father are descended from that line, originating with the famous "Goodman" John Close from Yorkshire. Does your Catherine Close fit into that family? Sharon