At 04:56 PM 1/15/2006, you wrote: >The local court house has a record of the owner and whom they bought it >from, then you look up that purchase and whom they bought it from, then >look up...this is no different from any bank transaction wherein the >mortgage people have to determine the chain of ownership before you buy. >There are firms that do real estate histories for a living...plain or >fancy...in the plain, you get list...in the fancy, you get document >copies. Ask any mortgage lender for a recommendation. Maryellen I have gotten behind on my mail. I may have discarded the original message. In looking for family land, in Anderson county, you could start from the ancestor's end. There are microfilm sets of county grantee/grantor indexes in the Carolina Room of that splendid library in Anderson. (I live in Pickens county and am a grad. student at Clemson. I hold an Anderson card, and get over there very occasionally.) Once you check the indexes: you would start with the ancestral family and could just write down the index info for every member of that family up to a certain date, and then get copies of the documents from the court house. (Park in the court house lot if you can get a space. Street parking may still be restricted to 1-hour only.) Don't expect a lot of help from the courthouse staff. Don't forget that some of Anderson county is under water now. The three big things I'm aware of near Sandy Springs are I-85, the main campus of TriCounty Tech and the Michelin plant. They do have good security in the court house. Elizabeth Whitaker