We would like to invite you to re-visit our website, The POORHOUSE STORY (a clearinghouse for information about 19th century American poorhouses) at http://www.poorhousestory.com We have just published a newly designed page for TEXAS Poorhouse History. We have added specific county pages for those counties which have substantial poorhouse information. BELL County is featured! We are directing readers' attention to a rather amazing document which has quietly been published on the TXGenWeb site for Bell County: a rare (for Texas) full transcription of the poorhouse record book. It was unusual to find such a specific record book in Texas. And the author/transcriber, Janet Clayton Gardner, did much more than just transcribe. She also carefully researched the history of this poorhouse and interviewed people who lived and/or worked there. Photographs make the experience of reading this material quite wonderful! DIRECTIONS: At the homepage (link above) click on POORHOUSES BY STATE, then on TEXAS on the table of states, and finally on BELL County on the table of counties. If you have been to the website recently you may have to click REFRESH or RELOAD on the browser to see the new information. There are other pages on the site which may give you some interesting perspective on poorhouses. They are off the homepage and include: the HISTORY page and the LETTER TO GENEALOGISTS (which explains why you might climb over your own "brick walls" at the poorhouse. There are great tips for researching poorhouse records for yourself on the RECORDS page; and you might want to subscribe to our (almost) monthly newsletter (which you can do in the lower right corner of the homepage). The information on our site will only grow through the submissions of generous readers. If you would like to e-mail me ... please do so off-list because I cannot maintain subscriptions to as many lists as we post messages on. (You can use an e-mail link off one of our web pages.) We hope you enjoy the site! Thanks, Linda Crannell (aka=The Poorhouse Lady)