That's very interesting, David. I would have assumed a case of illegitimacy, as well. We appreciate your willingness to share your findings with the rest of us! Jayna Quinn -----Original Message----- From: David Strickland [mailto:dstrickland@optekinc.com] Sent: Friday, June 23, 2000 11:24 AM To: TXMIDLAN-L@rootsweb.com Subject: [TXMIDLAN] Texas birth records 1926-1949 on Rootsweb I ran into an instance where the father was identified as ***DO NOT ISSUE***. I then checked for that name for the father and found 21,585 such records. I could not believe that there were that many "protected" unwed fathers, so I contacted the Texas State Dept of Health for an explanation. It seems that when a person dies and the Department can identify his birth certificate, they change the father's name to ***DO NOT ISSUE*** as an internal code to not issue a certified copy of that birth certificate to anyone claiming to be the deceased person! Obviously they are not catching very many death/birth relationships as I only found 1 out of the 100 or so deceased people I have checked. Anyway, thought all the listers might "enjoy" another instance of the bureaucratic mentality of dealing with a legitimate issue. David Strickland dstrickland@optekinc.com ============================== Get a MASTERCARD with NO Credit Check or Up Front Cash Security Deposit and GUARANTEED* Approval! NO Interest Rate! http://www.dollarsonthenet.com/cgi-bin/track/1631/19