Hi Paul, Forgive us for copying your personal email to us to these 2 email lists but your message contains some very important information that we think needs to be expanded on. The subject for this expansion is those "Loose Papers" of Surry..... Last June, 2000, we were at the Surry Courthouse with our brand new digital camera. We wanted to experiment taking pictures of the court books. The year before we were told that no photocopies were allowed so this year we wanted to 'copy' these books with photos. We bought a Casio QV3000 capable of 2048 x 1536 pixels with an IBM Microdrive that can store 245 hi-res pictures. This trip was to validate the capabilities of this camera by photographing court book pages. The experiment was a tremendous success. We took hundreds of photos. As we were packing to leave I noticed some big flat boxes stacked high on the east side of the vault room. They were labeled with dates like 1790, 1800, 1810, etc. I was intrigued. We hadn't seen these boxes in past trips. There was no tag that said "Keep Out" but these boxes were definitely not within normal reach. There was no courthouse personnel around so I pulled down the 1790 box and opened it up. We were amased at the contents! These papers were all original papers, pertaining to court cases. Thousands of them. In perfect condition! We looked through them with shaking hands. We knew that we shouldn't be doing this. I wanted so badly to take photos of every single one of these papres. I put the cover back on and put the box back on the shelf. As we left I asked the staff about those boxes. I was told that they were off limits because these contents were newly discovered loose court case papers and they were going to be microfilmed and categorized by the Library of Virginia. For more information I was to talk to the Surry County Historical Society which was "right around the corner". I immediately went there. I talked with a person named Dennis. Later I found out it was Dennis Hudgins, editor of the later 'Pioneers and Caviliers' fame. We talked for almost an hour. A very knowledgeable individual. These new loose papers, according to Dennis, were to be catergorized and microfilmed by the Library of Virginia, with assistance from a lady from North Carolina who had done sigificant Surry County research. We would have to wait for more information. We left. How I wanted to be accidently locked up in that courthouse overnight! To be able to take pictures of new documents would be a dream come true. But that was only a dream. We have no idea what has transpired since then about all those loose court papers. We saw them, we held them in our hands........ If anyone knows of the outcome of this subject we would surely like to know. And so would these lists. Steve and Bunny ----- Original Message ----- From: "Paul Drake" <martee@citlink.net> To: "Yvonne and Steve" <ysbinns@yspcbdesigns.com> Sent: Friday, August 03, 2001 1:36 PM Subject: Re: [VA-SOUTHSIDE-L] '1800' County Tax Lists - Brunswick County > You are MUCH more than welcome; you deserve a lot of "atta-boys" and > "atta-girls." By the way; when you gonna' do S'hampton and Sussex? > One more question; are the "Loose Papers" of Surry being abstracted? > What a powerful source those will one day be for all of us with > early Tidewater Roots. Have a nice weekend. Paul --------- Subscribe to BINNS-L surname email list: mailto:BINNS-L-request@rootsweb.com?subject=subscribe&body=subscribe American Binns Families and Individuals: http://www.yspcbdesigns.com/americanb/index.htm 1790/1800 County Tax Lists of Virginia: http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~ysbinns/vataxlists/index.htm