I've found that the spelling depends largely on how comfortable the clerk was with the language at the time events were recorded. I spelled it Nolen because that's how it is in the marriage record, a completely arbitrary decision on my part. I think the present day Patrick Co bunch spells it Nowlin. At 06:54 PM 11/4/98 -0600, you wrote: >Terri, >I've found the names to be interchanable throughout the years. Can anyone >else comment on this? >Barb R. --------------------- "You can pick your friends, you can pick your nose, but you can't pick your relatives." ;^> Shelby Hubbard Puckett spuckett@bgsm.edu