This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Surnames: TAYLOR - SMITH - HUGHES - SPRINKLE - HARDIN Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/an/ABC.2ACE/3848.1.3.2.1 Message Board Post: My point was not to nitpick with you about whether my great grandmother was Indian, Cherokee or any other particular tribe. But it has been passed down in the family that she was. and that if it has warranted as important enough to pass down, that it simply should be taken into consideration. Perhaps DNA will help families in this branch of search through the female lineage. It won't give anyone Native American tribal papers, but would give some weight to the stories. It sure has been interesting on a branch of the male side of my family. Oral history is an integral part of many cultures and certainly was for our early ancestors, many of whom could neither read nor write. My own experience, has the borne the following fruit: My family passed down information that my grandfather was married before and no one knew who she was. Because of this tale, I searched and did find her and documentation to prove it. Another grandfather was purported to have sired somewhere around twenty children, found him too and the two marriages, and the children that did not survive to back that up. Also a curious story about my gg grandfather's strange nickname led me to find (and confirm) a diary entry about him, that is in the confederate museum in Richmond that mentions him and his nickname. I've also seen mistakes in "hard' evidence about incorrect death dates on the social security index. So there you go. About photography, I am well aware about when photographs came into use. And there is no family story about my ggrandmother belonging to a motorcycle gang. No need on your part to be so condescending. Donnd