Hello All, I found the census information at ftp.ipums.umn.edu. They are in the /ipums/data directory and stored as a compressed UNIX file. Documentation is stored in the /ipums/user_guide directory. A PC program to decompress the files are in /pub/gzip. The census information is huge: The 1850 census is in ip18501.Z and is 6874 KB, 1860 is ip18601.Z and is 2060kb, 1870 is ip18701.Z and is 3337 KB, 1880 is ip18801.Z and is 21,235KB. Downloading took several hours. The files decompress to 76,782KB, 22,412KB, 34,948KB and 199,534KB respectively. I have a Pentium 400 MHz and even it takes several minutes to search through any of the files. I was glad to hear that these would be a good addition, and that I haven't been wasting time!!! I'll go through the files this weekend and search for Wise County (and surrounding counties) and post the results. Cheryl