Ms. Mills, Thank you for the encouraging words. I will be getting the book. Thanks, Keith Dixon --- On Fri, 10/23/09, Elizabeth Shown Mills <[log in to unmask]> wrote: From: Elizabeth Shown Mills <[log in to unmask]> Subject: Re: peter and mary ford To: [log in to unmask] Date: Friday, October 23, 2009, 2:43 PM Keith Dixon wrote: >I'm having a very difficult time understand what I'm doing. It is simple what I'm looking for but my computer skills are just not letting me do it. My grandfather's was Arthur Alfus Ford, he was born Feb 22, 1882 to Peter and Mary Ford. At the time the were living I believe in Prince Edward County VA. >I have joined a program with no success in finding them. I would like too know if anyone out there would or could help me find my family roots. My grandfather had a sister named Edna (Ford) Lee living in Richmond. She had a son by the name of Dewey that worked for the city. She married a gentleman that was well too do. I would love too know about my g-grandfather and g-grandmother and maybe their prior descendants. I believe they did fight in the Civil War. My grandfather was very devoted to VA. Mr. Dixon, Your frustration is understandable. It happens to virtually all of us when we become curious about our personal history and discover the challenge of research. The problem does not lie with your "computer skills." The reality is that everything isn't on the Internet. Indeed, *most* records are not on the Internet and the odds of finding any ancestral line online, reliably reconstructed, are slim. Very broadly speaking, there are two approaches to genealogy: "look ups" and "research." The term "look ups" apply when we go to any index or search engine and look for a name. We may be lucky enough to find the name, but we still haven't proved its our person or that the information is correct. *Research* requires us to learn how to go beyond those "look ups" and their corollary, "name gathering." You apparently have reached the stage where the "look ups" aren't working. What you need now is a good how-to-do-research manual, one that teaches you three essential skills: 1. Sources. You need to know how to find out what sources exist for the place and time of your interest, where to access those sources, how to use those sources, and how to interpret the language you find in those sources. 2. Methodology. You need to learn research strategies that go far beyond "look up a name." You need to learn how to correlate all the bits and pieces of information that you find in various records---details that, by themselves, don't prove anything but, together, provide you with the identity or relationship you are trying to prove. 3. Documentation and evidence analysis. You need to know which types of sources are more reliable or less reliable, how to evaluate each piece of information you find to determine whether it is likely to be trustworthy, and how to identify your sources fully enough that you have the information needed to make those evaluations---particularly as your research becomes more extensive and you start finding all sorts of contradictions between sources you assume you can trust. My favorite how-to-do-research book is one that is very unfortunately titled, but its guidance is golden. At the time they wrote this guide, the coauthors were president and vice-president, respectively, of the Association of Professional Genealogists: Kay Germaine Ingalls, CG, and Christine Rose, CG, CGL, _The Complete Idiot's Guide to Genealogy,_2d ed. (New York: Alpha/Penguin, 2005). With their help, you should be able to hurdle the roadblock you've now come to, with many meaningful discoveries thereafter. Elizabeth ----------------------------------------------------------- Elizabeth Shown Mills, CG, CGL, FASG Tennessee To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-roots.html To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-roots.html