[or-roots] Purchaing Document Question

Wed May 19 13:45:16 PDT 2004

Actually $45.00 is not to bad, I have spent that much on Probate Records of my Great Grandfather A. H. Robie a Pioneer in Eastern Oregon and Idaho.
I have also spent over $200. for out of print Oregon History books that have mention of my ancestors and plan on spending more in the future, it depends on what you want and how much you are willing to spend for records that pertain to your genealogy.
If gas had not gone so high I would be doing a lot of traveling right now in search of more on my family as I have been on Vacation for nearly two weeks.
Researching Cross, Craig, Robie, Roe, Barber, Jones and other related families.
Glen Jones Portland. 
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Leslie Chapman<mailto:khanjehgil at presys.com> 
  To: or-roots at sosinet.sos.state.or.us<mailto:or-roots at sosinet.sos.state.or.us> 
  Sent: Wednesday, May 19, 2004 12:01 PM
  Subject: RE: [or-roots] Purchaing Document Question

  First rule; It's for genealogy, do NOT buy certified info; IE I blew 45
  dollars on death Certs for my wifes Ancestors $45 = 3 certified copies, I
  could then have gotten same info from Or Archives for about $6 now $15, BUT
  my sis-in-law shortly after that was at OR archives and could have gottens
  same info for me for % .75.

  Several folks have asked for said help in past on list, if anyone is
  providing such help they are being wisely discrete about it.

  If you can get the info you REALLY need from an online index, don't buy it
  all unless you really want it. California has a lot of Data available online
  for free in indexes I can "maybe" get you a death birth and maybe even
  marriage date and name that way, plus often Mother's maiden name.

  If they aren't my immediate ancestor I am not really interested in paying
  for it, but that's me. Some folks feel obliged for every available doc for
  everyone in their family tree. WHY!

  I did blow thirty bucks early on for what turned out to be distant cousins,
  but it was a good deal, 25 cents a page plus or minus, but those kind of
  deals are rare. I paid $1 each for two Marriage Certs for my Namesakes
  inlaws, I was hoping their might be some useful info, no such luck.

  As far as info is concerned; Marriage Affadavits are usually more useful
  than Certificates, about all the cert gives is the date and names of
  witnesses, if they happen to be family they might be useful, my great Uncle
  Edward married a womean named Ida McCulloch who I have had a hard time
  finding family for, I just obtained their wedding cert and lo and behold,
  two people named McCulloch. Now I may be able to pin down her family for
  sure.

  Death certs are "usually" quite good, unless the informant doesn't have any
  or correct info. I have several death certs where about the only correct
  info is the death date and the name the person was going by when they died,
  wrong maiden name, wrong birth date and as bad as wrong country of birth.

  The advantage of death certs over birth is just that, the death info.

  As to any other documents, other than military record and naturalization
  papers most stuff is pretty useless for genealogy unless you are interested
  in putting together and exhaustive profile of some one. With one notable
  exception, if you are unable to find the basic documents for someone for
  some reason, then you might consider chasing probate and school records for
  information.

  I have very little experience with probate and have never tried for a school
  record. The latter for the most part are hard to impossible to get as I
  understand it, Probate records can be tricky, I did one for a member of the
  list last week, I got about $5 worth for her, but passed up almost $15
  dollars worth of documents that I didn't feel she would want as they
  provided no useful information or were duplicates, but if you are getting
  probate records by contacting a county clerk somewhere, they are liable to
  just copy the whole file and that makes a big differance. How much leeway
  you have there varies with courthouse. The lady at Douglas Co in Oregon I
  believe would be very cooperative in terms of just the facts as she is a
  genealogist herself, on the other hand some places resent the process so
  thoroughly that I imagine they would sock it to you to the max, for example
  I copied every doc in one of my gramma's probate record including the
  receipts, she put as many of them on a sheet as she could, but someone
  somewhere could sock you for fifty cents for each one which means six times
  as much money.

  I priortize by two things, how bad I need the info, ie if I have a 1900
  census for them, I really don't care about the day they were born, unless
  there is a lot of conflict about the birth date of course. I really don't
  care except for the immediate ancestors so haven't, except for the stuff
  mentioned above. Of course I have a lot of relatives doing research so I
  have certain advantages. If you are on your own that makes it harder.

  Hope this helps.

  Les C

  -----Original Message-----
  From: or-roots-admin at sosinet.sos.state.or.us<mailto:or-roots-admin at sosinet.sos.state.or.us>
  [mailto:or-roots-admin at sosinet.sos.state.or.us]On Behalf Of Ann
  Sent: Wednesday, May 19, 2004 8:05 AM
  To: or-roots at sosinet.sos.state.or.us<mailto:or-roots at sosinet.sos.state.or.us>
  Subject: [or-roots] Purchaing Document Question

  Hi All~

  I have a question.  How do you decide what to purchase for your primary
  documents?  Let's face it, genealogy can get expensive if you have a small
  income.  If I were to order every birth, death, divorce, land, will/probate,
  military, etc. etc. record for everyone in my line it would add up to
  something fierce.  Do you save it for direct ancestors--parents,
  grandparents, etc.?  Do tell--do tell.

  Roberta Batzner Chesley
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