Heard from an old friend, John Van Buskirk who has a very nice site for VAN BUSKIRK research at, http://www.geocities.com/vanbus1/ He also sent me a very large family file that ties into the the Old Cambridge District with the Buskirks Bridge families, near Eagle Bridge.

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Found an EXCELLENT webpage for people working on Rensselaer County research. The Troy Irish Genealogy Society (TIGS) has an extremely helpful amount of information on ALL people of the area, not just the Irish. http://www.rootsweb.com/~nytigs/ The resources page is superb. I do not have any Irish ancestors, err not yet, but this site will help anyone with connections to that area.

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It does'nt get any better than this. www.stevemorse.org

Stephen P. Morse of San Francisco has one of the MOST helpful sites on the Internet for searching and understanding how to search; Ellis Island and Castle Garden records, other ports of immigration, Federal and NYS Census records, including a super way to locate Enumeration Districts (Eds), vital records and birth dates, most any kind of calendar you will ever encounter in your research, and I have not even scratched the surface with what is available. I did have a chuckle though when I first went to look for him because I typed a wrong address in, stevenmorse dot com, and don't go there if you are faint at heart.

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If I was an author, published, and earning revenue for my effort, I would hate what is going on at http://print.google.com I'm pretty sure Google will push Bill aside in ruling the world, but what ever...

This is going to be a HUGE asset to researchers, as more and more titles become available. You can follow the Google side of the story at their official blog site http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2005/11/preserving-public-domain-books.html

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If any of you subscribe to the Dutchess County Mailing List from rootsweb.com, you will know all about this. If you do not, it would be worth the effort to subscribe to the list, (free of course) just to learn a lesson in civic duty, political intrigue, and perseverance. Ginny B. has led a campaign to force the County Executive and the County Legislature to hire a County Historian as required by law. For a couple of years now I have been lurking and reading her posts and all of the positive support messages she has been receiving, as well as the weasly responses from the politicians to her bold and outright “in-your-face” persisitance. Today I give her the “Asbestos Glove Award” because I would not want her to burn her hands while holding the politicians feet to the fire.

If you want to have some fun and learn how to handle the government, just go to the rootsweb mailing list archives for Dutchess County and read the MANY posts regarding “Dutchess County Historian”. I don't know what the outcome will be but she is one of my all time heroes!

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I have been having fun swapping some GIFFORD family material with a new found GIFFORD cousin that I met through this website and BLOG. See boys and girls it pays to get your data out there on the web. Use discretion, don't air all of the linen, but get a website or a BLOG, or post your basic lines to one of the big boards and you will meet new friends and make family connections that you have never dreamed of.

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