Somewhere online (the precise location I will not mention) I recently read that all the Bureau of Land Management Tract books were online at FamilySearch. The last time I checked FamilySearch Missouri’s books were not online. There were some families in Chariton County who filed pre-emption claims and I wanted to see if there were any neighboring families who filed claims that were eventually cancelled. I was hoping to look in the updated list of online materials
The only problem was that it wasn’t true. All the books were not online. They still aren’t. Either the author copied the information from someone else or assumed the list was complete because there were a lot of states listed.
Four reminders from that:
- Don’t believe everything you read.
- Don’t assume anything–check it out.
- Don’t just copy and paste information–check it out.
- Write things down as soon as you think of them. I’ve forgotten the fourth reminder, so this one will have to do instead.
