I’ve written about this before, but sometimes I am still amazed that livestock pedigrees as far back as 1938 are online at the American Angus Association’s website. Searching them is not so easy.

The image shown was for “Barbara 41 of Greenview” a cow born in November of 1938 and owned by my paternal grandfather.

Non-members can’t search by breeder or owner numbers–only by name. I did not know the name of any of my late Grandfather’s cattle, but a search for “Carthage” pulled up several references and I eventually found an animal with that word in its name.

Other than documenting a few animal sales, I didn’t really make any great discoveries on this site. But as with any piece of information, one needs to be careful in interpreting it. This cow was born in November of 1938 and lists my grandfather’s address as the owner. There’s no guarantee (based upon what is on this image) that he was living there in 1938 because the breeder’s name is not given and that date would be tied to the breeder and not to the owner.

A minor nuance to be certain.

But a reminder to think about what we find–what it says and what it does not.

I’m not certain if  Evidence Explained has a citation for livestock pedigrees in its pages. I’m reasonably certain this would be like citing any online database.