From roots-in@roots-l.rootsweb.com Mon Mar 20 13:19:08 2006 Received: from mail.rootsweb.com (mail.rootsweb.com [192.168.65.34]) by admin.rootsweb.com (8.12.8/8.12.8) with ESMTP id k2KKJ8jb019835; Mon, 20 Mar 2006 13:19:08 -0700 Received: from roots-l.rootsweb.com (roots-l.rootsweb.com [66.43.16.22]) by mail.rootsweb.com (8.13.4/8.13.4) with ESMTP id k2KKJ8pC008586 for ; Mon, 20 Mar 2006 13:19:09 -0700 Received: from roots-l.rootsweb.com (roots-l [127.0.0.1]) by roots-l.rootsweb.com (8.12.10/8.12.10) with ESMTP id k2KHmHFI023958 for ; Mon, 20 Mar 2006 12:48:17 -0500 Received: (from roots-in@localhost) by roots-l.rootsweb.com (8.12.10/8.12.8/Submit) id k2KHmHdc023957 for roots-approved@rootsweb.com; Mon, 20 Mar 2006 12:48:17 -0500 Received: from lists5.rootsweb.com (lists5.rootsweb.com [66.43.27.41]) by roots-l.rootsweb.com (8.12.10/8.12.10) with SMTP id k2KFwBFI023705 for ; Mon, 20 Mar 2006 10:58:12 -0500 Received: (from slist@localhost) by lists5.rootsweb.com (8.12.8/8.12.8) id k2KISrwu028582 for roots-in@roots-l.rootsweb.com; Mon, 20 Mar 2006 11:28:53 -0700 X-Envelope-From: GenBrd@aol.com Mon Mar 20 11:28:52 2006 Received: from mail.rootsweb.com (mail.rootsweb.com [192.168.65.34]) by admin.rootsweb.com (8.12.8/8.12.8) with ESMTP id k2KISqjb028571 for ; Mon, 20 Mar 2006 11:28:52 -0700 Received: from imo-m28.mx.aol.com (imo-m28.mx.aol.com [64.12.137.9]) by mail.rootsweb.com (8.13.4/8.13.4) with ESMTP id k2KISoZJ014058 for ; Mon, 20 Mar 2006 11:28:50 -0700 Received: from GenBrd@aol.com by imo-m28.mx.aol.com (mail_out_v38_r7.3.) id e.285.7b43bb5 (62952) for ; Mon, 20 Mar 2006 13:28:32 -0500 (EST) From: GenBrd@aol.com Message-ID: <285.7b43bb5.31504e4c@aol.com> Date: Mon, 20 Mar 2006 13:28:28 EST To: ROOTS-L@rootsweb.com MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" X-Mailer: 9.0 Security Edition for Windows sub 2340 X-Spam-Flag: NO X-Scanned-By: MIMEDefang 2.52 on 192.168.65.34 X-Scanned-By: MIMEDefang 2.52 on 192.168.65.34 Sender: roots-in@roots-l.rootsweb.com Subject: [ROOTS-L] Limiting research to what relationship? Hello all. I have a question that I expect to get many different responses for, but that will be very helpful. When my database reached 15,000 individuals I decided that I just had to draw a line for myself as to what is reasonable to research. At that point I decided that I would stop with 4th cousins. However, this was anyone that was 4th cousin X removed, it didn't matter. Now I am up to almost 20,000 and I realize that even this is ridiculous, for most of those people all I am doing is collecting names, dates, and places and not history. They are not close relatives by any stretch of the imagination. I suppose I can start by limiting the "times removed". But then I need to determine an "equivalent" for 3rd cousin X removed. And do I do it for second cousins and first cousins. After all, my 8th great grandfather's second cousin is pretty distant from me. So my question to listers is: Where do you draw the line? At what point do you personally say, "these people are too far distant from my family line and I am not going to add them". Obviously there is no right or wrong answer, I need some suggestions so that I can weigh the merits and make a decision before I lose my mind researching all these people that are more closely related to you than to me probably. <> Thanks for any help Jo H