Jim Rader's Web site www.rader.org   

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Welcome to my web site!  This site is an example of what can be done today with the internet and the GEDCOM files being shared.  My research work in these pages covers less than 40 hours.  My steps were as follows

1. I entered the information my mother had on one sheet of paper about her ancestors (mostly names and a few dates and places)

2. Before 1996 I submitted my entire genealogy file to Family Tree Maker's World Family Tree project and it appeared on their volume 7

3. In December of 2001 I thought I would check Ancestry, FTM and the LDS pedigree resource file to see if they had any more information on this line.  I fount 3 files, each had my original submittal as a source.

4. In mid-December a cousin found me because of the FTM file and Emailed me.  This is a cousin unknown to me prior to the email.  She supplied me with

   1. A scrapbook produced by my Civil War Ancestor

   2. 350 pictures of ancestors whom I had never seen

   3. A 4 generation picture with me as a child through my great grandmother

   4. Many obituaries and newspaper clippings about the family

5. I typed many of the articles and added them and some of the pictures to Legacy and selected create a web site 

  Descendants of Joel Matthew Valentine
  Surname List
  Index of Names