Family History Center Fever

On Wednesday, January 9, 2008 I worked my first shift of 2008 at the Fort Collins Family History Center. It was a rather gloomy and cloudy and snowy day. My partner, Cathy, and I were not swamped with patrons so we both read our own microfilms to fill in the time. Cathy is working on foreign (German and Chzech) records and I am still in Delaware. I have both New Castle County and Sussex County Tax Lists to read. This is to try to further prove my theories about the SANKEY and CLIFTON families. As you may have guessed by now, I was getting a slow start to my genealogy for the new year. After wrapping up my "last of 2007 projects" I was sort of in limbo. I didn't know where to start, so I just made Party Potatoes and worked on my Bead Flag project. All it took was a few turns of the microfilm reader handle and I was starting to be inspired again. As I read old Tax Lists in New Castle County Delaware and searched for my SANKEY family my mind started clicking again. Now I am off and running for 2008. For those that are curious, Tax Lists are the best way to establish residence between censuses, and when a man turned age 21 or when he died or when he moved away. I find my Abraham SANKEY first in 1777, although I am sure he was already age 21 by then. Where is he before 1777? The prior records may have been lost, or not microfilmed, or he was living somewhere else. It is interesting to note that William Scott is always next to him on the Tax Lists. This means they paid their taxes at the same time as the assessor usually entered the names as they came in to pay. William Scott was one of the executors of Abraham's will in 1789, along with the widow Jane Scott SANKEY. I suspect William is either her brother or father. At any rate, I am off and running now, filled with new questions and very few answers.