Here is a second clue to the identity of the person whose birth record was posted on August 19th. It is from a nearby English parish register almost three decades later:
Now are you beginning to figure out who I am? Is this priest's handwriting easier to decipher?
AskAboutIreland says about Griffith's Valuation, "The Primary Valuation was the first full-scale valuation of property in Ireland. It was overseen by Richard Griffith and published between 1847 and 1864. It is one of the most important surviving 19th century Irish genealogical sources."
Free searches of Griffith's are now available. If you had ancestors living in Ireland in the middle of the 19th Century, you should check it out. The database can be searched by either name or by location. Various boxes on the search page allow very specific information to be included. Be careful. Too much information entered there may eliminate all possible matches. If you get no matches, eliminate a search term or two. If you get too many matches, then you can be more specific.
While you are at the site, check out other features.
Can you figure out who this birth record is for? It is from an English parish register. He is an immigrant from whom at least three US Presidents descend. Post your guesses below. Who will be the first to identify him?
Additional clues will be posted weekly until someone makes an identification.
Take a look at the beta FamilySearch Catalog. FamilySearch is beta testing a new portal catalog and is looking for your feedback. Take a look at this now while you can participate in shaping this important tool into something that can be useful to you and others in the future. It certainly has a cleaner look than the previous version. Share your thoughts about it in the comments box below AND with the development team through the above link.
Enjoy!
Denise and I plan to leave Wednesday to drive to Salt Lake City. We plan to take a seminar on German Research on Saturday. 
Five of Denise's eight great-grandparents were from Germany or Prussian areas along the German/Polish border. We have never had much luck tracing them before they got on the boat to come to America.
We will spend the next week doing research in the Family History Library.
Hope all of you have some time to do research this month.
A partnership between National Parkinson Foundation and 23andMe will allow up to 10,000 people with Parkinson’s to receive a reduced rate of membership to the Personal Genome Service. The reduced rate of $25 is only for people who have been diagnosed by a physician, but we encourage non-patients to spread the word to people with PD. This discount is due to the generous support of Google co-founder Sergey Brin. Brin has been diagnosed with a genetic predisposition to get Parkinson's but is so far symptom free. A fascinating story of his fight to find a cure before it finds him is in the cover story of the July issue of Wired magazine.
This is a way to help find a cure and also to learn more about one's DNA. A normal price for the test is in the range of $300. All one has to do is go online and fill out a form. A collection kit will come in the mail. You spit (probably several times) into a vial and return the kit in the mail.
Connect to the project for more information.
