I am not sure to whom to get this out to, but I had a happening that I
thought maybe everyone who likes to travel to courthouses away from home
should know about.
Last week my husband took a couple of days of vactaion and we drove 225
miles from Eau Claire, Wisconsin to Janesville, Wisconsin to visit the
Rock County Courthouse, hoping to find the marriage record of his great
grandparents and his great grandfather's uncle who we beleive to have
married his great grandmother's sister. As we don't have the names of
the parents for the females, and a multitude of Hall's seemed to have
been in Rock County in the 1840's we decided to drive down and take a
look. We arrived a little before 10 a.m and we stopped to ask for
directions to the register of deeds, the security officer informed us
that the register of deeds office was closed for 2 days while the office
was being remodeld. He then showed us a newspaper article. We
explained that a newspaper announcement did us no good, since we were
not from the area. This gave me pause to think that from now on, when
on our little expeditions to find out more about our ancestor's in the
old courthouses. Maybe it isn't such a bad idea to call ahead and
confirm that they are not going to be renivating, or closed when you
wish to visit. I was at another courthouse recently, while open, they
were remodeling, and things were not to organized and kind of shoved
around. I thought maybe you would like to pass this on to people, so
they don't make the same mistake we did!
Took a nice drive!
Dawn Card