This Miller Genealogy Book Is Totally Worthless

About a decade ago a lady named Shirley contacted me for more information about my husband’s Miller family of Brown County, Illinois. In my previous posts I have mentioned John Whitmore, and his mother was Delilah Miller, so hence the Miller connection. I am not giving out Shirley’s full name because it isn’t necessary.

Through the years of corresponding with Shirley it seemed that she was a bit erratic with her information, and seemed to be more in a hurry to accumulate it rather than make sure it was correct. That said, it will not be a surprise to you that her long-awaited book about Benjamin Miller and his descendants is a total disappointment. To be precise, a $90, 1342-page-plus-index-and-two-typed-addendums worthless book.

It isn’t so much the money (although we can always use an extra $90…who can’t?) but the waste of time and effort on her part. The reason I say this is because for our part in the book, which of course I can be sure of because I have documented the line, this woman has me with three children when in fact we have but one child, a son. She was given every opportunity to get all of this information correct because I sent her all that I had researched so that all she had to do was incorporate it into her own files.

So, if you should ever run across a self-published book entitled “Benjamin Miller of Romney, Virginia and Wayne County, Ohio” (A Record of his Descendants 1732-2007) by Shirley ____ be aware that the information contained in it is unreliable. I wouldn’t pay more than $20 for it on Ebay.

A few years ago I did my own Yates and Allied Families book that I shared with just the immediate family and friends. No doubt there are some mistakes in it, but it was a smaller family file with less of a chance for error. Still, I was like a little genealogical sponge when it came to acquiring new family information, and I don’t think the mistakes I have made compare to this. By making such large mistakes in her book, Shirley tainted everything else and made it suspect. It’s a shame, because this book could have been a lasting legacy of this woman’s 30+ years of work. Now, it is just a hardbound dust catcher for my genealogy library.

Related Posts:

Genealogy Tracking: Wilkersons, Whitmores and L. Frank Boyd – Part 1

Genealogy Tracking: Wilkersons, Whitmores and L. Frank Boyd – Part 2