31 December 1997 - The search engine for the Observer-Reporter Obituary Archive has been modified in the interest of speeding up searches.  You can now limit your search to a particular month/year combination, thereby searching only portion of the obituaries we have archived.

30 December 1997 - Added two new articles about the Robson brothers.  Added four new wills to the articles and documents page. See the top of the list.

29 December 1997 - Added two new links to the personal WWW links page. See the top of the list.

22 December 1997 - Several new things have been added to this web site in the last month.  We have new sponsors,  new articles, and new personal web page links.  We've also reversed the order of the Observer-Reporter Obituary Archive index page to make it easier for dedicated readers to head straight for the latest additions.  David Boyd Jr. has joined the team as listowner for the PAWASHIN-L email list. Also, we've added a link to Robin L. W. Petersen's page containing 1794 Oaths of Allegiance.

20 November 1997 - We have a new lookup volunteer with access to early tax records.  Added a new link to the personal WWW links page: McWilliams.

15 November 1997 - For many weeks, the search engine for the Observer-Reporter Obituary Archive was broken.  It is in working order now.  We hope to make some improvements in the near future, specifically to make the searches faster.

4 November 1997 - One of your webmasters (Jean) will be out of town for two weeks starting November 9th.  However, your other webmaster (Todd) will  be keeping up with the surnames and queries. I'll respond to Email when I return. --Jean
The transcription of a will has been added to the articles area.  Thanks to Marsha Richns for adding to our cemetery knowledge with info on Florence (or Cross Roads) Presbyterian Church cemetery and The Raccoon (Presbyterian) Church Cemetery at Candor. And thanks to Eleanor Fujita for info about Three Ridges Presbyterian Church cemetery.

4 November 1997 - There's been an interesting submission to the articles area; this is a transcription of an original GAR submission form.

4 November 1997 - We've added a few new articles to the Beers Biographical Record On-line.  Thanks to Martha Burns for helping to tie up the last few articles. Here's a big thank you to Michelle DeVore Brubaker for sponsoring this site for December and January!  The USGenWeb server was inaccessible from our pages in the last few days.  It seems that their URL has changed from www.usgenweb.com to www.usgenweb.org, and they forgot to pass that info along.  The links on our pages have been updated with their new address.

4 November 1997 - We have new lookup volunteer who has access to three family genealogy books.

4 November 1997 - The USGenWeb query mechanism, which we have been using for the last year, appears to be permanaently broken.  Therefore, we have changed the Queries form.  For the time being, we ask that you simply send your queries to us via Email.  Once we receive them, we will attempt to get them added to this web site within a few days.

For those who submitted queries using the old form, and didn't see them show up on our Queries Archives, please resubmit them since they were probably lost when the old mechanism broke.  We apologize for that inconvenience.

3 October 1997 - Today we added an article about the Bailey's of Penna.

28 September 1997 - Sixteen new articles were added to Beers Biographical Record On-line .

27 September 1997 - Many of you have probably noticed something strange going on with the way some of the pages have been looking lately. That is, the graphics (titles, bullets, etc.) have not displayed correctly. It's not your browser that's causing the problem, it's us! We had a little glitch in some of our software configuration, but we're slowly getting the problem fixed. Thanks for your patience.

20 September 1997 - Check the personal links page for a new link to that includes the Pry surname.  We've added a "message and comments" area to the Beers Project page.

14 September 1997 - Several additions to the Civil War Rolls have been made in the last two weeks.  Have a look.  We added two new links to the personal links page, one that includes Allison ancestors and the other that includes Clark ancestors.

1 September 1997 - See the articles page for an article about the Hugh Scott Family.

31 August 1997 - The index to Pennsylvania towns/cities from the 1895 Rand-McNally Atlas are now on-line.

30 August 1997 - A reader contributed the transcription of a old genealogical article on the M'Connell family.  Check the Civil War Rolls for the addition of the Sixth Penna. Militia.

  23 August 1997 - Thanks, Leslie, for sponsoring September for all of us!

19 August 1997 - We added our first installment of Civil War Rolls today. The page is accessible from the front page via the "Projects and Databases" selector.

18 August 1997 - A new article was added today on the descendants of Melcher Young.  Welcome to our new co-webmaster, Todd Pelkey!  Todd will be keeping an eye on the Surname Registry, the Queries Archive, and the Lookups page.  Glad to have you aboard, Todd.

16 August 1997 - We've added a new article tody, a biography of Alexander Burns. This week, with the permission of the Observer Publishing Co, we began archiving obituaries from the on-line edition of the Observer Reporter.

16 August 1997 - Two new links were added to our page of personal web links.

4 August 1997 - Some enhancements were made to the search engine for the Beers Project. Search results are now alphabetized. Also, you can now choose whether you want to search for an exact match of a single full word (mill, but not McMillan or Miller) or for all words containing your search word (all of these: Howe, however, Howell).

3 August 1997 - Thanks to a suggestion from a reader, we've added a Reunion Calendar.  Given the wonderful growth of this web site and the increased number of people using and contribuiting to it, it is time to find a few committed people to help share the day-to-day tasks of keeping things running. 

2 August 1997 - Don't miss having a look at the several new articles that were added to this site today. Also, a new lookup volunteer has joined us who has access to the published Pennsylvania Archives.  Added road maps for Washington County courthouse, Citizens Library, and route from Pittsburgh to Washington, PA.

2 August 1997 - The USGenWeb query mechanism is back on-line, and the first batch of queries arrived in my Emailbox today.  They've been posted to the queries page.

21 July 1997 - On the visiting page, we've added links to two web sites: one for the city of Washington and one for Washington County.

19 July 1997 - Added a section to the top of the libraries page providing need-to-know info about the LDS Family History Centers as pertains to Washington Co., PA researchers.

19 July 1997 - On the getting started page, we've added a link to the LDS Family History Center "What Can I do First Page?"

19 July 1997 - A new personal web page containing Washington Co. ancestral ties has been added to our links page. Thanks Ken Antall!

17 July 1997 - In the vital statistics page we have made one useful addition. If you are looking for birth/death records, there is a new online resource for getting addresses, phone numbers, and expected fees. It is called "United States Vital Records", and we've put their link in the "Birth Certificates" and in the "Death Certificates" paragraphs.

16 July 1997 - We've had another volunteer step forward offering to do complimentary lookups. She has offered to use several very important sources.

15 July 1997 - Keep those articles coming! Today we added an excellent article on James Gibson of Brownsville.

14 July 1997 - Today we added 43 more articles to the Beers Project. That makes 1,359 articles on-line, with 119 currently being transcribed.

14 July 1997 - In the course of checking all links to outside web pages, we discovered that the Societies & Web Groups page had five, yes FIVE, bad links. They are fixed now.

13 July 1997 - Thanks to Kathy Tucker for sending us transcribed Civil War letters from Isaiah Thomas to his family in Washington Co., PA. They make for very interesting reading.

13 July 1997 - We've added another link on to our list of personal web pages. Check out Todd Pelkey's home page. We have also verified all links on that page as current as of today.

12 July 1997 - In an attempt to do some summer cleaning, we have gone through and verified all links on the libraries and booksellers page as working.

12 July 1997 - Our military page has had a couple of new links added: one to GENCAP's new "Pennsylvania in the Civil War" page and one to the "National Personnel Records Center" where you can obtain form SF180 used for obtaining military records.

4 July 1997 - Many thanks to our sponsor for August!

1 July 1997 - Today we made available the first set of obituary abstracts taken from the Washington Observer-Reporter for June 1997.

1 July 1997 - Today we added 43 more articles to the Beers Project. That makes 1,347 articles on-line, or the project being approximately 91% complete. There are 131 currently being transcribed.

30 June 1997 - A new personal web page link has been added for the Eric and Jacqueline Segal's web page.

21 June 1997 - We've added a musical touch to the main web page. The ragtime pieces are brought to us courtesy of my friend and colleague, John Cowles. If you have trouble hearing the music, we've added some info to the browser hints page that should help.

19 June 1997 - Another articles has been submitted, this one on the Wisehart Family.

19 June 1997 - Today we added 18 more articles to the Beers Project. That makes 1,304 articles on-line, or the project being approximately 89% complete. There are 174 currently being transcribed.

17 June 1997 - Today we added 33 more articles to the Beers Project.

16 June 1997 - Many thanks to our sponsor for July!

16 June 1997 - See the personal web links page for a new addition: "Jen's Corner".

8 June 1997 - You've probably noticed the latest in our continuing upgrades. The main www.chartiers.com page has been reorganized to make it a bit easier to locate your favorite features.

8 June 1997 - There is now an on-line index to newspapers. See our newspaper page for the link.

7 June 1997 - Another personal web page with connections to Washington Co. is on line. Check out Taggartsland.

5 June 1997 - We've added links to two services genealogists will find of interest. First, we've added a link to the NARA Microfilm Rental Program on the census page. And on the vital statistics page, we've added a link to a company called Vital Check which can help you obtain birth/death certificates.

5 June 1997 - Check out the libraries and booksellers page where we've added a list of holdings in the Library of Congress relating to Pennsylvania genealogy.

3 June 1997 - We've made some minor upgrades to the message board, mostly cosmetic.

30 May 1997 - Kudos to two volunteers, Neil Morton and Larry Jones, for their excellent contribution on the Beers Project. Neil scanned (quite skillfully!) all the photos and etchings, and Larry arranged for donated disk storage (many thanks!) and coordinated the web-based compilation. Have a look at our ancestors' faces from the 1880's and 1890's at the Beers Project Portrait Gallery.

30 May 1997 - On the Surnames Registry page, we've updated some links to other surname areas on the web, specifically the search engines for ROOTS-L and soc.genealogy.surnames.

29 May 1997 - We've added three new personal home page links, one each for the surnames: Yoho (Yohe, Joho), Allison, and Lutton.

28 May 1997 - Another volunteer has stepped forward to do lookups for us. Thanks, Wanda!

28 May 1997 - Many, many thanks to our sponsors for June. The continued support from the genealogical community is appreciated by all of us Washington Co., PA researchers.

28 May 1997 - The Webmaster is back from her holiday. So far, surnames and queries have been updated. I'll start working on other email replies this evening. Beers project additions should be caught up by this weekend. Thanks Jacky & Stewart your part in making our holiday a most restful one.

15 May 1997 - The Webmaster will be on vacation May 16, returning May 28.

12 May 1997 - Apologies to all those who had trouble loading our front page on May 8 & 9. The fault is mine, and I have corrected the problem. Sorry for any frustration I caused.

4 May 1997 - This weekend we began the rallying push to complete the Beers Project. Twenty-some volunteers will be receiving photocopies of articles for transcription early this week. Thanks!!!!

29 April 1997 - Folks have asked about copying pages from this web site in the past. For those people, I've added a copyright statement that spells out the guidelines.

25 April 1997 - Many, many thanks to our sponsor for May.

23 April 1997 - We found a few links relating to military records and war history that might be of interest.

23 April 1997 - For those of you researching the the American Revolution era, you'll be interested in the David Library whose link we've added.

23 April 1997 - We've located another professional researcher for the Western Pennsylvania area.

23 April 1997 - Yet another volunteer has come forward offering to do lookups of several important works.

23 April 1997 - Two new articles have been contributed, having to do with the French and Indian Wars.

8 April 1997 - Hark! My day job calls. Your friendly webmaster will be out of town on business for a ten day stretch starting April 11th. I'll be back on the 21st and will attempt to start working through email at that time.

8 April 1997 - We've added a new personal home page link and one of our lookup volunteers has gained access to some Civil War sources for Fayette Co.

6 April 1997 - I've done some spring cleaning on the Surname Registry page. All the links to outside Web pages have been tested and updated as needed.

27 March 1997 - Speical thanks are due our March and April Sponsors. We truly appreciate their generosity and spirit in helping to keep these pages growing and meaningful.

21 March 1997 - We have several new articles which have been transcribed from various Washington County history books.

21 March 1997 - It was bound to happen. One of my PC disks went bad earlier this week and I lost a few files in addition to my web page work being hampered while I ordered and installed a new disk. Luckily, my last tape backup was less than 24-hours old, so very few files were lost. We're back up and running now, and I hope to catch up this weekend, especially on the Beers Project.

15 March 1997 - The search facility has been upgraded once again. This latest change lets you select what portions of the Washington Co., PA USGenWeb pages you wish to search. Give it a try.

9 March 1997 - It seems that 12 queries that were submitted in January and February did not get forwarded to us from the USGenWeb query facility until today. They've been added to volume 4 of the queries pages. Apologies to those whose queries were late in arriving.

27 February 1997 - All the contributors to the Beers Project should be very proud to know we've reached the 550 article mark!!!

15 February 1997 - The search facility has been modified to make it a little more genealogically user-friendly. You can now enter full names, like "Robert McMillan", and get back a list of pages with that name.

14 February 1997 - One of our existing lookup volunteers has some records from Monongahela Cemetery she's willing to share.

12 February 1997 - In case you've not looked yet, we launched a new and very worthwhile project in January. Volunteers are bringing the Beers Biographical Record On-line. There is still plenty more to be done, but in just one and half months we've managed to get 300 articles on-line. Please read about the project and see if you can help. We welcome your participation!

27 January 1997 - Many thanks to our February sponsor for helping to keep these pages going.

25 January 1997 - A new lookup volunteer has graciously stepped forward offering to help with Civil War records.

25 January 1997 - We've updated our look. Hope you like the new front page. If you run into errors, let us know.

20 January 1997 - Two new links have been added to our list of personal web pages. Check them out!

11 January 1997 - You will have noticed on our front page that we've put together a transcription project called The Beers Project. Please read about the project and its goals, and if you want to join in, please email beers@chartiers.com.

8 January 1997 - Because our Queries and Surnames pages have grown so large, we've reorganized them with an eye towards future growth.

1 January 1997 - Happy New Year! What a wonderful genealogical year 1996 was! It saw the birth and impressive growth of the USGenWeb Project. I hope all who read this met with some success in your genealogical searches, and I especially hope that USGenWeb played a role, however large or small that was.