Today's Opinions

Henry Landes (Lan-dus) of Pennsylvania, who mustered into the U.S. Marines during the Civil War, kept a diary.

This diary became an important piece of evidence when stories surfaced of a man living in Tyler, Texas, named John St. Helen, who claimed to be John Wilkes Booth.

St. Helen/Booth said he had escaped from the surrounded barn in Bowling Green, Va., and wasnt dead after all.

It has been 12 years now since my first contact with John D. Greathouse of Missoula, Mont.

A nephew of Vandalias Civil War hero, Col. Lucien Greathouse, he had written looking for additional information on the family. Johns father was Isaac Ridgely Greathouse, son of John Stull Greathouse and his second wife, Catherine Waring, and Luciens younger half-brother.

It is through John that I was able to share with you photographs of John Stull Greathouse and his son, Col. Lucien Greathouse, in full military dress, in last weeks column.

As you may know, the Fayette County Genealogical & Historical Society publishes a quarterly magazine under the title of "Fayette Facts." This 60-page book is chock-full of research help on Fayette County families through church and courthouse records and family histories.

What you might not know is that the society exchanges publications with nearly 40 other genealogical societies around Illinois and beyond. One of these is the Genealogy Society of Southern Illinois, which publishes "The Saga of Southern Illinois," covering 28 counties in the southernmost part of Illinois.