From: "Max Huff- OmniSTAR, Inc." <mhuff@omnistar.com>
To: "Jerry" <roundup@hawaii.rr.com>
Subject: Re: More Huffs
Date: Wed, 5 Dec 2001 09:12:48 -0600
Jerry:
I want to point two probable errors in the data you recently sent.
1. Not all, nor even most, Houghs descend from Richard and Marjorie of Bucks County, PA. There were two other families who like;y have just as many offspring alive in this country today. They were (1) William and Sarah Hough of England, Ma., and CT. Their descendants probable outnumber those of Richard and Marjorie. (2) Jacob and Charlotta Hofe/Hough of MD and PA. This couple, of German extraction, are responsible for a very large number of Houghs today. You have to realize that in my years of collecting all Hough and Huff information I could find, I have over 100,000 Hough and Huff individuals recorded who lived in this country.
2. It had never been shown that Daniel (Daniel & Mary (Worley) Huff) is a son of John and Hannah Hough of Bucks Co., PA. They did indeed have a son Daniel, but he married Elizabeth Dudley and was old enough to be the father of your Daniel (Daniel Jr.). In fact, it is likely that your Daniel was a son of Daniel Hough Sr. who married Elizabeth and Daniel was probably a son of John and Hannah Hough; but, no document has ever been produced to prove the connection to Daniel Huff who married Mary Worley.
This is typical of some of the errors and assumptions to be found today on the Internet. Sadly, so many will pick them up and use them in their genealogy without checking on their validity. Then, of course, others pick it up from there and on it goes. If enough people use it, it may at some time in the future be taken as valid - without regard to the existing primary documentation.
My mentor, Prof. Granville W. Hough, was a painstaking researcher (for more than 60 years) whom I trusted explicitly; but he always told me to not believe anything unless I had seen and read the documentation for myself. That's still good advice and even more so with the advent of the Internet. It seems that on this new communications medium, things are given a measure of validity merely by appearing in print on your screen. Don't believe it for a moment.
I don't mean to get on a soapbox, but in spite of my 10+ hours/day on the Internet in my business and avocation, Genealogy is still a study of facts supported by primary documentation. Everything else is supposition and guessing and should be labeled as such. I frequently use the words "possibly" and "probably" in my Genealogy documents where primary documents have not been found that support the statements.
Best Regards,
Max