Introduction

I have recently joined the group and want to take this opportunity to
introduce myself. My name is Sheila Prader and I have several ancestors
from Jalisco, including Los Altos de Jalisco. Some of my locations are
Venustiano Carranza (San Gabriel), Sayula, Etzatlan, Arandas, Ayo el Chico,
Tepatitlan, La Barca and Ocotlan.

Some of my Jalisco surnames are Mojica, Guerrero, Ramos, Cano, Romero y
Chaves, Hernandez Gamino, Martin del Campo, Plasencia, Ochoa Garibai,
Vasquez, Salcedo and Acebes as well as many others.

I have done a lot of parish/diocesan record research and have some knowlege
of other record groups. I'm familiar with the compound surname system often
used in Los Altos as well as the surname fluidity I have seen others
mentioning in the archived posts. This practice of alternative surnames
used by both males and females during their lives (and in records after
their deaths, as when they are named as grandparents) also occurs in
Portuguese records and in some Spanish records as well. I am a proponent of
systematically reading entire rolls of microfilm, alternating between
baptisms, marriages and deaths in 10-year time spans, and extracting records
of anyone with the same surnames in the same time periods in order to
reconstruct related families. I learned this from George Ryskamp, for whom
I used to work as a research assistant. I don't pretend to be more than a
very lucky of student of his. The phenomenon of surname fluidity is also
something George was researching and writing about several years ago.

I also have early California ancestry and I have spent more years
reconstructing the early California lines and descendencies of others than
my own in Jalisco. I am looking forward to getting back into my own lines
and hopefully extending some into parishes in Spain and the Basque
provinces.

My work schedule will not allow me to be a constant contributor to the
mailing lists, but I will participate as I can and I look forward to
connecting con mis primos y primas.

--Sheila P.