Elian & guns

[Leslie Goldstein]

I did see a comment on the research that challenged it on the grounds
that men tended to use guns mostly intheir youth so they woudl have been
passed on to younger relatives before there was any estate to be
recorded in probate.
LFG

Paul Finkelman wrote:
>
> I have not looked at colonial probate records for a while, but Randy's "Bible"
> analogy may not get us very far, since Bibles had no "value" -- there were
> mostly valuable to the family -- my guess is that they might have been ignored
> in a probate record.  On the other hand, guns were very expensive and quite
> valuable, and thus would be part of a probate record.
>
> Paul Finkelman
> Chapman Distinguished Professor of Law
> University of Tulsa College of Law
> 3120 East Fourth Place
> Tulsa, OK  74104-2499
>
> 918-631-3706
> Fax  918-631-2194
> paul-finkelman at utulsa.edu
>
> Ranyd Barnette Wrote:
>
> An interesting test of Bellesile's methodology would be to see, for example, if
> he reports how many family bibles were present in the probate records, since we
> can safely assume that family bibles were both valuable and nearly universally
> owned.  When the data is published, it will be important to be sure it is
> controlled in some such manner.--