by George G. Morgan
The tax bill can, in fact, be one of the most important pointer documents of all. Look for them at home among family papers as well as at the tax assessor’s office. As a collection of clues, the following items can often be deduced from an original tax bill:
Determine, first, the issuing county and government office. This would be the place to look for property records from that time period in order to locate a copy of the deed or to obtain information pointing to the original deed.
Name and address of the person(s) whose name(s) appear(s) on the property tax roll for the year in question. While there may have been a change in ownership at some time during the year, the person whose name appeared on the roll at the time the tax bill was typed and mailed is what was included here. Amendments were often made by hand on the original tax bill if they were needed, such as an ownership change a short time before the tax bills were generated and mailed.
Address of the property for which the tax bill was created.
Legal description of the property. The Section, Township, and Range reference numbers are listed. In addition, further descriptors of the Lot and Block numbers refer to the specific location of the property. (By locating the map used for the specific real estate tax year and for the county in question, you can easily locate the precise location of the property. Don’t forget to use city directories to help with this task.)
The Volume and Item numbers (123-456) and the descriptor found on a typical tax bill refer to the specific tax roll for this property. For example, you would look for the real estate tax books for township listed in the legal description in that tax year, and then specifically for Volume 123 and listing 456.
All of the points listed above are clues to point you to tax rolls, maps, and to a deed for the property.
If you locate a tax roll containing a listing for an ancestor, it probably will not tell you how long he/she/they owned the property. You might need to trace back year by year.
However, with a legal description in hand, you can generally visit the county courthouse’s land and property division and obtain a history of the ownership of a piece of real estate. (This is what title insurance people do on a piece of property in order to determine that the title on the property doesn’t have any legal encumbrances on it, such as a tax lien, outstanding mortgage, or legal judgment.) There may also be information on file regarding the name of the financial institution holding a mortgage, the name of an insurance company linked to the property, and/or the date of the discharge of a mortgage or other indebtedness.
Watch for names of other relatives who might have been involved in the transaction(s) in some way.
Look also for other information on the tax bill. The assessed valuation of the property may tell you the relative financial status of the person or family.
The total tax on a piece of property may tell you something about the neighborhood’s roads, schools, libraries, sewers, and other utilities that affected the quality of life for the people at the time.
Look, too, to see if the tax bill was paid on time or not. This might indicate financial solvency or troubles. Once you know what you are looking for, you may hit a stride and make connections with a number of important records.
In the next column I will talk about different types of tax records and go over the tell-tale clues that can be gleaned from tax exemption records.
Happy Hunting!
George
© 2006 Copyright George G. Morgan. All rights reserved. Reproduction in any format is strictly prohibited without written permission. Please contact George at aha@ahaseminars .com for more information.
This column is made possible through the efforts of the Questing Heirs Genealogical Society of Long Beach. For more information about that society, go online and visit www.qhgs.info.
