Aitkin's Index of Wills, Inventories, etc. prior to 1901, Vol. 3 — Morris County section — all 54 Cooper-surname entries, verbatim, with their NJSA docket numbers.

What this document records

What an index gives

DOCKET NUMBERS — which is what makes an archive order possible. Each row carries a testator, an N-number (the NJSA loose-file docket), a book-and-page for the recorded copy where one exists, and the record type and year. ⇒ this is a finding aid, and its rows are not evidence about anyone's life.

It maps onto the catalog

FIVE ROWS CORRESPOND TO ENTRIES THE CATALOG ALREADY HOLDS, which is a useful check that the docket numbers are being read right: #7 Daniel Cooper 873N, B.36 p.67, Will 1795 ([A.8]) · #8 Daniel Cooper Jr. 672N, B.29 p.472, Intestate 1787 ([A.10]) · #23 John Cooper 456N, B.20 p.227, Will 1778 ([A.29]) · #41 Peter Cooper 3127N, Will and Inventory 1847 ([A.87]) · #54 William S. Cooper 4790N, Will 1862, Inventory 1863.

Inv only rows

"Inv. only" IS THE KEY TO A NULL ELSEWHERE. A row marked inventory-only means an intestate administration with no will — exactly the record class Ancestry's wills database does not index, which is why [A.32] came back empty for William Cooper of 1880. ⇒ reading this index by record type is how such gaps get anticipated rather than discovered.

Unworked rows

THE INDEX SURFACED MORRIS-COUNTY COOPERS THE CATALOG HAD NEVER SEEN, and most remain unworked. Each has a docket number, so each is orderable; see todo.