01
The record speaks first
A transcription, image, index, family account, and inference do different work. The site names those differences instead of flattening them into a single idea of “proof.”
About the research
Family, identity, and an unfinished record.
My birth name is Shannon Jeremiah Meason. I grew up as Andy Cohen after being adopted. This project follows one biological line without displacing the Cohen family that raised me.
Why this exists
The mystery is real. So is the responsibility to tell it carefully.
Where the Record Ends is researched and maintained by me, Andy Cohen. I was born Shannon Jeremiah Meason, and my interest in my biological family history grew into this ongoing evidence-led research project. You can read more about that personal context on my genealogy page.
The search began with a personal question and grew into a record trail across Kentucky, Missouri, and Texas. Some discoveries supplied names and dates. The most interesting ones changed the shape of the question.
Where the Record Ends is the public, editorial layer of that work: a place to show the family line, preserve unresolved cases, and write the narrative that the evidence can actually support. It is not a dump of a private tree or a claim that every open question has been solved.
The first-person voice matters. This is research about identity as well as ancestry, and it is written from inside that experience.
Editorial method
Four promises to the reader.
02
A conclusion can remain revisable
High confidence is not the same as direct evidence. Current assessments carry their support, limitations, and the kind of new record that could change them.
03
Context is not evidence
A period map or regional photograph may help a place feel real, but it is never presented as the family’s property, route, or likeness without a direct basis.
04
Privacy outranks completeness
The public site contains a deliberately reviewed subset. Private records, living-person details, restricted artifacts, and raw research data do not become public merely because they exist.
Contribute to the research
Have a record I haven't seen?
Original documents, family records, photographs, cemetery information, and corrections can all help move an open question forward.
Start where the evidence changes