With a notebook tucked in the crook of her arm, Margaret Parker stepped out of her car and onto the streets of downtown Akron.

She had something to prove -- or disprove, as the case may be. Either way, her mission was to discover the truth.

That's why she raised a red flag when the Ohio Bicentennial Commission announced plans to honor Civil War journalist/author Ambrose Bierce with a marker in Meigs County, commonly accepted as his birthplace.

Parker had long suspected that Bierce -- the subject of a national manhunt in 1913 when he vanished attempting to join Pancho Villa's revolutionaries in Mexico -- may have been born in Summit or Portage County.

Bierce, a prolific writer, had never commented on his birthplace. And while most biographers placed him in Meigs, Parker raised eyebrows after finding the Bierce family lived in Portage County's Nelson Township in 1840 and then in Akron in 1850. Bierce was born in 1842.

Parker wasn't held back by the fact that she's the president of the Meigs County Historical Society. ``I don't care where the marker goes, but it needs to be in the proper place,'' she said, ``and that might be right here.''

So Parker drove 180 miles -- from Meigs County's seat of Pomeroy, population under 2,000, to Akron -- hoping to put to rest the skepticism she has harbored for years.

When she arrived Friday morning, she was immediately met with some interesting news.

Michael Elliott, a local history buff who works at Akron-Summit County Public Library, had taken an interest in Parker's predicament. He had talked Peggy Ball, a freelance researcher from McLean, Va., into slipping over to the National Archives in Washington, D.C., to look up Bierce's Civil War pension records.

Ball had no problem finding them. The archivist who helped her turned out to be an Ambrose Bierce fan.

What she found seemed to end all debate on the matter.

Records analyzed

Bierce, of Company C, 9th Indiana Infantry, ``swore'' in his 1907 pension application that he was born in Meigs County. The file noted there was no birth record.

Another phone call by Elliott to Indiana turned up Bierce's enlistment papers. At the age of 19, he recorded Meigs County as his ``nativity.''

Parker was intrigued, but not quite ready to head back home yet. Why isn't there a single document placing the Bierce family in Meigs County, she wonders aloud. No tax record, no property deed, no voting record.

After disproving several ``facts'' that Bierce biographers have printed in the past, she still craved confirmation.

So Parker headed down High Street to the University of Akron. Ironically, the Summit and Portage county tax duplicates are stored at a place called Bierce Library -- named for Ambrose's uncle, Lucius Bierce.

An omen?

Parker was met by archivists John Miller and Steve Paschen, who delved into the library's resources for her.

They pulled out local histories dating back to 1854. They piled up heavy books listing land and property taxes for Summit and Portage counties. They pulled out a slim folder containing an old city directory.

After a few hours of scanning the fragile documents, Parker found clues that were more tantalizing than satisfying.

In 1840, Marcus Bierce -- Ambrose's father -- owned about 12 acres of land in Nelson Township. In 1841, he was down to less than 2 acres, a horse and a cattle.

In 1842 -- the year Ambrose was born -- Marcus Bierce was gone. He did not reappear on the Summit or Portage tax list through 1850.

What property?

But the census says Marcus and Laura Bierce -- along with 8-year-old Ambrose -- were living in Akron in 1850, Parker pointed out. How could they not show any land, any horses, any cattle, any carriage or any money in the one record that immortalized such things?

Perhaps the answer was down the street, where the old property deeds are kept.

Parker and Miller made the short trip to the Summit County Recorder's Office, but came out empty-handed. There was no record of Ambrose's parents ever owning land in Summit.

Back at Miller's office, a quick check with the Summit County Board of Elections turned up another dead end. They knew of no voting records from the 1800s still in existence.

Time was running short, but Parker had one more stop to make before declaring her work here done. As the clock slipped past 3 p.m., she returned to her car and made for Ravenna.

If Marcus Bierce had sold the last of his property in 1841, surely property records at the Portage County Recorder's Office would show it.

At 3:40 p.m., Parker hurried to the fourth floor records room. She was rewarded with a crisp, typewritten index of property records, so well-organized it took just 10 minutes before Parker was shaking her head again.

Marcus Bierce didn't appear to be the poor squatter that many biographers made him out to be in Meigs County. The Portage County records show that at least 23 times, he bought and sold property in Nelson and Freedom townships, sometimes nearly 100 acres at a time.

But there is no record that Marcus Bierce ever sold the land he owned in 1840 and 1841.

``It only makes it more of a mystery for me,'' Parker said as the office staff prepared to close for the weekend. ``I'm completely baffled.''

Without evidence that Bierce was born in Summit or Portage, would Parker now take at face value Ambrose's own contention that he was born in Meigs County?

``If Ambrose said that, we almost have to accept it,'' Parker said as she left the administration building and headed for her car again.

So will she give the green light for the bicentennial commission to bring their marker to Meigs?

Parker pauses, a struggle clearly showing on her face.

No record in Summit. No record in Portage. No record in Meigs.

No peace for her historian's soul.

Her voice hung in the air after she closed the car door and drove away:

``You know, I think I'm gonna keep looking.''