diff --git a/ChangeLog b/ChangeLog
index 1d733e641..2a7a3e3a4 100644
--- a/ChangeLog
+++ b/ChangeLog
@@ -10,6 +10,7 @@
 	* doc/gramps-manual/C/custom.xml: Likewise.
 	* doc/gramps-manual/C/Makefile.am: Ship new files. 
 	* doc/gramps-manual/C/Makefile.in: Likewise. 
+	* src/latin_utf8.py (latin_to_utf8): Convert to unicode only if needed. 
 
 2003-09-21  Alex Roitman  <shura@alex.neuro.umn.edu>
 	* src/plugins/book.glade: Minor improvements to the dialogs. 
diff --git a/src/latin_utf8.py b/src/latin_utf8.py
index 9f52a61f5..e5a24fc6c 100644
--- a/src/latin_utf8.py
+++ b/src/latin_utf8.py
@@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
 #
 # Gramps - a GTK+/GNOME based genealogy program
 #
-# Copyright (C) 2000  Donald N. Allingham
+# Copyright (C) 2000-2003  Donald N. Allingham
 #
 # This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
 # it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
@@ -22,6 +22,8 @@ def utf8_to_latin(s):
     return s.encode('iso-8859-1','replace')
 
 def latin_to_utf8(s):
-    return unicode(s,'iso-8859-1')
-
+    if type(s) == type(u''):
+        return s
+    else:
+        return unicode(s,'iso-8859-1')