>In the Grid, I have two columns, one is bound to a character field and the other one to a numeric field. When I run the second instance of the form, the numeric column displays the second table's values just fine, but the character column displays nothing. Only when I select a cell do the contents appear (BTW, the contents are the right ones),

Roberto,

It is a little difficult to be specific because your message used some invlaid terminology that makes it hard to know exactly what you are doing.

First grids don't have controlsources, they have recordsources.

Now, for the problem you describe I would guess that you are setting the controlsource for the textbox in the column and not the controlsource for the column itself. If this is true you have two choices, 1) set the column's controlsource and leave the textbox controlsource blank, or 2) set the sparse property of the cloumn to .F.