GHOTES

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ghotes

or: Genealogy & History Of The Eastern Shore

GHOTES is a group of folks who share an interest in the GENEALOGY AND HISTORY OF THE EASTERN SHORE of Virginia. A few goats slip over the fence into MD occasionally, and that's okay with us. Their ancestors did it first.

GHOTES MEMBERS COMMUNICATE VIA A SMALL NON-PUBLIC MAILLIST. We send messages to a central server that, in turn, distributes the message to all of the ghotes members. Messages are usually about genealogical information. We ask questions of the group and answer ones that we can. Sometimes questions of history or place or custom or event are asked or information shared.

SHARING is a key value that ghotes members, also known as goats or ghotes themselves. Members are expected to ask for help and give some in return. Some of our ghotes are experienced genealogists, and we have several members who have developed very large bases of information. Others are rather new to the field. These less experienced genealogists, who temporarily may be, or think they are, limited in their own information resources, are expected to comment on general issues as well as to volunteer to help with look-ups, data entry, or other activities. Even new genealogists have information that is valuable to others. An old letter, family bible page, or photo can be very informative and highly prized.

Since the ghotes maillist took shape, late last year, members have found many a cousin--live ones--in the group. This is been an unexpected reward that our cousins seem to enjoy tremendously. And ghotes certainly don't seem to think of themselves merely as subscribers to an internet maillist. Ghotes are friends.

ON BECOMING A MEMBER OF GHOTES

TO JOIN THIS MAILLIST GROUP, you need to have an active research interest in the Genealogy & History Of The Eastern Shore of Virginia, and a willingness to share--whether data, history, or time toward a project like the home page. This sharing part is important; it keeps the maillist alive. It also means that the folks who have been doing a lot of sharing for quite a while have opportunities to get information in return. Oh, yes--you'll need a good patience muscle for the moments that our system hiccoughs, and a very healthy and unshakable sense of humor for other trying moments. We take genealogy seriously, usually, but not ourselves so much. And we are a friendly, helpful group. No goats stomp about and say mean things.

We don't have an automatic subscription process. Since we're small, and just getting started really, although it seems as though we've been writing for ages, this lets the goats know what the "newbie's" (also known as the "kids") interests are, etc. Usually members try to find some tidbit for new members right away so they feel welcome and are active.

SO, you send short introduction of yourself for posting to the ghotes message system? Whatever you like. The basics are good... who you are, where you are geographically, your special interest in the Eastern Shore of Virginia, & most important probably, the Eastern Shore surnames you are working on. And any special little brick wall that you may have hit with an Eastern Shore name would be good. We like to keep ghotes on the tips of their little hoovers.

Just for the sake of clarity, the Eastern Shore of Virginia refers specifically to two counties: Accomac and Northampton.

be posted to the list and your e-mail address added for distribution of the ghotes-digest. (It runs every other day or so. More often if the goats have been busy. This weekend I think we ran five!)

Hmm. ONE more thing... We LIKE to have long messages with lots of information in them. We expect information to get posted to the list so all the ghotes can add their cents. In that way, I think we are probably quite different from the likes of ROOTS-type lists.

We'll be looking forward to hearing from you. Let me know if you have other questions about GHOTES.

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