Julia: Thanks for providing the backgrounder on this. I too have noticed many variations of the same family tree. Given the nature of genealogy and the uncertainly of this whole process, especially prior to 1850, I guess some of this is to be expected. There is a way to solve this. The Lee Society of Virginia is an official membership organization who's applicants must prove lineage to Richard Henry Lee, or a proven link to a previously approved application. All applications MUST contain authoritative documentation. This is analogous to the same approach of the Daughters of the American Revolution. I realize that this sounds like a snobby, expensive, and very laborious way of maintaining a family tree, but since everything for the Lee's has been 'proven' for over 370 odd years of family history, it is perhaps the most accurate and widely developed family tree in America. I realize that the above is not plausible for Hancocks, and that furthermore it is not your intent to achieve such a feat. However, I do on the other hand feel that circulating information in multiple variants could lead to a situation where inaccurate data becomes 'fact' over time through wide scale distribution, which is something the Internet is perfectly suited toward. So my question to you and your colleagues is how can we organize this data in such a way as to afford open access to all rightful owners in a manner that reduces errors and does not favor one version over another. I am VERY interested in helping within my means to enable the "Project" to achieve such a goal. I feel that most others would also agree! Again thanks for the clarification, and I am sorry that some of my VERY DISTANT cousins were so unnecessarily RUDE!!! Casey -----Original Message----- From: JULIAFWOOD@aol.com [mailto:JULIAFWOOD@aol.com] Sent: Friday, June 22, 2001 2:17 PM To: HANCOCK-L@rootsweb.com Subject: Re: [HANCOCK-L] The Hancock brothers from Virginia - Maureen Hanc ock In a message dated 06/22/2001 10:15:32 AM Central Daylight Time, CaseyMc@pianet.org writes: > I'm not sure if this is the "Chart 3" you reference, but try: > > Just a little history on Chart #3 and the Hancock Project. When we were very much involved with the Project, and taking all the submissions of all the Charts for the Project, we received several of Chart #3. Bob Hopkins' was the first to arrive, and John Hancock, a member of our committee put it online, and that is the one that is listed above. Meanwhile, we were trying to merge all the ones that we had received from all reseachers of this line, and it became a nightmare, as all the data was different, and would not merge. We had angry members asking that their names be removed from the researcher's page since Bob's file was the only one online, and did not properly represent their individual research, and we received much hate mail from one particular researcher because her email address is included in Bob's data. She seemed to think that we put it there and had the power to remove it, and that our refusal to do so was a personal vendetta against her. Her messages to the committee became more and more abusive, until I, finally, removed the URL from our Chart #3 page. And blocked her, so that she cannot send me mail. It is my intention to list each researcher's homepage next to their name on our Project's Researcher pages for each Chart. I have tried to get to Bob's Hancock family on his homepage, but my computer hangs up each time I try. I do not know what the problem is with his page, but I will not link to it until I am able to access the Hancock's that are there. If any of you have a homepage on your line, whether it is Chart #3 or any other line, send me the URL along with your particular line. I will get it on the Project pages ASAP, but I do not do this often, as I have other duties as well. I will try to let you know when it has been posted. Thanks, Julia French Wood ==== HANCOCK Mailing List ==== Thank you for your support of The HANCOCK Family Discussion List. Please post your HANCOCK folks periodically so we will all know who you are looking for.