) ( ( ) Good Morning Family! ( \ .-.,--^--. ( Come on in. . . \* ) \\|`----'| - The coffee pot's on. . . .=|=. \| |// ...and we even have decaf, |~'~| | |/ tea, and hot chocolate! | | \ / _|___|_ ------ (_______) Today's topics include: 1. Welcome to new cousins 2. Flames and flame wars 3. The Web isn't all bad 4. Neat links TO OUR NEWEST COUSINS ~~ On behalf of the entire 4H family, I'd like to extend a most hearty welcome to those cousins who came into the family fold this past week. We are very glad to have you with us and hope you'll stay and remain a part of our online family. As soon as you're comfortable with us and the list, please send in your Howell lines so we can all see how we're related to you. We do not have a fancy format for sending in records or queries to the list. Post as many as you wish! If the data has anything to do with Howell ancestors or any of the 9 variant spellings we research that might help someone, please feel free to post it. Every scrap of information is appreciated. You have joined not just a list, but a family of cousins who are four teams of researchers combined into one family, the 4H. Although we are one family, we have two homesites and if you haven't visited these sites yet, you are encouraged to do so ~ Home for the HOWELL-L, HOWELLS-SOUTHERN-L, and HOWLE-L is the Howell Research Room (otherwise known as the HRR) which opened May 28th. You'll find it located at <http://howellresearch.com>. While not large in size yet, this site is to become a clearinghouse dedicated to global research of the Howell[s] surname and all her variant spellings. You're invited to submit material for display at the HRR. Simply let me know you want to house material there and what it is. We can display anything, provided it doesn't involve living persons. Contact me at <[email protected]>. Home for the HOWELL-SURNAME-L is the Edward Howell Family Association site at <http://www.ehfa.org>. This is a site dedicated to descendants of Edward Howell of Southampton, Long Island, New York. There you'll find an online transcription of "Descendants of Edward Howell (1584-1655) of Westbury Manor, Marsh Gibbon, Buckinghamshire, [England], and Southampton, Long Island, New York," Second Edition by Dr. David Faris. Web mistress for the EHFA site is Kristen Howell <[email protected]>. You're welcome to share this Coffee with your genealogy friends and relatives provided it is without alterations ...and is complete as written. If they are not members of this list and would like to begin receiving the Coffee, they are now able to. Simply have them send a blank email to <[email protected]>. This is the sixth and last, in a series of Coffees dedicated to helping newbies adjust to computering genealogy. Next week I'll return to my regular format of ... well, most of you know ~ there IS no regular format! FLAMES AND FLAME WARS I've told you about some of THE worst things that can happen to you while on the Web ~ viruses, scam artists, spam... The last of what I call "the nasties" are flames and flame wars, and yes some of them are as bad as the name(s) sound. Flaming is what happens when someone says something hateful to one or more people on an email discussion list; someone gets angry and/or hurt, and words start flying back and forth. Pretty soon members of the list jump into it and within hours a flame war has begun. The list members stop talking and nobody wants to post for fear of being on the receiving end of a hateful message. Flame wars will destroy a list faster than anything else. Tender newbies, my 'survival lesson' for today is with regard to flames and flame wars: * Realize that body language and voice inflection are two very important tools removed from us as we all sit behind our monitors and read messages. We have only our words to be relied upon to carry the meanings of what we say. It's so easy for someone to take offense to something you hadn't intended as hurtful or inciting, and it happens every day. * Read and re-read your message to make sure what you're sending has clarity of meaning ~ that what you've typed won't be taken awry by someone else. * If YOU are angered or hurt by someone's words, please think twice before firing back on him/her, especially on the list. Many list managers have now insituted a policy whereby flaming someone is grounds for immediate removal from the list (I happen to be one of those managers) without a chance of returning from the suspension. Instead, send your message directly to the person and ask what the problem is. * Think THREE TIMES before sending a message meant to incite or hurt someone. Do you REALLY want YOUR good name on a message of hatred and meanness in the public archives? * While thinking those three times, read your message for effect. Would it hurt or anger YOU to be the recipient of your message? THE WEB ISN'T ALL BAD So much negativism! Isn't there anything GOOD to say? There sure is... For all of the people who would rip you off, send you spam and flame messages, there are probably 5,000 who would help you. As in real life however, the bad seems to rise to the top and hide the good. Not THIS time! :-D To have the final say, the good-deed-doers (ever see or read the "Wizard of Oz"?) :) will take over the rest of this Coffee. Below is a list of 20 sites I have used that I know people work extremely hard from their end to try to help all of us. The best way I can do that is to send you to their sites so you can see and judge for yourself. NEAT LINKS You've probably already discovered them, but just in case you're one of our brand-new newbies to computering genealogy, the following sites offer many helps ~ to include volunteer look-ups and research assistance ... all for free. Books We Own - <http://www.rootsweb.com/~bwo/index.html>. A list of resources owned by others who are willing to do lookups in them. Ellis Island Records - <www.ellisislandrecords.org/>. Searchable database and copies of passenger manifests of ships arriving at Ellis Island starting from 1892. Family Search - <http://www.familysearch.org/Eng/Search/frameset_search.asp>. The site belonging to the Mormons. Do you know about the International Genealogical Index (IGI), Ancestral File and Pedigree Resource Files? Guess what, they're online right here! Federation of East European Family History Societies (FEEFHS) - <http://feefhs.org/>. Covers all of Europe (and Russian Asia / Siberia) Albania, Armenia, Austria, Azerbyjain, Belarus, Bosnia (and Herzegovina), Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Repblic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Macedonia, Moldova, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, and Yugoslavia (Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia). Has over 980,000 Central and East European surnames, locations and other unique words from the 5875+ files here. Need I say more? Genealogical Index [GENDEX] - <http://www.gendex.com:8080/>. 9,557 GedComs with 31,888,958 individuals. You really *don't* want to miss this one! Genealogy [in the] United Kingdom & Ireland [GENUKI] - <www.genuki.org.uk/gs/>. Primary historical material, rather than material resulting from genealogists' ongoing research, such as GEDCOM files. Genealogical WFT CDs - <http://loricase.com/CDs/cdwftlist.html>. Specialized free lookups from people who own World Family Tree CDs. Genealogy Helplist - <http://helplist.org/>. List of volunteers willing to help others in specific areas. Genealogy Researcher's Trading Post - <http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/7748/>. Trade research work with other genealogists in distant locations. Genealogy Resources on the Internet - Mailing Lists - <http://www.rootsweb.com/~jfuller/gen_mail.html>. A comprehensive site for all currently available genealogy e-mail mailing lists. Genie Angels - <http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~angels/>. A network of volunteers assisting others to obtain genealogical research documents. Handy Online Starting Points - <http://www.CyndisList.com/handy.htm>. Genealogy search engines. Lookup Exchange - <http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Plains/8555/lookup.html>. Lookup Exchange. A county-by-county list of resources covering England, Scotland, Wales and the Isle of Man, made available by volunteers for free look-ups. Lookups from Privately Owned Resources and Publications - <http://members.home.com/loriltd/private.html>. People volunteering to do lookups in their own personal libraries. Obituary Lookup Volunteers - Rootsweb List - <http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~obit/>. A list of people who are willing to do obituary lookups in their area. Random Acts of Genealogical Kindness - <http://raogk.rootsweb.com>. "The volunteers of this movement are agreeing once per month to either videotape cemeteries, etc., or to visit county courthouses in the county (or area of a country) they live. The cost to you would be reimbursement of costs incurred in granting your request (video tape, copy fees, etc.)". Slektsbiblioteket - <http://www.slektsbiblioteket.com/>. The largest Norwegian lookup service. More than 1,000 resources, more than 200 volunteers. USGenWeb Project - <http://www.usgenweb.org/thestates.html>. Looking for information on a specific county? This is the place to head for. The State sites are the jumping off points to get started on your research. At each State Site, you will find links to each County within that state, where you will find a wealth of county related information. On the County Sites, you can post queries to help you over that "brick wall." The work, building the site, gathering material to place there ~ all of it by volunteers. USGenWeb Project Archives - <http://www.rootsweb.com/~usgenweb/>. Offers actual transcriptions of public domain records. You will find copies of census records, marriage bonds, wills, and other public documents. WorldGenWeb Project - <http://worldgenweb.org/>. They're attempting to place genealogical information for every country in the world, and every region within each country, online ~ and its all being done by volunteers. If you are researching your emigrant ancestors, then this is a must-see website. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ There is absolutely no way I can list every site. The point I wanted to make with this extremely brief list is to let you know that no matter how many "baddies" there are who want to separate you from your money, no matter how many viruses plague us ... there are still so, so many people willing to help you and give freely of their time and resources to do exactly that. You have but to ask. A postscript here: please be sure to thank the volunteer who tries to help you. Since they all work for nothing, surely your thanks will go a long way toward letting them know their efforts are very appreciated, whether they're able to help you or not. :) Family ... it's what we're all about. I so enjoyed spending this time with you today. Thank you for sharing it with me. I wish each of you a week filled with health, productivity, fun, and above all, filled with love and inner peace. ) ( ) _.-~~-. (@\'--'/. Colleen ('``.__.'`) `..____.'

First we'd like to thank the cousins for all the help, especially Wilma. Now we're at another roadblock and have tried tracing bacwards, forwards and sideways with no luck! Larkin Howell b. c.1804-06 Ash or Ashe Co., NC, father of Jesse Howell b. Nov. 1828, Ashe, NC: Larkin's father is listed in some sites as James? or Jim Howell b. 1760-70, VA. We can't seem to trace him any farther. HELP PLEASE! Other families in my family tree include OSBORNE, NEWSOME, HALL, SWORD, BOLLING, etc. We'll be glad to help anyone else if we can. Okie [email protected]