List I have just joined the Perth-List in the last 24 hours after having had Mr Rodger's posting forwarded to me. As a fellow Perthshire researcher I probably should have joined a long time ago, although my fellow Balquhidder Stewart researcher, Malcolm Gray, has kept me well informed. When we are done with the matter of "The Landed Families of Strathearn", I hope to be a valuable contributor to this group. So as not to drag this matter out unnecessarily in this forum, I hope to add a few comments here and be done with this matter as soon as possible. However I do not wish to stifle legitimate concerns and I will do my best to respond, either here, or personally, to any questions that do come up. As I am new to the list, I appeal to the guidance of the Admin and the regulars as to which conversations are appropriate here and which are better held privately. I have apologized privately to Mr. Rodger for reading more into his words than he intended. He assures me that his words were not intended to be slanderous. I hope others will understand my loyal desire to jump to the defence of my friend, Gordon MacGregor. I want to clarify that I too have been a victim of the delinquency of Perthshire Heritage Publishing. I am fortunate in that I was one of the first to order the book, and one of the first to complain about not receiving it. Thus my complaint was also one of the first to be resolved -- and it was resolved by the personal intervention of Gordon MacGregor himself, who, at the time was unknown to me. It was through our correspondence on this very matter that our friendship has evolved. So, I have great sympathy for those who are still awaiting their book. I had to wait a year. I can't imagine how frustrated I'd be if I had to wait two years! I also note that Gordon had offers from major publishers who could have fulfilled the orders more readily. However, he nobly chose, albeit naively, to publish with a local Perthshire publisher in order that the income from this project would flow into Perthshire and not into London. As noble as his intentions were, clearly, Perthshire Heritage was not capable of handling a project of this size. I also don't believe anyone even imagined how popular the book would be. It is my understanding that Perthshire Heritage literally collapsed trying to fulfill the orders for this book. It is not my place to speak on behalf of Gordon MacGregor, so I have asked him to prepare a statement in his own words which I have offered to post here so that he may speak on his own behalf. That being said, I would like to concur with the excellent suggestion made by Pam below, but offer some hopefully helpful clarifications. It may be confusing to try to separate the actions and responsibility of the publisher from the author. And it is important to remember that the publisher and the author are not the same person (at least not for the "old" orders"). It is the publisher who has been delinquent here, not the author. The author has no power over the actions of the publisher. Furthermore, the author has not ever been paid for the THOUSANDS of copies that were never sent. However, since the author's name is on the book, he is understandably concerned about his credible reputation and thus has paid out of his own pocket for each and every copy that has been sent out. Thus, if you have received your copy, please understand that Gordon has paid for that copy and the shipping himself. Even though you rightfully paid the publisher, Gordon himself has not received a dime of your money. It has understandably been suggested that Gordon should refrain from taking new orders while he is still clearing up the old orders. May I clarify that the old orders are not Gordon's to fulfill, but he is doing so to protect his integrity and reputation...to the best of his ability. I hope it might also be understandable why Gordon might desire to continue to earn some income from his work in order to assist with the cost of paying out of pocket for the publisher's delinquent copies. Also, to the best of my knowledge, the publisher has never shared with Gordon their customer list. Thus Gordon has no way of knowing who the people are who have legitimately paid for copies. His only way of fulfilling the old orders is for people to contact him. He also has no means to verify who is telling him the truth and who is trying to scam a free copy. Thus he must take it completely on faith when someone contacts him complaining of an unfulfilled order. And I believe that is exactly what he is doing. I will close here for now as I do not wish to prolong this matter unnecessarily, but neither do I wish to stifle legitimate discussion. And I hope to move on to discussing Perthshire genealogy. Sincerely Ryk Brown Co-host - Stewarts of Balquhidder Research Forum Descendant of the Stewarts of Ardvorlich -----Original Message----- From: Pam Arnold [mailto:pparnold@earthlink.net] Sent: October 29, 2004 6:25 AM To: PERTHSHIRE-L@rootsweb.com Subject: [PERTH] The Landed Families of Perthshire Lawrence I see nothing wrong with your query about the book. It appears to be a well thought out request for information, which you apparently got! Perhaps Rev Brown might suggest that his personal friend Gordon MacGregor stop accepting monies for a product he isn't quite able to ship, and place a little notice on his website that he's behind in filling his orders. I fail to see the reason for any delay if he is offering to simply email a copy of the book. I, for one, certainly can see why you would consider the website offer a scam when neither reply nor book was forthcoming. Perhaps Gordon MacGregor needs to adjust his aol email so that he can receive all the mail sent his way. That might well be the source of all the problems. It is good to know the book exists in some form and that it might be possible to procure a copy. I think your patience is commendable and that you should attempt to get your second payment back through Pay Pal while you have the opportunity. I'm also rather glad that the Rootsweb list mail is archived and available to searchers on the web. It might help prevent others from adding to the burden of Gordon MacGregor's overwhelming requests for the book. When Mr. MacGregor resolves his backlog and you do get a copy of the book you have paid for, please share that information with the list so that anyone interested might then purchase a copy. Pam Arnold Perthshire List Admin