Hi Brian, Robert L. Wynne's response to your recent query about Prof. W. Wayne Smith reminded me that I had not responded on this pet subject of mine. As I had repeatedly run across references to Dr. Smith, in Oct 1998 I took advantage of vist to NC to go to the Rowan Co. Public Library which houses a collection of his papers. These turned out to be a collection of the correspondence sent to him over many years about Winn/Wynne families. I could not find that Dr. Smith actually published anything of his own, other than the letters and comments he sent to others, but it is clear from these papers that he became a sort of central clearinghouse for Winn/Wynne speculations. He go into it because his wife was a Winn descendant. Dr. Smith lived in Boise, Idaho, where he taught the University -- I don't have my files at hand since a recent move --- and did not do any field work or research in the East, altho he did rarely hire a researcher. What he tried to do was correlate or make sense out of all the different Winn/Wynne genealogies he collected, most if not all of which got very speculative going back before, say, 1800 when the census began to provide objective data. His conclusions are not to be trusted and shifted over time. In my opinion, his chief sin was having accepted and promulgated info he got from one Mame E. Wood, of Philadelphia, a "genealogist" (for hire)who claimed to have solved the mysteries of the origins of the Wynnes of Va. but who (as she admits in some of her own correspondence housed in Phila.) simply made completely unproved assumptions to link Wynnes and create pedigrees. The primary sin was creating the John Wynne & Elizabeth Minor marriage and set of children which continues to circulate and bedevil Wynne discussions. While the collection in Rowan Co. holds loads of Winn/Wynne "data", separating the wheat from the chaff is probably more work than simply doing basic genealogical research on whatever Winn/Wynne line one is following. Myles Johnson Rockville, Md. ***************************************** ... On Sun, 13 Dec 2009 21:42:48 -0800 "Brian Winn" <brian_winn@winnlawgroup.com> wrote: > > > In re-reading Dean Winn's "Notes on the Winn Family of Virginia, South > Carolina" I see a lengthy quote from Prof. W. Wayne Smith, University of > Idaho regarding the ancient Winns, which is the second or third reference I > have seen to his Winn research > > Did Prof. Smith publish anything on the Winns? If yes, would someone mind > sending me a copy or a reference to his publication? > > Thanks > > Brian Winn

Myles: thanks for helping me close off a wild goose chase Merry Christmas everyone Brian -----Original Message----- From: winn-bounces@rootsweb.com [mailto:winn-bounces@rootsweb.com] On Behalf Of Myles Johnson Sent: Friday, December 18, 2009 10:27 AM To: winn@rootsweb.com Subject: Re: [WINN] Prof. W. Wayne Smith Hi Brian, Robert L. Wynne's response to your recent query about Prof. W. Wayne Smith reminded me that I had not responded on this pet subject of mine. As I had repeatedly run across references to Dr. Smith, in Oct 1998 I took advantage of vist to NC to go to the Rowan Co. Public Library which houses a collection of his papers. These turned out to be a collection of the correspondence sent to him over many years about Winn/Wynne families. I could not find that Dr. Smith actually published anything of his own, other than the letters and comments he sent to others, but it is clear from these papers that he became a sort of central clearinghouse for Winn/Wynne speculations. He go into it because his wife was a Winn descendant. Dr. Smith lived in Boise, Idaho, where he taught the University -- I don't have my files at hand since a recent move --- and did not do any field work or research in the East, altho he did rarely hire a researcher. What he tried to do was correlate or make sense out of all the different Winn/Wynne genealogies he collected, most if not all of which got very speculative going back before, say, 1800 when the census began to provide objective data. His conclusions are not to be trusted and shifted over time. In my opinion, his chief sin was having accepted and promulgated info he got from one Mame E. Wood, of Philadelphia, a "genealogist" (for hire)who claimed to have solved the mysteries of the origins of the Wynnes of Va. but who (as she admits in some of her own correspondence housed in Phila.) simply made completely unproved assumptions to link Wynnes and create pedigrees. The primary sin was creating the John Wynne & Elizabeth Minor marriage and set of children which continues to circulate and bedevil Wynne discussions. While the collection in Rowan Co. holds loads of Winn/Wynne "data", separating the wheat from the chaff is probably more work than simply doing basic genealogical research on whatever Winn/Wynne line one is following. Myles Johnson Rockville, Md. ***************************************** ... On Sun, 13 Dec 2009 21:42:48 -0800 "Brian Winn" <brian_winn@winnlawgroup.com> wrote: > > > In re-reading Dean Winn's "Notes on the Winn Family of Virginia, South > Carolina" I see a lengthy quote from Prof. W. Wayne Smith, University of > Idaho regarding the ancient Winns, which is the second or third reference I > have seen to his Winn research > > Did Prof. Smith publish anything on the Winns? If yes, would someone mind > sending me a copy or a reference to his publication? > > Thanks > > Brian Winn ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to WINN-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message