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- WELCOME TO THE THIRD ISSUE !
First. . .I must apologize for the lateness of this issue of the Update. it never got done over Christmas vacation, and when I got back to work I found that I had only a week to get a grant proposal off (I thought I had 4 weeks). That was followed by a weekend of 60 mph winds tearing off roofs and a paper my son had to finish on George Washington. Things are back to normal. ..I realize that most of you reading this are sitting in the middle of winter, with snow up to the kazoo and temperatures dipping below zero. . .THANK GOD I LIVE IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA. Having grown up in Chicago, I know what winter is like. If I didn't have to deal with it - driving on icy roads, shoveling snow, slushy bus stops, I might consider a move. Mind you, I said consider. But for right now, I'll stay here.
Nevertheless, here it is. By the way, there was no Volume 1 Numbers 3 & 4. The newsletter seminar I took told us to start a new year with a new number. - ergo, Volume 2 # 1.
I have been inundated with information for the files. Don't stop. It's great. But please be patient with response time. I find it takes quite a while to get backlog cleaned up, plus I have scads of data from other places that I am trying to fit in here and there. Plus answering other correspondence and trying to keep up with Skinner Queries that I see in other publications.
I must comment about the family histories that I have been receiving. They are great! So far I have received a 400 page handwritten Skinner family history compiled by Genevieve Copley. A beautiful job. Robert Heath sent a copy of a 100 page handwritten copy of the Skinner-Hope family record. This included copies of line drawings done by the author while he was writing it back in 1908. Numerous pages of family groups, articles, family group sheets, and miscellaneous bits and pieces of Skinner data arrive regularly. As this information is coming in, it's being added (slowly) to the computer file. Any text on a person is being listed in a separate file for compilation at a later date. As it stands now, the plan is to go down from Thomas, generation by generation, and collect whatever information there is about the lines. There's a lot, of information hiding in a lot of places. Let's see if we can dig it up and get it shared.
This issue includes the final listing from the Myer's computerized listing. You now have everything he had at its time of preparation. As has been stated before, this is NOT a complete listing of Skinner descendants. It is, however, an extensive one. I am regularly adding to it and have doubled its size. We won't be printing that one, though, as the descendants chart my program (Family Roots by Quinsept) prints is of a different format and considerably more spread out.
We have quite a few queries in this issue. I'd like some feedback on whether they should be all together or spread throughout the Update. I had to send one back. When I get a query to be published, I go through the files and whatnot I have to see if the information is already there. Once in a while it is, and it's quite satisfying being able to help someone make that Skinner connection. No need to have a query in that can be answered by the 'association's' data bank
Since the last issue, I have received a letter from Mrs. Cynthia Rummel of Kenilworth, IL. She was one of the 'original' Skinner Kinsmen with Doris Wahl. She and Mrs. Wahl had divided the Northern and Southern branches of the Skinners. I hope that Mrs. Rummel will be making regular contributions to the Update.
Gift subscriptions to the Update are a nice way to keep families up to date on what's going on in the Skinner clan. Tree climbers aren't the only ones who are interested in their families. We'll be including (hopefully) more "personal glimpses," biographical sketches of people both dead and living, and articles like Asahel's letter on page one. These are great for kids to develop a self identity. In a letter I received from Howard Skinner of Berkeley, CA he wrote,
"It is important to be proud and to silently find reasons for considering oneself proud. Genealogy can help us feel proud - or to imagine that we are proud."
'Til the Spring...
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