Newsletter No.2

Mailing List Archive

Chris Hutton (OPC, St Winnow) has been quietly saving all the mailing list digests since Vol 2. Anyone is welcome to request a copy of a particular digest from chris@hutton.fsnet.co.uk

OPC Status

Since the first newsletter was published, volunteers have agreed to take on the following parishes:-

St Erme - Gill Hart Gill_Hart@btconnect.com

Penwerris and Bolventor - Hilary Watson Hilton@watsonh31.fsnet.co.uk

Crantock - Claire Sinclair Paterson cleopat@clear.net.nz

Perranuthnoe - Diane Donohue chyreen@btopenworld.com

St Gluvias, Penryn – Graham Warmington gwarmington@blueyonder.co.uk

Online Database

Efforts are continuing behind the scenes and there should a draft online by the 1 June.

Publicity

As well as Julia’s Internet-Genealogy magazine (mentioned elsewhere and available on our website), we have also had publicity from these:-

Rick Parsons’ website has been used by the County Council Archaeological Unit as a source for their latest study (http://www.historic-cornwall.org.uk)

A brief mention of the OPC website and my Calstock one in this month’s Family Tree magazine

A talk given by Gillian Kempster to the DFHS.

LDS CDs

No progress to report, but Lancashire OPCs are having the same problem.

Bouquets

No doubt we’ve all had researchers who show no gratitude or who think we’re available to do their look-ups 24/7, but many others are very grateful.

Gillian Kempster writes that “I have just received a little package of gifts from New Zealand by way of thanks for something I did (which actually gave me as much pleasure and interest as perhaps it did them)”

I received an email from a US researcher which began “Wow – wow - after having employed two different people to do genealogy for me a few years ago and not getting this far!!”

Last but not least!

Welcome back, Susan Old. We’re very glad you are on the road to recovery.

Cheers

Myra

Newsletter No.1

OPC Status

We currently cover 197 of the possible 247 Parishes, although the numbers are difficult to assess. There have been no recent resignations, but no new volunteers, either.

Why is it difficult to be precise about the number of Parishes?

Because some Parishes have been absorbed by others, whilst in other cases new Parishes have been created. Carnmenellis is an example of both, as it was created from part of Wendron in 1846 but it's now part of Stithians.

Online Database

This is one project which seems to be making progress. Led by Bill O'Reilly, those involved should have a draft online for testing soon. Please don't forget that all contributions of data are welcome.

Temporarily Unavailable

We use this term on our website to indicate when OPCs have to suspend their email-answering service for longer than a week or two. So it covers situations such as illness or family bereavement, not short term holidays. However, if anyone wants to let me know when they're away for a short time but don't want this publicised, please do. It can help when I receive emails from researchers unable to contact an OPC.

LDS CDs

Despite the continuing efforts of Diane and Julia, this source of data for transcribing seems to have dried up, at least temporarily. This is frustrating for everyone involved, but even more so for the new volunteers who are waiting to go public with their roles. Some of them live hundreds of miles from the nearest Family History Centre.

UK OPCs

The OPC scheme has spread to other counties, with variations but still based on the ideas of Michael McCormick, David Stick and Paul Brewer. The coordinators of the 8 counties now have an online facility for swapping ideas etc and a mailing list. So I'll let you know of any developments.

General

Please visit our website (http://www.cornwall-opc.org/index.htm) to see how it's progressing. Julia is doing a great job including frequently adding new transcripts. If you'd like to amend your parish page, she's always willing to receive up-dates and error reports.

Suggestions for items for the next newsletter are welcome, as are contributions.

Cheers

Myra