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| I. GENERAL |
(1) What is the purpose of this collection of genealogy researchers?
The Harrgene Association is dedicated to the investigation of the genealogy of the Harrington, Herrington, Harington,
Herendeen and associated lines world wide.
(2) How are the different spellings of the surname related?
Since Harrington appears to be the most common spelling of the name today [and because it's the way I spell it...],
this will be taken as synonomous with all it's alternate spellings. Two centuries ago, the Herrington spelling
was quite common. In England prior to that, the Harington spelling is the version most frequently encountered.
(3) Are all Harringtons descended from the same source?
Unlikely. Many Harringtons stem from one of several lineages, including the Benjamin Hernden (or Herendeen, et
al.) of Rhode Island line and the Robert Harrington of Watertown line. These two men were contemporaries in the
1600's and many researchers have claimed them to be related,
either as brothers or as uncle and nephew, but there is still some uncertainty of this link. Both are the immigrant
ancestors of their lines.
There are other Harrington lines in America (by many names), several of which have been shown to originate from
either Robert or Benjamin. Some lines originated from Ireland. These Irish Harringtons may be related to the "true"
English Harrington line, but it is more probably that they adopted English surnames in place of their original
Irish names.
There is one interesting idea, though, that hints at a possible connection between the Irish Harringtons and the
English Harrington line. In the 1700s the British government settled loyal Englishmen from Northern England in
Ireland as a means of establishing control over the island. It is thought that the Harrington line originated from
Cumberland, one of the areas in Northern England from which the Irish resettlers could have been drawn. It is possible
that Harringtons were included in this resettlement activity. Historians have said that the English transplants
of the 1700's became "as Irish as the Irish" and may have adopted Gaelic-sounding names over the next
century. If this were true, one could argue that some of the Irish immigrants who chose the Harrington name when
they came to America were of this English stock. It would be enlightening to find records of the original Englishmen
who resettled to Ireland and see if there are any Harringtons in the lot, or if indeed there were any Harringtons
in Cumberland at the time of the resettlement.
(4) What places and times are researchers investigating?
It has been noticed that there are several "hot" areas where Harringtons were present in large numbers.
The Boston area is a rich place for the descendants of Robert Harrington of Watertown from colonial times to the
present. The 1700-1850 Connecticut/Vermont/New York/Illinois area is of great interest to a number of researchers
on the list; it is known that many of these lines are descendants of Benjamin Herendeen. There has been much interest
in Canadian Harringtons; this line may have moved to Canada from the US during or prior to the American Revolution.
Virginia was settled in colonial times by Harringtons; this line is known as the Southern Harrington line. It is
also known that the Harrington name is fairly common in the Carribean. And of course, there are still Harringtons
(or Haringtons) living in England.
While many people have traced their lineage back to England, there are only a few researchers dedicated to exploring
the Harrington history in that land. Similarly, there are a number of researchers investigating Irish Harrington
roots, but very few have done research on the Harringtons in Ireland.
(5) How long have Harringtons been in the New World?
Both Robert Harrington and Benjamin Herendeen were in New England in the 1630's, the very earliest days of the
American Colonies. Robert was a well respected Bostonian. Benjamin, well... let's just say he must have been quite
a character.
Harringtons have been immigrating to America ever since. Quite a few came to the states in the mid-1800's, no doubt
many came to escape the potato famine of that time. |
| II. The Mailing List |
(1) What is a mailing list?
A mailing list is a way for people to easily send email to each other. Email messages are sent to the address of
a computer program that forwards a copy of the message to everyone subscribed to the list.
(2) How do I subscribe to this list?
Send a message to:
HARRGENE-L-REQUEST@genealogy.org with the word 'SUBSCRIBE' in the subject. Don't bother writing anything in the
message part of the subscription message because it'll just be ignored anyway.
(3) How do I unsubscribe from the list?
Send a message with the subject 'UNSUBSCRIBE' to the same address: HARRGENE-L-REQUEST@genealogy.org
(4) How do I submit email to everyone on the list?
Address your email to
HARRGENE-L@genealogy.org
or just reply to a message from someone else on the list; most mail programs will address the message to the list
properly (but please check the address just in case!)
(5) Why do I see messages from "harrgene-l@emcee.com"?
emcee.com and genealogy.org are synonyms as far as we're concerned. I think they're two names for the same set
of hardware. I've been told that genealogy.org is the more appropriate suffix to use.
(6) What if I want to send a big file to everyone?
There are several ways to submit large files to the group. Attaching them to an email sent to the harrgene-l address
is probably not a good idea since not everyone will be interested; it may cost people time and money to download
the mail whether they want it or not.
There is also a web site for this group. This is ideal for anything of more general and long term interest. You
can upload a file directly to the web site; see the site for more info on this! You can also email stuff to me
and I'll manually install it on the web site.
If you are still new at this internet stuff and want to bypass the electronic tricks, material can be sent to me
at my postal address (please contact me for the address.)
(7) How will the information I submit to the mailing list be used?
What about copyright issues?
Submitting an email to the HARRGENE-L mailing list is a form of publishing. This automatically protects your email
under US copyright law. Others must treat your email exactly as they would a book or magazine article - they couldn't
redistribute your email in another publication, for example.
In addition to the regular daily email distribution, you should be aware that email messages are archived with
the intent of being make available through the web site. This archive is a form of database and is also protected
under copyright law. No one may copy the archive and re-publish it without the permission of the HarrGene Association. |
| IV. The HarrGene Web Site |
A lot of good information is stored on the web site. The address is: http://www.harringtons.org/harrgene.cgi
The Harrington database is available from the site and can be viewed as linked web pages. There are other collections
of data and assorted mail messages and web pages on various Harrington topics.
If you'd like to contribute files to the web site, it's easy to do. Go to the upload page at
http://www.harringtons.org/Harrington/upload.html
and use the file browser to locate the file you want to upload. Note that you must be using Netscape 2.0 or later,
or Internet Explorer 3.0 to be able to use this feature.
(1) Copyrights
Everything posted on the web site is protected under US copyright law unless stated otherwise in the web page.
Where the web page's author is given, the copyright belongs to that individual. In other cases the copyright is
the HarrGene Association.
Care has been taken to avoid infringement of other copyrights. Special permission has been granted by the originators
of most works shown on the web site. It should be noted that in the cases where special permission was not obtained,
the use of the material is likely covered as Fair Use because the aim of the HarrGene web site fulfils several
Fair Use criteria:
1. Non-profit educational purpose
2. Used for research, teaching, commentary, or criticism.
3. In some cases additional information is added to the work. For example: Rewording for clarity, correction of
errors, additional details such as links added.
4. In most cases, the original work's copyrights were either not registered or the work was intended for research/educational
purposes and not for financial gain.
5. No more was taken than necessary. In some cases the needs of Harrington researchers required the entire document,
but with others, only the releevant sections were extracted. |
| V. Sharing databases |
(1) What are "GEDCOM" files?
The GEDCOM format is a standardized way to present genealogy data. Many genealogy programs can understand this
format so it is ideal for sharing genealogy data between researchers.
The GEDCOM format is ASCII (straight text) which makes it simple to send files through email. Here is a clip of
a portion of a GEDCOM so you'll know one when you see it:
0 @I1@ INDI
1 NAME Sidney P. /Harrington/
1 SEX M
1 BIRT
2 DATE 1809
2 PLAC prob VT
1 DEAT
2 DATE 1898
2 PLAC IL
1 FAMS @F1@
1 FAMC @F2@
(2) How can I create a GEDCOM of my genealogy?
There are dozens of different genealogy programs available; each has its own capabilities. Commercial programs
can be found in many software retail stores. If you're looking for something less expensive there is a freely available
program called Brother's Keeper.
Whatever program you choose, check to make sure that it is capable of importing and exporting files in the GEDCOM
format. That way you can use information generated by the rest of us Harrington researchers. The documentation
for the program will explain how to import and export these files.
(3) How can I share my genealogy with other Harrgene researchers?
Once you've created the GEDCOM files you can transfer them as regular email attachments, or you can "cut and
paste" them from an editor. See section IV for more info on transferring the files directly.
Please don't send your GEDCOM to the harrgene-l mailing list. If you want everyone to have access to it, you should
think about publishing it to the web site. You can either use the upload page at http://www.harringtons.org/Harrington/upload.html
(4) Will others be able to copy my hard work and call it their own?
No. GEDCOMs are considered to be databases and are protected under Database Copyright law. The individual items
in the database are not specially protected (though long discourses, documents, pictures, etc. contained there-in
may be), but the compilation as a whole _is_. This means that distributing your GEDCOM requires your permission.
Anyone who takes your GEDCOM off the HarrGene web site and sells it on a CD, for example, would be violating US
Copyright law.
There are also laws against derivative works. For example, if someone takes your Gedcom, changes or adds a few
new entries, and then redistributes it under their own name, this would be a derivative work. Your permission is
required before this is done.
(5) What can I do to help?
The most useful thing for you to do is just continue doing your genealogy research. Let us all know what you find;
it may be that something useless to you is very useful to someone else.
One of the most useful things you could do is to write something for the web site. Toby Dills, for instance, has
written a number of excellent pages about the research he's done on Benjamin Herendeen, Robert Harrington, and
the English Haringtons. |
| VII. Netiquette |
The members of the Harrgene list are a friendly lot. We try to follow some rules of conduct (called "Netiquette")
to keep everyone happy. I've found a fun to read netiquette guide and put it on the web site: http://www.harringtons.org/Harrington/MailingList/netiquette.faq
Please read this. It has a lot of good information about how to be a good internet citizen. Here's what I feel
are the most important points:
1) Avoid evangelism: Are Mac's better than PC's? Who cares! Don't waste time on topics that have been argued
to death already.
2) Avoid flaming: Don't insult others, and if you're offended by something someone says, try to keep your
cool. Wait a day and then send a polite message *privately* to the offender.
3) Apologize if you do something wrong or offend someone unintentionally.
4) If you respond to someone else's message, trim it down or paraphrase it. There should be just enough
of the old message to clue people in on what you're responding to. If you simply _must_ include the entire message,
please put it at the very end of your message, with your new comments at the top. As a rule of thumb, there should
be more new text than old.
5) DON'T SEND A MESSAGE IN ALL CAPS. IT'S HARDER TO READ!
6) Remember that anything you say on the list could be read by anyone, including your relatives! And it'll
be stuck in the group's archives for your grandchildren to read one day!
7) Try not to send "Me too!" messages. If someone asks, "Is anyone interested in thus-and-such",
let the person know your interest privately; don't send it to the list - no one else cares but the person who asked,
after all!
8) Try to format your messages so they're easy to read. Spelling and grammar are important, too. But don't
insult others if they have poorly worded messages; they may be new or have a disability.
9) Read the netiquette guide for more info: http://www.harringtons.org/Harrington/MailingList/netiquette.faq |
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