Fay Family History Research on the Internet

A Brief Introduction to

Fay Family Message Boards and Mailing Lists

 


Please post ancestry/genealogical questions to our Message Board which will be answered by a Fay Family researcher.

Since 1999, Rootsweb.com, and now their new parent company, MyFamily.com, have made available to Fay researchers several free internet resources which several of us have worked to develop and integrate into single source of free and readily available online research resources. That task continues. We would like to briefly introduce those resources to you here so that you may best utilize then to your advantage in your family history research.

The Resources

MESSAGE BOARD

By contrast, message boards like those at Ancestry.com and RootsWeb.com provide a resource to be used by anyone who chooses to post a message or search the boards, quite possibly involving a surname or topic only indirectly related to their research. There is no requirement to subscribe to a discussion group to make a contact through a search, or post a query or reply on a board. A board is often a great place to post a query about your "dead end" or "brick wall" ancestors. A far larger audience will search the boards over a period of time than will subscribe to any one mailing list.

For Fay researchers, we have message boards at both Rootsweb/Ancestry.com and at a different company (and not administered by Fay researchers) at Genforum. They are not equivalent resources and perhaps a note on that aspect is in order.

During June of 2001 an extensive remodeling project was begun at the Rootsweb/Ancestry message boards, which had previously been two different messages board systems. The boards and the databases that serve them were combined into a single, larger database. 

If you had previously posted at the Ancestry.com Fay message board or the Rootsweb.com Fay message board, your post now appears on the combined message board.  The search routines have been and continue to be enhanced well beyond the abilities of previous message boards at any site. 

MAILING LISTS and DIGEST

Many chose to then extend their archives research by participating in online discussions through the Fay Mailing List.

Message Boards and Mailing Lists would seem to be similar, but researchers that have used both have come to discover some strengths and weaknesses that may suggest you use one over the other or perhaps both as the situation warrants.  Both Mailing Lists and Message Boards are valuable research tools. A very good tutorial site explains how to start using mailing lists.

A Mailing List is an excellent place for in depth discussion among list subscribers who are usually serious researchers of the list subject. Discussion on a Mailing List tends to cover a topic at length, and when that topic is exhausted a new discussion begins on another subject. The strength of a Mailing List is the ability to include a large number of people and opinions in an ongoing, in depth, discussion benefiting list subscribers immediately.  In March 2006, there were 105 Fay Mailing List subscribers and 102 Fay Mailing Digest subscribers.  We would like to invite you to join us on the Fay Mailing List.  More detailed Fay mail list subscription information can be found at: http://lists.rootsweb.com/index/surname/f/fay.html

Future of Online Fay Research Resource

Starting with a fairly tenuous set of web skills and experience and shaky financing a couple of years ago, the Fay internet resources have grown, though not always without missteps along the way, and has been fairly well received by the online genealogical and historical communities. But even with that seemingly good beginning only a small fraction of the printed Fay research held by museums, libraries and private collections is accessible online. And the mail list and message boards are not as active as they might be if well marketed, both in North America, in Europe and elsewhere.

We have virtually unlimited web server space and Message Board and Mailing List resources to expand the Fay material online.  We hope these resources help in your research.

Ken Barbi (Message Board and Mailing List Administrator)