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Introduction
As always, greetings to all readers of “Daltons
in History”!!
Since the last issue of “Daltons
in History”
was uploaded in mid-October, the DGS officers and committee have been
very busy working on a range of new developments for DGS members and the
wider community of visitors to this website.
Of particular interest to all will be the new subscription
and membership pages, where you can now join the DGS from all corners
of the globe and use a variety of payment methods for your subscription
– including PayPal, credit or debit card, bank transfer, standing
order or cheque (check). For those who are already members you can renew
your membership, again using the full range of payment methods, and for
those who are UK taxpayers, you can Gift Aid your subscription, which
will increase its value to the Society as a registered charity by 25%.
All of this has been implemented to make it as easy as possible to
join the DGS and continue to pay your subscription each year, with
maximum value to you and to the Society.
We have also updated the page for ordering back numbers
of the DGS Journal, offering significant savings on bulk orders and
again offering a wide range of payment methods.
And we are almost ready to publish our latest DNA
Report for all participants in our project, who are members of the
DGS.
Last month, I announced the launch of the new DGS
website, “Daltons in History” 2.0 (DiH2.0 for short).
Further developments are in hand and there is more about this below, together
with the usual updates on all aspects of the Society, its events, its
publications and its projects. Please read on!
“Daltons in History” 2.0
(DiH2.0 for short)
Last month we commenced the launch of a completely new
and additional DGS website. This is in response to the suggestions that
we need something more interactive and attractive to a wider readership,
and at the same time we need to provide added value for the members of
the Society. The new website is called “Daltons in History”
or DiH2.0 for short. It has both an unrestricted presence available
to all, and sections for DGS members only. It also includes enhanced use
of social media – Facebook, Twitter etc. DiH2.0 has now been rolled
out to the whole DGS membership worldwide, with registration details,
usernames and passwords being issued to all paid up members for whom we
have an up to date email address registered with the Society. This enables
members to access the restricted areas of the site and enjoy the substantial
benefits that the new site will bring. Any DGS members who have not
received an email notifying them of their username and password should
email their local secretary with a request to be registered for DiH2.0.
Alongside this exciting new development, the main DGS
website at www.daltongensoc.com,
the Dalton Data Bank (www.daltondatabank.org),
the Dalton Forum (http://daltonamericas.org/messageboard/)
and the other North American DGS websites (accessed via www.daltonamericas.org/)
all continue, and remain with open access for all. Each month we will
continue to bring you “Daltons in History” on the main
DGS website, in a revised format and this will evolve over the next few
months. It will include Chairman’s Notes and other news items and
articles, taken from DiH2.0 and made available in the public domain. There
are still a number of more detailed decisions to be made about this, as
there are about DiH2.0 itself and we want to be as responsive to our membership
as possible. Therefore all members are invited to make observations
and comments about the new website and thus contribute to its success.
We want the site to serve all DGS members as well as it possibly can,
and we also want to encourage more of those with an interest in Dalton
family history to join the Society, and take advantage of what will be
an ever growing and ever more valuable resource.
Future DGS events
An announcement was made at the Annual General Meeting
in Dublin that the 2014 Gathering and AGM is to take place in East
Anglia, UK over the weekend of Fri/Sat/Sun 12/13/14 September. We
have reserved accommodation and rooms for our meeting and dinner on the
Saturday at the Park
Farm Country Hotel which is at Hethersett in Norfolk, only a few miles
outside Norwich.
The theme of the weekend will be Dalton families from
East Anglia, of which there are several, and the programme will include
our 2014 AGM, talks about Dalton family history and visits to places connected
with East Anglia Daltons. As usual we will hold our Annual DGS Dinner
on the Saturday evening.
I am most grateful to DGS Committee Member Mike F Dalton,
who lives in Norfolk, for taking up the role of 2014 Gathering Organiser.
Mike and I, together with DGS Secretary Pam Lynam and DGS Australian Secretary
Maureen Collins, are meeting up in Norfolk in mid-November to visit the
hotel and discuss the more detailed programme. Pam and Maureen both descend
from a Norfolk Dalton family the study of which was a major element of
the gathering based in Swaffham, Norfolk back in 1999.
Full details about the weekend, the outline programme
and a registration form will be available here next month (December
2013) and they will also be despatched to all DGS members with Volume
59 of the DGS Journal, when it is published at the end of the year.
If in the meantime you have any questions please contact
either Mike F Dalton, Gathering Organiser (mfdalton@btconnect.com)
or Michael N Dalton, DGS Chairman and Gathering Coordinator (michaelndalton@aol.com).
We hope to return to the United States and visit Virginia
in 2015. It has also been proposed that we return to South Wales,
UK in 2016.
The DGS committee is actively taking these plans forward
and we will be making further more detailed announcements in the coming
months about locations and dates. So watch this space!
We like to plan ahead and explore other options for our
annual gathering events, so if you have any particular thoughts about
where you might like to meet, or a particular Dalton theme you think we
should incorporate, we would really like to hear from you with your ideas.
The Dalton International DNA Project (DIDP)
Our DNA project continues to attract considerable interest
with a regular stream of enquiries about joining being received by myself
and Karen Dalton Preston as administrators of the project. Last month
we published a DIDP Update and this can be found in the “Dalton
DNA Project” section of this website. Click here.
This gives details of our new report on progress with the project, which
is about to be published. This latest report has now been finalised
and it will be made available to all project participants that are paid
up members of the DGS before the end of November.
In order to strengthen the management of DIDP we have
formed the DGS DNA Project Sub-Committee. The members are Melanie Crain,
Mike F Dalton, myself and Karen Dalton Preston as the coordinators of
Genetic Families A, B, C and D respectively, with Chris Pomery continuing
to act as the project consultant.
For the successful progression of the project, we have
agreed the following:
- a shift away from DNA testing in isolation towards genetic
genealogy and traditional research working in partnership
- directed traditional research programmes for each genetic family
- targeted recruitment into DIDP in order to identify the DNA
signature of Old World Dalton families in both England and Ireland
- a clear statement of the benefits of joining the project (even
if you turn out to be a singleton)
- more comprehensive follow up on enquiries to improve the rate
of conversion into participants
- more comprehensive write ups of the research work being undertaken
in each genetic family
The sub-committee will work to put plans in place to
achieve the above and will monitor the development of the project more
closely with the remit of each of us extending outside the boundaries
of our individual genetic family. It will be our aim to ensure that we
cover the interests of and the enquiries from all participants in the
project, and in the list of genetic family coordinators you will see that
each of us already look after additional groups in the project. Those
relatively few participants without a coordinator are invited to contact
either Karen or myself in the first instance and we will involve others
to assist as appropriate.
We are indebted to Chris Pomery for all his assistance
with the project over the past seven years. In addition to our latest
report referred to above, this has included the preparation of three earlier
very comprehensive project progress reports, and then a series of six
reports covering individual genetic families. He has also given informative
presentations at our annual gatherings on several occasions. We now have
some 180 participants in the project, and well over 80% are members of
one of the 15 identified genetic families.
The DGS Journal
Volume 58 of the DGS Journal for June 2013 was printed
and distributed to members in July. As always this most recent volume
of our award winning Journal contains much of interest. If you are not
a DGS member, please consider joining the Society. This will entitle you
to receive the Journal regularly, and much more. Full details are in
the newly updated “Join
the DGS” section of this website, or just
click here.
John Dalton, our Editor, always welcomes articles
and other items for publication in the Journal, and material for publication
should be sent to him as early as possible. This will enable him to plan
the content of the next and future issues. The deadline for contributions
for Volume 59 of the DGS Journal, due for publication by the end of December
2013, has been extended to 30 November 2013. John is happy to advise
and assist contributors and, if you have any questions or need help, please
contact him by email at johndalton78@hotmail.com.
Back issues of all DGS Journals are available.
These can be purchased individually, or in sets at attractive prices.
Full details are available on the newly updated pages for the "DGS
Journal Index" section of this website, or just click here.
You will also find a full synopsis of the contents
of the Journal of the Dalton Genealogical Society commencing with Volume
1 published back in 1970 through to Volume 41 published in December 2004.
Lists of contents are given for Volumes 42 to 58 and the full synopses
will be uploaded in due course.
We are most grateful to DGS member Mrs Pat Robinson,
who holds stocks of back numbers for the Society and arranges for their
distribution in response to requests from the local secretaries (address:
Mallards, 3 High Street, The Green, Barrington, Cambridge CB2 5QX, UK
email: gandprobinson@waitrose.com.)
Membership and subscriptions
We have completely updated the arrangements for joining
the Society and paying annual subscriptions to the DGS. Full details are
in the newly updated “Join
the DGS” section of this website, or just
click here.
For the past few years, the DGS in North America has
had a PayPal account to facilitate payments being made from members in
the USA and Canada. We have now opened a DGS PayPal account linked to
the bank account for the DGS here in the UK, and through the PayPal links
on the membership and subscription pages new members can join the DGS
and existing members can pay their subscriptions wherever they live in
the world.
Conclusion
Enjoy this issue of “Daltons
in History”, your
regular update on everything that is happening in the world of Dalton
family history. We will be back again in mid-December.
Thank you for your attention and please do send your
articles, notes and snippets of information for publication in “Daltons
in History” to me (email: michaelndalton@aol.com)
Yours very sincerely
Michael Neale Dalton
Chairman and Honorary Life President of the Dalton Genealogical Society
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