Sharing Your Genealogical Material and/or Data With the Pennington Research Association and Other Researchers
Please note this page is under construction and many of the links do NOT work.
The Pennington Research Association (PRA) encourages organizations and individuals to contribute genealogical material and/or data to the PRA.
The PRA always welcomes genealogical and family history information and material from researchers who are willing to share it with other researchers. We prefer material and/or data that is already in electronic format but will accept printed material and/or data.
The Pennington Research Association does not seek any rights to the material you provide.
We will publish and/or store data and material in an order/manner determined both by the difficulty in preparing the data for access and/or publication and/or storage and by how popular we believe the data, article, report or material will be.
Please Note: Be sure to remove information on living persons BEFORE you submit your genealogical material and data. Click here to learn more about the PRA's policy on copyrights and privacy.
There are four (4) ways to share your genealogical material and data with the PRA and Pennington researchers:
- Send a family group report/book to the PRA. Using a genealogy software program (such as Family Tree Maker), create a family group report/book for the oldest known Pennington ancestor and ending with the most recent descendant. This is usually called a descendant's report. Be sure to check the box that removes information on living persons BEFORE you create the family group report/book. Click here to learn more about the PRA's policy on copyrights and privacy. With your consent, this information will be forwarded to the Editor of the Pedigrees to be published in the next edition. Also with your consent, this information will be posted on our website for our master database (JFMF) by using your gedcom file (see next item), or if you do not have a genealogy software program, it will be added as a paper document. Click here to learn how to submit a family group report/book using a genealogy software program.
- Send a gedcom file to the PRA. Using a genealogy software program (such as Family Tree Maker), create a gedcom file for the oldest known Pennington ancestor and ending with the most recent descendant. This is usually called a descendant's style gedcom file. Be sure to check the box that removes information on living persons BEFORE you create the the gedcom file. Click here to learn more about the PRA's policy on copyrights and privacy. With your consent, this information will be posted on our website for our master database (JFMF) by using your gedcom file. To learn how to submit this item, click here.
- Send an article to the Pennington Pedigrees to be published in the next issue. You can send the family group report/book created in item #1 if you like, or you can shorten it if there are too many pages to be published. You can add an introduction to the article so readers know your relationship with the persons in the family group report/book. If you do not have a genealogy software program, you can still submit an article if it is typewritten.
- Donate your family genealogy and/or history information and any other material (pictures, wills, deeds, etc.) to the new PRA Archive/Library at Earlham College in Indiana. We encourage members and researchers to send copies, or originals, of their material to the Archive/Library so it will be indexed and placed in the archive so other researchers can access it via the Internet and/or through their local library lending program.
You can do any one (1) of the above options or you can do all four (4) or any combination of the four (4). We encourage researchers to contribute their family genealogy, histories and material to all of these projects.
- To submit item 1, create the family group report/book in your genealogy software program and then save it as a rich text file (rtf) and then send it to Gene Pennington, Research Director as an attachment to your message.
- To submit item #2, create the gedcom file in your genealogy software program and then send it to Gene Pennington, Research Director as an attachment to your message.
- To submit item #3, create the family group report/book in your genealogy software program and then save it as a rich text file (rtf) and then send it to the Editor of the Pennington Pedigrees as an attachment to your message, or, if you do not have a genealogy software program, you can still submit an article if it is typewritten directly to Editor of the Pennington Pedigrees.
- To submit item #4, click here to learn how to submit items to the PRA Archive/Library.
With the author's consent, any material and/or data submitted will be retained for publication in the Pennington Pedigrees, published on our website for the John French Master File (JFMF) and published in other formats such as a CD and on our websites. Click here to view a PRA Consent to Publish form.
Authors and data providers must hold the copyrights to the material and/or data they provide, and they must be willing to grant genealogists the right to freely extract data and information from the material and exchange that data with other genealogists.
Please do not send the material and/or data itself. Once your message is received, the Research Director will evaluate the material. You will then be contacted by the appropriate person in the PRA to arrange for you to submit the material and/or data.
Click here to learn more about the PRA's policy on copyrights and privacy.
If you have any questions, please contact Gene Pennington, Research Director.
If the Pennington Research Association agrees to use your material and/or data, the author will be asked to complete a consent form when they submit their material.
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Family Genealogy Reports Created with a Genealogy Software Program
It is presumed you are using a computer program for your genealogy research. If this is not the case, then skip this next section and go to the last section.
Most genealogy programs work the same way for the main reports they can create.
Select the oldest know Pennington ancestor as the "base" or starting point for the report/book and then select a descendants style report/book. Be sure to check the box that removes information on living personsBEFORE you create the report/book. Click here to learn more about the PRA's policy on copyrights and privacy. If you are presented with options for the report, be sure to include the basic events such as birth, marriage, death and select all the descendants (including spouses and their children) with at least 10 generations (which should bring you to modern times).
Please make sure you include your sources, notes etc. as part of the report/book. This should be an option you can select when you create the report/book.
This will generate a report/book with this person as the "base" and then show all of their descendants up to and including yourself or whichever person you choose. Basically, this is a "straight line" report/book from your oldest know ancestor to you (or the family member you are connecting with).
When you save it, you should have the option to saving it as an "RTF" (rich text file) file rather than printing the report/book. Save the report/book in "RTF" format. Be sure to note WHERE you have saved the file and what name you have used to save it as since you will need to know this to attach the file to your e-mail message.
Now, close the program and send the e-mail message with the file as an attachment. If the file is very large, you may want to use a compression program like WinZip to reduce the size before you send it. This reduces the upload time from you to your ISP and the download time for us.
Please submit your report as follows: Typed, at least 10 point font, white paper, 1" margins on both sides if possible. Prepare your report/book in descendant style with your oldest know ancestor as the "base" (starting point). Be sure to remove information on living persons BEFORE you create the report/book. Click here to learn more about the PRA's policy on copyrights and privacy. Make sure each page is numbered and each family group is identified clearly. Please make sure you include your sources, notes etc. as part of the report/book. For our mailing address, please contact Gene Pennington, Research Director.
You must use a computer program for your genealogy research to create a gedcom file. Please refer to that program's help section for more detailed instructions. For more information on gedcom files, click here and scroll down the page to the section titled "Common Sense Guides to Gedcom Files".
Most genealogy programs work the same way for the gedcom files they can create.
Select the oldest know Pennington ancestor as the "base" or starting point for the gedcom file and then select a descendants style gedcom file. Be sure to check the box that removes information on living personsBEFORE you create the gedcom file. Click here to learn more about the PRA's policy on copyrights and privacy. If you are presented with options for the gedcom file, be sure to include the basic events such as birth, marriage, death and select all the descendants (including spouses and their children) with at least 10 generations (which should bring you to modern times).
Please make sure you include your sources, notes etc. as part of the gedcom file. This should be an option you can select when you create the gedcom file.
This will generate a gedcom file with this person as the "base" and then show all of their descendants up to and including yourself or whichever person you choose. Basically, this is a "straight line" gedcom file from your oldest know ancestor to you (or the family member you are connecting with).
Be sure to note WHERE you have saved the gedcom file and what name you have used to save it as since you will need to know this to attach the file to your e-mail message.
Now, close the program and send the e-mail message with the gedcom file as an attachment. If the file is very large, you may want to use a compression program like WinZip to reduce the size before you send it. This reduces the upload time from you to your ISP and the download time for us.
Once I receive the gedcom file, I will send you a publication release form to complete and return to me.
, Research Director if you have any questions or need help submitting genealogical data and/or material.
