Introducing the Curator Team

Marsha - I'm just as "gee whiz" about this as you are. Sorry that people seem to find that a negative. My goal is still to make as many merges as possible as accurately as possible based on what's out there on Geni. There's no sense in having 150 different Zacharie Cloutiers - better to merge them all into one, and then make sure his info is solid. It's easier to correct one profile than 150.

Marsha - I was thinking of a nickname for us as I think of you as a sister from another mother. How about "the gee whiz kids?" BTW you are two months younger than me so I get to take the lead. :)

Ha! Twins separated at birth, Erica!

I think we were going to start a Merge Queen team at one point. The GWK sounds good, too! That way we could have girls and boys on the team - but I don't want to start another discussion about THAT! LOL! ;)

How does one become nominated to be a curator? I'm very interested. Is there a particular process?

Jennifer ...

Can't say how/why Noah picked the first five, but Noah wants the selections to come from the users, not Geni. So we the first five added 7 based on geographical representation of those who had exhibited hard work, good work, and the ability to work with others. The second 12 was the same deal, although we tried hard to make sure languages and specialties were represented.

We will expand again, a big part of the planned growth so far was to make sure unintended issues were caught with the fewest people in the loop. Fortunately we haven't run into many technical or other problems. Generally speaking, those that do good stuff and know how to work collaboratively with others are on the radar. This is not meant to be some sort of exclusive club, but a collaboration of peers, there is certainly a bunch of work to be done.

Please be patient with us as we figure out best practices.

Gene

Hello all.

I'm now a curator. I'll help in any area that I'm able.

Thanks to all for this opportunity!

:)

Noah asked me if I was willing to help as a curator, too.

I can't promise to spend great amounts of time fixing issues, and I'm NOT all-wise in all issues ... but when I'm around, and when I can, I hope to help.

Curators ... the janitors of the Big Tree.

I think Noah is still taking "icon" suggestions. Photoshop at him. :)

I wanted you to have a customized one, Bjorn. Zombie hunting helmet maybe.

I got my badge! Wooohoo. :-)

Erica we could draw a battle-axe across it.

Works for me. Purple suits you nicely, by the way.

Ah purple! I like it. :D

I am honored to join the curator team. I am from Florida and have been working on my tree for over 54 years since I was a teen ager and used to listen to my grandmother Ruby Atwood Coontz recite our family tree back to the 1600's from memory. I started writing down everything she said and have been hooked ever since. I have taken several college courses in Geneology, and have proven most of what she recited. There are a few lines, I have been stuck on.

I have my own business and am a virtual agent, and one of my clients is Apple for whom I help configure computers for people calling to order a computer. I help them build the computer to suit there specific needs.

I personally added over 18,000 profiles that I had searched and proved over the years. Thanks for having me on the team.

Myrna, welcome! My hands hurt thinking of you entering all those profiles! I've entered only about 2,000 of my husband's family and I thought that was a lot. LOL!

I got my first Apple (a 27" iMac) last November and i LOVE it. I go back and forth between PC and Apple at work and at home and I really wish we could 'go Apple' at work.

Your grandmother sounds awesome. I'm so jealous! My grandparents wouldn't even talk about THEIR parents!

The numbers are growing , 'I don't know how many are pointed now - but have had the honor to join.
I am not of a fine familie and not a computer freak.
Only a plain accountant that think historie is very interresting, have during the last two years spend hours and hours on merging and solving different problems it has almost become sort of a game!! But first of all used GENI as a inspitation to read articel after articel on different issues!!
Hope the curator ability will help my to use more time on reading historical articels and less on solving different problems!! As far as I can see - it makes life much more easy;-))

Sorry Bjørn
Language:
Scandinavian: Danish, Norwegian, Swedish.
English and German
Main interrest: Royal families after 1500 mainly northern europe.

Hello everyone. My name is Kaloyan Ivanov and I was just made curator. I will try and help in any way I can in the Bulgarian part of the tree.

I work as a translator to/from English, but I know a little bit of Spanish, Russian, French, German and Japanese. I am also familiar with Hebrew, Greek, Turkish, Macedonian and Swedish.

Do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions/comments.

I'm also honored to join the curator team.
I am embarrassed to say that my only language is English, but I will do my best with Google Translator to communicate with everyone, if needed.
I began my love of history very early on, when my parents took me to many historical sites across the United States.
I am adopted, and absolutely Hated the "family tree" projects in school. My mother's side of the family came from England on the Mayflower, so that is one of my main areas of interest. I also became obsessed at an early age with the Royal lines of England/Britain, Scotland, Ireland and France.
Several years ago I found my biological parents and am just now at the very, very early stages of tracing my actual blood relatives.
I love history, plain and simple. I'll do my best to help out in any way I can!

Gunther, you are, too, from a fine family - it produced you, didn't it? :)

Welcome to the group. I know you'll be a great asset to geni and all of its members!

Me and you both, Heather. I SO wish I could speak at least ONE other language!

Welcome to the group. I know you'll be an asset. I'm waiting for geni to come out with birth parents and adoptive parents as options. I have several relatives who were adopted and have found their birth parents. I'd like to include them.

I'm also working with an adoptee via my husband's DNA to see if he can find his birth father. It's all so interesting.

My favorite thing is when I find out not just the birth/marriage/death dates, etc., but find out what the peoples' characters were like. For instance, one of my husband's great-nth uncle who came here before Texas was a republic died because he threw himself in front of his cousin, who was the target of a shooting. So interesting!

Better stop now - I could go on and on but welcome!

I am a new Curator. I have been working on my family tree for almost 2 years, filling in the blanks and expanding the branches of the tree started by my first cousin.

I am most interested in the migration from Virginia to the Appalachian areas -- North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky -- the path my own ancestors took.

My second area of interest is Quaker history. I didn't know much about Quakers until I found out my ancestors were Quakers who came to America to escape persecution.

My third area of interest is Gold Rush era of California, in which my husband's mother's family played a role. Since I live in Northern California, I foresee many future field trips to explore this part of the family history.

I am self-employed as a financial planner. I am married, have one grown daughter and three grandchildren. I knit lace as a break from being on the computer.

Unfortunately I can only read and write English but Google translator is a great help.

Happy ancestor hunting!
Maria

I'm also one of the new curators. I was born and still living in Finland (Newsweek contained recently a statement about this country :-), and belonging to the small swedishspeaking minority. I work in the telecoms area.

Have been working with genealogy only since 2008, when Geni triggered my interest. As there's paths from both my mother's and my father's side to ancient Scotland, that's where I've been working a lot, alongside with Finland. As a late addition I started working on the van Holland -area.

I speak fluently Swedish, Finnish and English. Trying also to remember something from my German studies from way back, as some of the sources are in German.

Lars

My myopic hobby interests as a curator is the legendary Viking line running from Fornjot Fornjot "the Ancient Giant", King of Kvenland to Ivar Halfdansson Ivar Halfdansson, Opplendingejarl, branching out into neighbouring areas as time and energy permit. My standard question when asked to do something is likely to be "Why do you think that?" - sources rule!

I live in Norway and work in Stockholm (which is NOT in Norway), speak Norwegian and English, can get by on text in the other Nordic languages (Swedish, Danish, Icelandic), understand some German, and fall back on Google Translate for most other languages.

Happy to help when needed, when I can!

I wanted to add that the families I am following in the migration into Appalachia are Salmons/Sammons, Slones, Mead/Meade, Preston, Frazier/Frasure, Martin, Hall, Newman, Akers, Justice, Jarrell, Caudill, Sizemore, Carter, Park, and DeBord/Deboard families.

The families I am following in the Gold Rush are Henderson, Snelling, Tandy and Burrus. Some of those branches have been traced back to the Norman invasion through the Clopton, Pecche and Quarles lines.

I am so happy to share information on my family. I always learn and get as much as I give.

Greetings! Thanks for the include on the curator team! I feel like an alcoholic accepting a drink! My addiction to this site just might get a whole lot worse if that is possible.: )
15 or so years ago I got tired of hearing all the family stories about who we are supposedly related to, so I started a hunt to either prove or disprove them and managed to disprove them all, but that lead to a lot more interesting discoveries, and I have been on a roll ever since.
My background is in construction/renovation, theater set building and props. I am a pretty good problem solver, ran a girls summer arts camp, owned a bookstore in the 70's, camp hiking trip leader, traveled and worked picking grapes in France and care taking a farm in Tuscana with 100 animals.
I am as interested in trees that I don't have a connection with as well as my own. It is all interesting and a great excuse to learn as much as possible about our history.
I know a bit of French, but on the whole my language skilled are abominable.
So glad to be participating and if I screw up don't hesitate to let me know!
Meg

So glad to have you on the team Margaret!

Welcome Harald and Lars! I haven't had the pleasure of 'working' with you before but I look forward to it!

I would like to take this opportunity to welcome all the new additions to the Curating team. I feel somewhat ashamed of what I've achieved when I read all these introductions....What a great team! The Geni Tree should really start improving rapidly now.

To all CURATORS:
I think you are doing a great job and so far I have learned a lot from your input.
Are you volunteers or paid people?
From one of the answers I got I know that you are also Geni users like I am.
Hopefully, by the end of this period of experimentation and discussion we can
have a more robust and intuitive Geni site.

Thank you, Daniel! We are all volunteers who are heavily involved as Geni users.