January 2025 - Howes that?

[mardler]

Hello everyone. As you can see from my email, I'm in the Deep South! For the last two weeks, I've been away from Florida. My wife and I flew from Florida to Santiago, Chile, where we spent a few hours before flying farther South to Punta Arenas and thence to Puerto Williams, the southernmost airport in South America. There we boarded ship and headed for the island of South Georgia. We spent 3 1/2 days there going from inlet to inlet, always looking for a relatively quiet harbor preferably sheltered from the wind and ocean swell.

The ship is billed as an 'expedition cruise'. So there are frequent trips around bays in small zodiac boats and occasional landings to walk among penguins and seals. It is a trip of a lifetime, honestly. Beyond the wildlife, the scenery in South Georgia is truly spectacular. Although it is at about the same latitude as much of England, the island lies in the Antarctic climate zone with many glaciers and steep mountainsides, in many places dropping thousands of feet directly into the sea.

Right now, we are at 60 degrees South in the Scotia Sea, headed toward Elephant Island and thence to Antarctica. Fortunately, the wind is mostly on the ship's bow. So there is not too much of a sideways roll!

Generally, time at sea between destinations allows me to catch up with emails and so on though, yesterday, our attention was diverted as we sailed past the enormous iceberg A23a, mention of which you may have seen in the media. It took us 2 1/2 hours to pass by!


New Zealand question from December
Our thanks go to correspondent, Janice, from New Zealand who was able to provide an answer to the question we had posed about Rachel House, the kiwi actress and film director. It turns out her parents were from Glasgow in Scotland and both have now passed on. Her father was a remarkable man. I don't think I've ever seen a wider range of occupations in an obituary. Here's the list: "Historical documenter, maritime adventurer, councilman, arts supporter, tripe and onion fanatic, project manager, community builder, soccer fan, engineer, tree activist, anti apartheid protestor, historic building lover, guava jelly maker, marmalade connoisseur, public speech maker, Holden driver, politician, choir boy, ballroom dancer extraordinaire, political allegiance alternator, health worker, charity organizer, craftsman, antique plate zealot, published author, chocolate addict, tall dulcet toned Scotsman " Quite a man!

Is there someone out there who can help us take his family farther back? We're looking for John Merrick House, born 29 Dec 1931, likely in Glasgow.

Our thanks go to Janice too for her enthusiasm in providing us with a list of New Zealand House births, marriages and deaths which we have used to connect almost all of them up with prior Australian and British families. We now have well over 1,000 people with NZ connections.

Our monthly progress
I'm so pleased that we have finished my large marriage project. It's enabled me to start catching up on old emails and deal with daily correspondence more quickly! We have added almost 1,300 people to our file this month, finishing at 218,949 people.

The Guild of One-Name Studies marriage indexes now hold over 65,000 marriages submitted by yours truly, most from our efforts in this study.

Thanks to everyone who has contributed to our efforts.