160 names on a list

Great candidates! Have you voted yet?

There are 160 names on John D. Reid’s list, from the United States, from Canada, from Europe, from Australia and beyond.

They are traditional genealogists and genetic genealogists, regional specialists and overall generalists, male and female and — perhaps most importantly — known and less known.

It’s the annual “Rockstar Genealogist” poll conducted by John on his blog, Anglo-Celtic Connections.

This is where John asks genealogists around the world to nominate and then vote for their favorite genealogy “rockstars” — people he describes as “those who give ‘must attend’ presentations at family history conferences or as webinars, who when you see a new family history article or publication by that person, makes it a must buy. If you hang on their every word on a blog, podcast or newsgroup, or follow avidly on Facebook or Twitter they are likely Rockstar candidates.”¹

Nominations for this fifth year of the poll are closed, and the voting is now open — and will remain open until noon EDT on Sunday, September 11th. There is one change this year. John notes: “If you’ve voted previously you’ll see a change this year. To increase fairness voting will require access through your Google account. It will mean you can change your vote by signing in again with your account. If you don’t already have an account, most of us do to take advantage of the many Google apps, sign up for one for free here.”

With that Google account, you can vote here. (And you can read about the voting here.)

It’s a wonderful (thankless time-consuming) thing that John does every year, and it’s a great way for our community to get together and honor some of our best and brightest.

The Legal Genealogist is honored to be among those nominated, because so many people that I consider to be friends and mentors are among the nominees. And what I really love about what John does is that it’s such a great way to find out who some of the new up-and-coming folks are in our community and around the world.

This is where those of us who mostly research in the United States can find out about our friends in Australia and New Zealand, like Jill Ball of GeniAus, Pauleen Cass of Family history across the seas, Kerry Farmer of Family History Research, Shauna Hicks of Diary of an Australian Genealogist, or Helen V. Smith of From Helen V Smith’s Keyboard. And those are just the bloggers! Add in Jan Gow and Michelle Patient and …

This is where we US types can find out more about our colleagues across the pond, in the UK or elsewhere in Europe, like Audrey Collins of the UK, Fiona Fitzsimons and Maurice Gleeson of Ireland, or Yvette Hoitink of the Netherlands.

This is where we US types can find out more about our friends in Canada — just to name a few, you might want to check out Lesley Anderson or Daniel Earl or my dear friends Alison Hare and Kathryn Lake Hogan, or Brenda Dougal Merriman or Janice Nickerson or Mike Quackenbush or David Pike or …

Getting the picture here?

There are so very many truly excellent folks on this list.

So take a moment, yes, to vote for your favorites. There are 160 great choices from the names on this list.²

But take more time and explore the names on this list — there’s so much more to be found among the best and brightest of our community.

SOURCES