Re: [Harp-L] 20 years ago today harp-l began

[George Miklas <harmonicat@xxxxxxxxx>]

Going back into the archives.... looks like I registered on the 5th of
November 1993... A year after Harp-L was born....

gm

On Sat, Oct 6, 2012 at 12:42 PM, Bob McGraw <harpbob@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> Happy birthday harp-l, and thanks to all the people who gave the time,
> expertise and money to make harp-l happen and keep it happening. The
> argument could be made that this list is one of the most important
> developments in the harmonica world, period. I would not be the player that
> I am today if not for harp-l.
> Thanks...a huge thanks.
> WVa Bob
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
> On Oct 6, 2012, at 8:56 AM, owner-harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx wrote:
>
>  Here's a link to that first month and the text of the first post.  If you
>> read past the first week things begin to pick up.  There are actually more
>> than a couple of people still subscribed to harp-l who were around pretty
>> much as the list began.
>>
>> Harp-l began as a humble student run LISTSERV hosted on the Western
>> Kentucky University computer systems.  The original listowner was Chris
>> Pierce.  When it was no longer possible for Chris to run the list we were
>> forced to find a new home, we settled at Garply systems and we were run by
>> Hugh Messenger. An interesting time and the the list was hopping.  Our
>> peak post volume occurred in this time frame.  Hugh's life changed and he
>> was no longer able to keep up with the tasks of list ownership.
>>
>> We continued to be hosted by garply and later the entity that garply
>> became.  SPAH at the behest of Douglas Tate covered the costs of our
>> hosting.  Initially Danny Wilson and then later a team of 3 took over the
>> ownership duties.  The team of 3 included Michael Polesky, Ken Deifik and
>> I believe Robert Gaustad.  Michael quickly became the last man standing
>> and ran the list for years with the assistance of Jonas Karlsson and a
>> small team of volunteers called harp-l-workers.
>>
>> Our Garply hosting became less reliable as the company's interests,
>> ownership  and focus shifted.  If you peruse the archives you'll notice a
>> gap.  That gap was generated by a Garply disk crash.  Michael personally
>> paid to have the disk replaced in a era when a replacement disk for a DEC
>> Alpha was close to a thousand dollars.  Years later Michael paid to have
>> the 2nd Garply disk data recovered when it was shipped to me loose in a
>> box damaging the drive.  All of the harp-l archives including the gap era
>> were recovered.  The reason they are not currently up is they have
>> formatting issues.
>>
>>  From Garply we moved to a new host whose name currently escapes me.  We
>>>
>> did acquire the use of the name harp-l.com at that time.  Dave Gage
>> generously obtained the domain name and paid those fees for years for us.
>> Our hosting was unreliable.  We were off line for a couple of months
>> twice.  Membership being loyal we always bounced back but it cost us.
>> Other resources became available and harp-l has never again been as
>> prolific as it was during the Garply era.
>>
>> I've been involved with harp-l since the WKU era.  I became involved with
>> the harp-l-workers group during the Garply era and during the middle of
>> the Michael Polesky era I was in many senses the person running harp-l.
>> Frustrated with our hosting I teamed with Ben Nathanson another long time
>> harp-l member to find a better more reliable way to keep harp-l afloat.
>>
>> We ended up acquiring the harp-l.org domain name and used it to test
>> hosting sites .  We got lucky and our second hosting choice, rimuhosting
>> ended up working perfectly for us.  We set up parallel lists using the 2
>> domain names.  This way we were able to beta test the new system while
>> still maintaining the old list.  We switched from our long time mail list
>> software, Majordomo, to our current system Mailman.
>>
>> On July 30, 2004 harp-l was finally hosted on its own server with control
>> over every aspect of the system.  We own the domain names thanks to Keith
>> Graham and Dave Gage who generously allowed us to acquire them.  We are no
>> longer SPAH supported, we've been independent since the server switch.
>>
>> So thanks to Chris Pierce our founder and each and every one of you who
>> helped along the way.  That a student run internet list started before we
>> had web browsers still exists today is more than a minor miracle.
>> harp-l-listowner
>>
>>
>>
>> http://harp-l.org/pipermail/**harp-l/1992-October/date.html<http://harp-l.org/pipermail/harp-l/1992-October/date.html>
>>
>> WELCOME to all!!!
>>
>> This listserver is for harmonica lovers/players/enthusists/and any one
>> else that is interested.
>>
>> This is not for any one particular style of music.  I hope that
>> through this list much can be learned from all different forms of
>> harmonica playing.
>>
>> Blues, Jazz, Swing, Folk, Country, Rock, and ALL others are welcome.
>> If you have questions or if you would like to share your ideas,
>> experience and knowledge, please feel free.
>>
>> It will probably start out slow, but after a while I think this list
>> should work out well.
>>
>> Thanks.
>>
>> Good Harpin',
>>
>>
>> Chris Pierce
>> ------------------------------**------------------------------**
>> -------------
>> Chris Pierce                    |    In the Light and Sound of God
>> Gilbert Hall                    |    Dragon's Gate Kung Fu:  Ja-Kari-Do
>> 1505 Russellville Rd Rm 327     |
>> Bowling Green KY  42101-3565    |    Departments of Biology and Chemistry
>>
>>
>>
>>


-- 
George Miklas, Harmonica Performing Artist and
Entertainer<http://harmonicagallery.com/>
John Philip Sousa's THE HARMONICA WIZARD
MARCH<http://harmonicagallery.com/sousa>
Harmonica Repair Done Right by George <http://harmonicagallery.com/repair>
SPAH is the Society for the Preservation and Advancement of the
Harmonica...a non-profit, membership organization dedicated to serving the
harmonica community. <http://spah.org/>
**