I started researching the Binnie family in the mid-1990s, from a detailed 
chart originally drawn up by Gill`s Uncle Rod.  Aunt Maud then 
spent some time with me at our farm at Christon Bank filling in gaps, adding 
dates and new arrivals, and providing details of some of Granny Binnie`s 
family, all from memory!  When Gill and I visited cousins in the Lebanon in the 
mid-1997, I took my notebook computer with me.  With the help of Hanna 
Wakim, Anis Francis, Nakhle Francis and Youssef Khalaf, who very 
patiently translated from the original Arabic parish records, many more cousins 
were added to the other branches of the Mansour family.  They also made sure we 
met as many of the cousins who were still alive as we could possibly fit in 
during our regrettably brief stay!  Then, in 1998, after we had decided to 
emigrate to New Zealand, Aunt Maud very kindly consented to my borrowing many 
of the old family photos in her collection, from which I made notes and scanned 
images before returning them to her.

Since arriving in New Zealand in February 1999, I`ve also made considerable 
progress investigating George Binnie`s ancestors.  The results of this 
research are presented here for the first time, and will be new to you too.  I 
hope you find it interesting.  The web site doesn`t have the capability to 
expand stories about individuals in the tree to any great extent, but I hope to 
do that on another site in due course.

The last four years or so have proved to be a watershed for the branch of the 
family who had settled in Zimbabwe.  Although perhaps not quite as extreme as 
that caused by the Lebanese civil war during the late 1970s and 1980s, it has 
resulted in most of the Binnie clan emigrating once again, like so many other 
members had done previously in the last hundred years.  This web site has been 
a long time coming - sorry to Hilary and Michelle, who have both 
asked for some sort of contribution ages ago - but I hope it will go some way 
to bringing the now widely separated branches of the family a little closer 
together.

The fact that you need a password to enter this site means that, although it is  on the internet, it`s not accessible to the general public, and private  information such as dates of birth are therefore not available to all and  sundry.  Please feel free to pass on the URL/address and password to other  family members.  I would also encourage you to please send in any details  missing from the site, new additions to the family, and photos (either recent  or old) which you think may be of interest.  I have loaded many of those from  my own collection, but I`ll do my best do get a good selection of any other  contributions online as soon as possible.  Please take a moment to read and  leave a message in the Guest Book too - it`s always good to see who has visited  the site recently!

If you would like higher resolution versions of any of the photos on this site,  please let me know, and I`ll be happy to send them by email.

With love and best wishes,

Brett, Gill, Lesley, Camilla, Louise and Hannah
Tauranga, New Zealand