Deborah,
Welcome.  Contact Elise LeCompte, Registrar here at the Florida Museum of
Natural History, for info on beads excavated from various sites here in
Florida.  Her email is:  [log in to unmask]

Kurt

At 10:19 AM 2/9/2000 -0700, you wrote:
>Hello!
>
>First, I confess that I'm not a Conchologist!
>
>I found your Listserv when doing a search on shells and have been
>lurking for about a week or so.  It's always fascinating to see how the
>Internet can bring together groups of people with similar interests from
>all over the world.
>
>I'm working a project to develop a global bead database, described at:
>http://www.members.home.com/judvan  We are a group of bead researchers
>(including archaeologists), small bead museums and bead collectors.
>
>As I'm sure you are aware, shells of all types have been used (either
>whole or in part) for beadmaking for thousands of years.
>
>I will now truly reveal my ignorance:  Has any Conchologist focused
>their study on shells used as beads or in beadmaking??  Or are there
>references that discuss the types of shells used in this way?
>
>Websites that might have this type of information, would be greatly
>appreciated.  For example, Worldwide Specimen Shells website is very
>informative:  http://users.erols.com/worldwide/
>
>As this is 'off topic,' if you could respond to me privately?
>
>Thanking you in advance,
>Deborah Zinn
>