Robert is the editor of the New England Historical and Genealogical Register, the nation’s premier genealogical journal. He is responsible for selecting, arranging, and editing the articles appearing in each issue, reviewing submitted books, and working to keep the quarterly schedule on track—all ably assisted by the Register’s associate editor and consulting editors. Once each issue’s editing has been completed, Robert then works with other members of the Publishing team to lay out the final version before it goes to print.

Robert serves as the point of contact for the Register with the public and within the American Ancestors organization. On the public-facing side, he receives all article submissions and books for review, determines the suitability of those submissions for the Register, and works with the authors of articles in the editing process. He also fields inquiries and other communications about the Register from other American Ancestors staff.

Robert earned an MA in linguistics at the University of Washington in Seattle. He served as an instructor there and later at Western Reformed Seminary in Tacoma and Puyallup, Washington, before signing on as the Register’s twenty-seventh editor since its 1847 inception. Robert is the author of several dozen articles appearing in the Register and other genealogical journals; he was elected a Fellow of the American Society of Genealogists in 2021.