"Geoffrey D. Rasmussen" wrote:
> For those following the source examples messages, my apologies for not
> responding sooner, I've just returned from out-of-town.
>
> Now to respond to Mark's comments below...
>
> This used to be a dilemma for me too! How does one set up the source for a
> vital record, such as a birth certificate? I used to have one master
> source, entitled "Birth Certificate". This kept my master source list
> fairly clean. If I wanted to know who all had a birth certificate as a
> source, I could press the show list button, and I would get a big list.
> However...this doesn't help me much for a couple of reasons.
>
> First, I can't take advantage of anything in the master source such as the
> repository, author, comments, etc. For instance, a birth certificate of my
> grandfather is kept at a different repository than one for his wife.
>
> Second, by setting up my birth certificate as outlined on the "tips from the
> experts" site, when I click on the show list button, now I can have a list
> of everyone affected by or mentioned in one person's certificate - more
> useful than a listing of everyone who has a certificate.
>
> Third, having talked to several professors at BYU about documentation
> techniques, each of them explain a bibliography in the same way. For
> instance, if I cited my grandfather's death certificate in my publication,
> this is a unique, master source. It's bibliography entry must include the
> certificate number, the author (State of Idaho, Vital Records Division), and
> the year of death. According to them, it would be wrong for the
> bibliography entry to just say "Birth Certificate".
>
> I completely understand your opinion, which is shared by many others. I
> used to do it your way. Having studied documentation guidelines, talking
> with other professional genealogists, and consulting with History and
> English professors, I have finally decided to do it as outlined on the web
> page. Whichever way we do it, let's all just be consistent!
>
> Thanks for your comments,
>
> Geoffrey D. Rasmussen
> Millennia Corporation
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> http://www.legacyfamilytree.com
>
<snipped for brevity>
Could I make a slight suggestion? You have done a great job of stressing the
importance of documentation and I believe you correctly suggest that each unique
source deserves its own citation, however unwieldy a large number of them may
be. Certainly this is the method suggested by Elizabeth Shown Mills and other
authorities on documentation. My slight suggestion is that you have given an
example of the way in which you source your Vital Records which follows Mills'
suggestion for bibliographical entries (location oriented), but her suggestion
for Primary Citation would be name oriented. I believe she offers two choices
for handling this, location oriented and name oriented. Clearly you were
illustrating how you handle this, but it would be great if a mention could be
that this other way would also be acceptable.
Incidentally, UFT offered Mills' _Evidence!_ as an unlock option purchase with
its product. With the demise of UFT, perhaps Millennia Corp. might consider this
as an additional option to a future version. Should you want to contact Mills, I
have her email address which I would be happy to send via private email if
needed.
Best regards,
Henry Sutliff
