User talk:Jrich/Archive 1 (0-2013)

This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

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[3 December 2010]

I'm ashamed to admit, that I often start with information that comes from source I don't particularly trust. Or at least, sources that can't be reviewed (one-world tree, etc.). When I go through and tidy up such pages, I jettison such useless stuff so there will be no pretext that I know anything with any certainty.

If you have sources that tell a different story than the one that appears there, you should absolutely feel free to indicate them, quote them as appropriate, change the page generally, etc.--Jrm03063 00:09, 7 September 2008 (EDT)

I'm sorry, I posted the wrong source! I got the Micah Palmer date from http://hippeesandee.bravepages.com/gen_an/ances/sco_but/sanc_110.htm. But obviously it doesn't make sense with the stuff that you posted - I'm still figuring out how to do this. Sorry!!--Klingonpixie 10:46, 3 December 2010 (EST)

General Talk Comment & Hannah Bangs Response to Comment

Removing sources does not give the impression you don't know anything about it. It says, to me anyway, "I decided this is the best information available, and you should believe it."

Forgive me for a little bluntness here. There is an old saying in genealogy, "Genealogy without sources is mythology."

Actually, it is worse. Look at Person:Elizabeth Kendall (4). In 1909 William Cutter, an outstanding genealogist, published his correction to his own article (and the work of others before him) showing that James Pierce was the wrong marriage for Elizabeth Kendall (daughter of Francis, the original immigrant). That was about 80 years before the Internet started. Yet my guess is at least 50% of the Internet sites still have the wrong marriage for Elizabeth.

Once you put bad data out there, it is hard to eradicate. At least if you put sources, you can pass the blame. Seriously, at least then people can judge the reliability of your information intelligently. If you are embarrassed by the OneWorldTree sources, all the more reason to identify them, so others aren't fooled.

Instead of spending time merging all those duplicates, spend time finding primary sources. It is actually exhilarating to find one that is not commonly known, and you will feel like you made a difference, rather than just compiling what somebody else compiled before you but couldn't be bothered to make easy for you.

--Jrich 22:34, 7 September 2008 (EDT)

I've added my share of sources, check out my tree and you'll see. I'm also a stickler about leaving explicit information around about defects that have crept into people's GEDCOMs (search on "Disputed Lineages"). Still, there is a rationale to focusing on reducing duplication. When the duplicates are removed, then repair of an error, addition of sources, etc., really can help everyone. If I'm swimming around in my solo area of interest, it's only a matter of luck if someone finds the stuff that I manage to add, much less whether they can tell if it's better than an alternative interpretation.--Jrm03063 10:44, 8 September 2008 (EDT)

Merging/removal of duplicates is important. And diversity of interests is what makes a collaborative effort like WeRelate potentially valuable. My remark in this regard was hasty.

But bad data is like a spinning road sign: many people will waste time going down the wrong road a la Elizabeth Kendall, previously mentioned. Hence, my obsession with sources. I believe everybody can be in possession of the right answer, but in collaboration you have to be willing to prove it to others who may not have access to the same sources, or be emotionally vested in other answers, or just not sensitive to the complexities of some cases.

Assertion is not proof. If you are inputting data with no sources, or based on websites that have no sources, then you are merely asserting your answer, as if your word should be all the proof needed. There are already plenty of websites that do that. There are already mechanisms for searching through ancestral files and OneWorldTree, etc. What is needed to go beyond this is a place to collect source citations and have discussions leading to a concensus on the most likely answer.

I have no problem with "wrong" data, if justification is given. Perhaps it shows that I need to find more evidence for my "right" data. Perhaps I have overlooked something. Perhaps those that say Thomas Skillin was born 1624 in Topsfield, MA actually mean Topsfield, England and there is evidence to support this? Then I want to find out because my data is wrong. Tracing immigrants across the pond is where most errors occur and hence documentation is needed the most.

--Jrich 10:13, 10 September 2008 (EDT)

Bad data that continually re-surfaces is a real problem. I try to deal with it by treating it as "real" data, that should be explicitly acknowledged and then refuted (ideally with a concrete source). My practice has been to put a section at the end of the narrative body called "Disputed Lineages" where I describe the problem/discrepancy/known error, the pages that were incorrectly connected, etc.

To my mind, improving our data base is a bit of a two-step. Of course I don't want to proliferate bad data, but I'm generally not loading new stuff. I approach the merge from the point of view that someone somewhere thinks that what I see in front of me is right. I try then to move werelate in the direction of representing the same thing but without the duplicates. The next step, which I sometimes get into if there are mutually exclusive facts (simultaneous marriages for example), is to start piling up the source material proof.

In a perfect world, folks wouldn't upload unsourced information. But we're awash in such pages. If I can at least boil that down to a set that is closer to the unique set, then added sources will be that much more beneficial.--Jrm03063 10:36, 10 September 2008 (EDT)

James Pierce / Elizabeth Parker [21 November 2008]

Removed the "unknown" marriage. Cleaned up the meaningless citations.

I uploaded an unchecked gedcom before I knew more about this wiki collaboration concept. Cleaning as I go. The dilemma was whether to take it all down again or fix it as I go. Also a new upload would create hundreds of duplicates again.--Tylercolbyhill 12:13, 21 November 2008 (EST)

Thank you. --Jrich 12:48, 21 November 2008 (EST)

Wheeler Error [2 December 2008]

I appologize, I am new to this, and didn't see the comment. If I can help on the cleanup, please let me know. Andy--Awputnam 11:59, 2 December 2008 (EST)

General & Hannah Bangs [3 December 2008]

In general, I agree with your comments toward maintaining data integrity in genealogy. However, without those mythological family recollections which have no documentation, the largest percentage of genealogical research and subsequent finding of data would never have taken place. There is a balance, and both are useful in their own way. For many of us who have become gatherers first, and source documenters second, it would be nice if there were an easy way to annotate to indicate such anomalies in one's database on a person by person basis (prior to any clean-up which may or may not ever take place), considering that such is a thousands of persons task. If one takes the hard-line genealogists' view only, that would indicate that people who do not or cannot follow such strict (and necessary) procedures should not participate, and I find that is not the case. Most people today, who are involved in genealogy (although the term itself might not accurately fit) are not deeply involved in those details...although that is changing to some degree.

Second topic: I am responding to your comments regarding Hannah Bangs, Edward, the Mayflower vs. the Ann, etc. My comment about Kay Blair may be incorrect due to memory issues of my own. Or, it may be a position that she and the DFA have changed based on better research. She is the main contact person for the Doane Family Association (DFA), and I see that you quote their position on it. So either I got it wrong way back or they changed it in their files. Either way, thanks for pointing it out. I've emailed back and forth to her a few times, both long ago and more or less recently. She is very helpful, and would only support good information to the best of her ability. --Dougcouch 16:18, 2 December 2008 (EST)

There is no crime in making mistakes, all the good genealogist have, and any honest person will admit to several, but the stakes get considerably more serious when you post it in a public place. The only good defense is to cite a source of some authority. Besides hiding behind the authority of your source, you also allow others to refute the fact if wrong. Family tradition and all that are no longer accepted as genealogical proof. The position that Edward Bangs was on the Ann seems pretty unanimous in my sources, and it is not new, as for example, the History of Eastham, etc., book that I cited was published in 1844. --Jrich 16:53, 2 December 2008 (EST)

I suppose I'm riding the horse not favored to "win" (haha). Still, the author(s) of History of Eastham, and other similar works of the era, were based on...you got it...family tradition and recollection...their often being written long after those they wrote about had passed on. Genealogists have indeed improved methodology, and agreed upon better criteria for determining facts to be accepted officially. But the data they start with, is not documented before the fact of research, and often enough, research did not go forward on the "needle in the haystack" premise that with a world full of possible locations where someone could have been born, married, died, etc., they would just start anywhere. They had family traditions and recollections to give them one or several starting places to prove or disprove by documentation...if and only if such documentation was available anywhere at all. If it was not, this does not discount the family tradition and recollection. If the documentation was found, it still does not discount the other, because documents are FREQUENTLY inaccurate or entirely wrong in one or more points. Again, thanks for your efforts toward correcting those errors inevitable in the data to the extent possible...it helps a lot! --Dougcouch 19:33, 2 December 2008 (EST)

I believe you under-estimating the amount of work those historians/genealogists undertook if you think significant amounts of their work rested on tradition. Many of them poured over town records, deeds and other sources. Family tradition is only good when you have no documented proof and then you should pursue some form of confirmation of it. Now as we are 100, 150 years later than those works, family tradition is even less reliable, having had to undergo even more tellings...

Not underestimating at all. Just because they did that, does not discount the value of tradition. I never suggested that such tradition was accurate. I also am not suggesting that laboriously studied out and documented records of alleged fact are necessarily accurate...just more often more accurate. And you still get thanks for the work you do. And so do the countless millions of families who kept records of their own...which sometimes are more accurate than town, city, county, state and country records. --Dougcouch 23:58, 2 December 2008 (EST)

Margaret whoever... [31 December 2008]

I figured that there was some certainty that there was a Margaret that was the spouse of that marriage. Whether she was Weeks or someone else is unknown. I don't think there were three such people however...--Jrm03063 15:03, 14 December 2008 (EST)

Don't you think it would be better to have a Family page for Gabriel Wheldon and Margaret Unknown, with one wife named Margaret Matthews and an alt. wife named Margaret Diguina? While the wife is Margaret, people may collect information about the two Margarets on each one's page, which is obviously unique to that Margaret, such as parents and place of origin, and when one is known, just remove the other from the Family page and rename it.

(Sorry about my earlier use of the name Margaret Weeks - shows what happens when you use unknown work without checking - her name would be Matthews if sister to Marmaduke Matthews (see History of Malden, p. 158.)

As it stands now, it says Gabriel Whelden and Margaret Diguina. As I find this scenario basically no more than family tradition, at best, I am not comfortable leaving it so. On the other hand to choose just Gabriel Whelden and Margaret Matthews might annoy some who feel the other story deserves representation until disproven. Either way will mean new people searching for the missing choice will find nothing and end up creating the duplicate again.

--Jrich 17:32, 14 December 2008 (EST)

I stumbled over here hoping to learn more about jrich, and found this; which then took me over to Gabriel Whelden. Interesting find, jrich, that hand-written document that is the source for the Native American Margaret theory.

I became familiar with Whelden while researching my husband's descendancy from Richard Taylor of Sudbury, MA. Many "genealogies" and GEDCOMs, etc., claimed he was of Yarmouth, son of Richard Taylor, the Rock. I therefore spent most of a year researching the Richard Taylors of Yarmouth, including getting to know Gabriel, Margaret and their related controversies past and present.

To make matters more confusing (and interesting) the results of my research draw into question which Richard Taylor Ruth Whelden married and when she died. I've begun to document this research here. I have many more notes offline, including the text of wills. I have confidently proven that Richard Taylor of Sudbury was not the son of Richard Taylor Rock of Yarmouth. In the process, I have begun to question how many Ruth (____) Taylors there were there. From what I can see, there's only one.

I raise this issue here, not only because of the connection to Whelden but also because of the challenge jrich has provided all of us to document document document. My research of the Richard Taylors of Yarmouth revealed a lot of research based on "tradition" -- stories treated as "fact" handed down generation after generation, but with insufficient documentation to support.

All to say: I'm happy to have come over here. And I see that jrich and I have more in common than I thought. ;-) jillaine 02:22, 31 December 2008 (EST)

Nathaniel Moore and Sarah Jackson response [21 February 2011]

Thanks for bring this up. I'll have to look into it. But not sure if much can be found. I'm a bit disappointed in R. G. Clarke's site. When I first started checking it, he was posting just information he found in NYGBS "The Record" so I felt comfortable using it. But it seems to be different now than it was. He uses an old DOS program and it always has been difficult to follow. I really haven't studied the Moore family. More 'stuff' for the gonna-do list! Until I get to it, perhaps I'll put your comments on the Conflicting Data Page and/or in Nathaniel's Notes. Hope that's OK with you. Thanks again. --Janiejac 19:40, 30 January 2009 (EST)

---I've checked into this some more and decided you were right. So I've changed my data base now, uploaded again and noted the correction on my Additions and Changes page. Thanks for bringing this to my attention.--Janiejac 18:07, 6 February 2009 (EST)

---Hi again. Suffolk County! I don't have access to that article either, but did use the info from an earlier study on the Moore's. This is what I put in my Notes after your query: I, Janie, have studied the Southold Index of 1698, Bunker's page 250 about the Moores, and the article published in "The Record" Vol 15, April 1884, pgs 59 & 60 and have come to see that Jrich was correct. So the source references to the Jacob Milton Bergen book have been removed for this particular reference.

Now if there is a later article about the Moores, it would be good to see. Would it be possible for your library to get the publication via inter-library loan? oh, probably not; I don't think they loan genealogy material. So what to do? Which to believe? Do you have access to 'The Record' that I referenced above? That told me more than the other sources and specifically said Nathaniel, s/o Thomas & Martha Youngs m Sarah Vail and that his nephew, Nathaniel, s/o Thomas and 'probably Elizabeth Mott', married Sarah Jackson. Nothing was said about Sarah's birthdate so I removed the date I had. Pls let me know if you learn anything further. --Janiejac 22:00, 7 February 2009 (EST)

PERSI gives following:

• Thomas Moore descendants, Southold, NY; Suffolk County Historical Society Register. Riverhead NY: Mar 1976. Vol. 1 Iss. 4
• Thomas Moore descendants, Southold, NY; Suffolk County Historical Society Register. Riverhead NY: Dec 1975. Vol. 1 Iss. 3
• Thomas Moore descendants, Southold, NY; Suffolk County Historical Society Register. Riverhead NY: Sep 1975. Vol. 1 Iss. 2
• Thomas Moore descendants, Southold, NY; Suffolk County Historical Society Register. Riverhead NY: Jun 1975. Vol. 1 Iss. 1

If I can't find it at my library, I think I can order copies through PERSI. But it takes 6-8 weeks plus it will be some time before I have time to check out the library. --Jrich 22:38, 7 February 2009 (EST)

Thanks so much. I'll check to see if the State Library here (Tallahassee, FL) has these records. I guess in the meantime, I'll leave the data base as is. Genealogy = determination and dogged persistence! --Janiejac 23:09, 7 February 2009 (EST)

Sorry to dribble and drabble. Just passing on what I find.

Source:Ancestors of James Wickham and his wife Cora Prudence Billard, which I found on heritagequest.com, p. 74, says that Ann Hampton, the wife of Benjamin Moore, who was the brother of the older Nathaniel, m. (2) 1691 to "Jeremiah Vail, widower", and as a result Jeremiah Vail was awarded administration on Benjamin Moore's estate. If confirmed, this scenario might explain the brother-in-law reference in the older Nathaniel's 1698 will without requiring that he married Sarah Vail. [The genealogy Source:The ancestry and allied families of Nathan Blake 3rd and Susan (Torrey) Blake : early residents of East Corinth, Vermont adds a wrinkle saying that in a deed dated 25 Jan 1691/2 Thomas Moore calls Jeremiah Vale a son-in-law. This relationship is harder to justify than Nathaniel being a brother-in-law because Sarah Vale as Nathaniel's wife wouldn't account for this. There is the additional possibility that Jeremiah's unknown first wife was a Moore. (P.S. In trying to recheck this, I cannot find it using my own citation above, but it is mentioned in Source:Source:Vail, Henry Hobart. Genealogy of Some of the Vail Family Descended from Jeremiah Vail at Salem, Mass., 1639, p. 31. Perhaps I accidentally listed the wrong source.)]

Ironically, since it seems to refute the evidence I know of supporting Sarah Vail as Nathaniel's wife, this source also says the older Nathaniel married Sarah Vail [as does the Blake genealogy]. It says she was baptized in Salem 21 Mar 1647/8, which would be an appropriate age for the older Nathaniel bp. 1642. The Jeremiah Vail referenced must be Sarah's brother bp. 1649 in Salem, her father having died.

I found the baptisms referred to in the Vital Records of Salem. The Southold Index does not mention Jeremiah Vail having a second wife, only that his will mentions a wife Anna (the above source left the first wife nameless), and though it suggests Benjamin Moore died before 1691 since he was not named in his father's will, it does not identify his wife, nor say anything about a second marriage for her, nor have any particulars about the handling of his estate.

Although the articles on the Moores of Southold referenced earlier are probably of interest to me, it appears that the article I should have cited in regards to the Sarah Vail/Sarah Jackson issue is from Suffolk County Historical Society Register, titled "Historical Address of Charles B. Moore..." in Vol. 9 (1984), p. 104. This is good news for me, as I believe this volume of the register is one listed in the catalogue entry of my favorite library. As soon as I can get back down there... --Jrich 12:03, 8 February 2009 (EST)

As I suspected, my local genealogy library (Cole Library in Carlsbad, CA) had only vol. 6-13 of the Suffolk County Historical Society Register. Therefore I was unable to browse the major article on the Moores of Southold in volume 1, but I was able to see the notes on Charles B. Moore's address in volume 9. This was, after all, the article refuted to clarify the Sarah Vail issue. This article was a reprinting of notes somehow associated with his address. (Since the purpose of the article is to publish the notes, not the address itself, it is unclear to me if they were part of the address, or simply part of his preparation, or even corrections he found afterwards?)

Suffolk County Historical Society Register, Vol. 9, No. 4, p. 103: Celebration of the 250th Anniversary of the Formation of the Town and the Church of Southold, L.I., Notes from "C.B.Moore's Addresss". Note Z. 10. - "Sample of Errors"

Robert Jackson, one of the original settlers of Stamford, Conn., born as early as 1620, married Agnes, daughter of William Washbourne, who came to Long Island from Sandwich with Rev. Mr. Leverich. [..skipping pretty general stuff about Robert..] His daughter Sarah became the wife of Nathaniel, the son of Thomas Moore, shipwright, of Southold, and received a bequest by Robert Jackson's will in 1683. He, Nathaniel, became an active ship master, was employed to carry furniture to Lloyds Neck in 1678, lived until 20 April, 1698, acquired land in Westchester County and left a will, in which he called Jeremiah Vail his brother-in-law. It was hastily supposed from this that he had married a sister of Jeremiah Vail; but this was afterwards found to be an error. Vail had married Anne, the widow of Nathaniel's brother, Benjamin Moore, and in that way was his brother-in-law. Sarah, daughter of Robert Jackson, survived Nathaniel Moore and died his widow on 10th of June 1733. Their son, Nathaniel Moore, Jr., died unmarried in 1699. Their daughter Hannah married John Terry (No. 654 of index), and their daughter Elizabeth married Chistopher Youngs (no 743 of index), and their daughter Deborah married John Boisseau, the Huguenot. There was another daughter, probably unmarried.

Also, at Carlsbad Library, Early Long Island Wills, Suffolk County 1691-1703, William S. Pelletreau, publ by Francis P. Harper, New York, 1897, p. 158

Will of "Nathaniel Moor of S'hold in ye County of Suffolk on Long Island in ye Province of New York", dated 19 Apr 1698, mentions "my beloved wife Sarah Moor", "my son Nathaniel Moor" [under age] "be put out to learne such a trade as he do most incline to", "my father Thomas Moor", "my five daughters" "at ye age of eighteen years or the day of their marriage which shall first happen", "my brother in law Jeremaih Vale & my son in law John Terry shall be ye only Executors".

Summarizing my current thoughts, I still like the Sarah Vail scenario best. The problem with basing the in-law references on Jeremiah Vail's marriage to Anne (Hampton) Moore, is that once Benjamin Moore died, I don't think Ann would any longer qualify to be a daughter-in-law of Thomas or sister-in-law of Nathaniel, making the in-law references in both cases a little stretched.

I would like to see more information about John Jackson Moore, but assuming that this was his legal name (and not something assigned him by some researcher to distinguish him from other John Moores) it would indicate Sarah Jackson is a very likely candidate for his mother. However it seems unlikely that the older Nathaniel Moore was his father, as no son John is mentioned in his will, and he should have been, being about 7 at the time the will was written. Therefore, it would seem to make sense that Sarah Jackson married the younger Nathaniel Moore, son of Nathaniel's brother Thomas, Jr.

There is still that nagging problem, that the best estimates we have of birth dates make Sarah Jackson about 8 years older than the younger Nathaniel Moore. Not impossible, but not typical. So clearly, more information is needed... --Jrich 19:27, 20 February 2009 (EST)

Thank you so much for the info and your thoughts on this matter. May I use your several paragraphs above (maybe slightly edited) on a web page I would create for my Conflicting Data Section on my Jackson site? If so, you might consider giving me your name and email address so I can give you credit and/or in case anyone would like to contact you. But whatever you decide is OK with me. I do appreciate your concern that I/we get this as correct as possible. --Janiejac 20:36, 20 February 2009 (EST)

Heritage Quest [1 February 2009]

Hello
I noticed that you created a new Repository for Heritage Quest. I wanted to let you know that we have a page here Repository:Heritage Quest Online for the same resource (I've been referencing it a lot myself in the last few days :>)--Jennifer (JBS66) 10:13, 1 February 2009 (EST)

I was surprised when I didn't find it, but I made the mistake of searching for "HeritageQuest" one word and nothing was returned.--Jrich 10:17, 1 February 2009 (EST)

GPS Genealogical Proof Standards [9 February 2009]

Thank you for posting those comments and that link on the JUNK page! Genealogical Proof Standard. That was very helpful and I'm able to pass on the link. I appreciate your taking the time to respond to me. I was sort of 'off-topic' but that was the only place I could think of to post such a thing. The responses from both you and Julliane were helpful! I'm sure I'll be referring back to those standards again and again. I also can relate to your stages of development of a genealogist. I'm sure most of us can find ourselves somewhere there. --Janiejac 13:13, 9 February 2009 (EST)

Thank you [5 April 2009]

You are a breath of fresh air. (But I say that to everyone who agrees with me!) jillaine 21:09, 14 February 2009 (EST)

Second this! Your "progress of the online genealogist," from unquestioning acceptance to doing original research, brings to mind the Stages of Grief. I think there's a basic, almost genetic, difference between the mindset of those of us who began "doing genealogy" long before computers or the Internet, and those (usually much younger) people who don't even own a dictionary because they can always look up words online. (And I say this as someone whose first home computer was a TRS-80 Model I, back around 1979.) My wife and I teach "Beginner Genealogy" classes every year in LSU's continuing education department, and it's always a struggle to balance for the students the undoubted usefulness of data copied online (so quick, so easy) with the necessity of still going to a courthouse and pawing through the probate files, for instance. But for me, that's the fun part! --mksmith 13:55, 5 April 2009 (EDT)

Could you review a merge? [2 March 2009]

Hi,

Could you review a merge that you did a couple of weeks ago: http://www.werelate.org/wiki/Special:ReviewMerge/18839 ?

It looks like these two people had the same father but different mothers. Given that the first mother died shortly after the first Mehetabel was born, and that the second Mehetabel was born a few years later, I'm wondering if the father remarried and had another son with his new wife but called him the same name (perhaps the first Mehetabel died)? Anyway, after reviewing the merge if you feel that the two Mehetabel's shouldn't have been merged, you can unmerge them by clicking on the Unmerge button at the bottom of the ReviewMerge screen. Thanks!--Dallan 11:24, 2 March 2009 (EST)

I won't argue that the scenario described [an earlier daughter by first wife who died in infancy] isn't possible, but the original page said born "abt. 1647" and no sources were cited, so it is hardly convincing. Given that the Barnstable, Mass., Vital Records (transcribed below) appears to show all of Henry's children, including some who died in infancy, and did not include this Mehitable, and given that the birth of son Eleazer crowds out most of 1647 as a possible birth year, I think the merge was, and still is, reasonable. I would need to see some evidence to think that there was another daughter named Mehitable.

From Source:Mayflower Descendant on p. 3:73

[p.399] The births of ye Children of Henry Cob
his son John Born at Plymoth 7 of June 1632
his son James born at Plymoth 14 of January 1634
his Daughter Mary born at Situate 24 of March 1637
his Daughter Hannah born at Situate 5 Octo’r 1639
at Barnstable
his Daughter Patience born About 15 of March 1641
his Son Gershom born About 10 January 1644
his son Eleazer born About 30 March 1648
patience his Wife buried 4 of May 1648
Henry Cob & Sarah Hinkley Married 12 of Decem : 1649
His Daughter Mehitable born 1 Sep 1651 & buried 8th of March 1652
his Son Samuel born 12 October 1654 & Died 7 of December 1727 Et: 74.
his Daughter Sarah born 15 January 1658 & buried 25 January 1658
his Son Jonathan born 10 of Aril 1660
his Daughter Sarah born 10 of March 1662/3
his Son Henry born 3 of Sept: 1665
his Daughter Mehitable 15 Feb: 1667
his Daughter Experience 11 Sept 1671.

--Jrich 12:59, 2 March 2009 (EST)

But note another inconsistency:

• Your Mayflower Descendant record indicates that Mehitable Cobb born 1651 died the following year 1652.
• The merge review indicates that Mehitable Cobb b 1651 did not die until the 1720s.

Isn't it likely then, that the Mehitable Cobb who died in the 1720s is she who was born much later (1688? sorry don't have two screens open).

I'm following this because I'm familiar with a Yarmouth/Barnstable Cobb-Taylor marriage involving a Mehitable.

I can't help but wonder if there was a 1647 Mehitable Cobb born to some other Cobb marriage? I wonder this because of the year discrepancy between 1647 (or 1651 for that matter) and the 1688 birth of the later Mehitable.

-- jillaine 13:41, 2 March 2009 (EST)

Yep.

But I did not create the Mehitable Cobb page that I merged. I just did the merge with the other Mehitable Cobb having parents Henry Cobb and Patience Hurst. When I started working on this page, the children were not correctly attributed to the various parents, with some of Patience Hurst's children born after her death (i.e. belonged to second wife Sarah), duplicates of several of the children (e.g. Eleazer and Eliezer), and it included Augustine Person:Augustine Cobb (1) and Edward Cobb Person:Edward Cobb (1) who belong to a different Cobb family (perhaps the Mehitable b. 1647 is a sibling/child of Augustine and Edward, but I am unfamiliar with that family, and the page I found had her in this family, so I assumed she was a duplicate like Eleazer, and merged her away given again that no source citation was presented.) The family was clearly majorly messed up and all I was trying to do was to sort out the children to get it approximately correct. I have not finished my research on this family and when I do I will feel more qualified to come back to this page and correct all the children.

Clearly the Mehitable Cobb who lived into the 1720's must be the last so-named daughter b. 1667, not the one b. 1651 who d. 1652. Or alternatively, not from this family. I do not know where the 1727 date came from, and did not want to remove it until I knew where it should go...

--Jrich 14:16, 2 March 2009 (EST)

(We should probably move this whole thread over to the Mehitable (talk) page in question. -- jillaine 15:07, 2 March 2009 (EST))

It wasn't clear which Mehitable was the best one to move it too, so I just put it here so it's out of Dallan's way. --Jrich 15:53, 2 March 2009 (EST)

Sounds good to me. I was just going through a system-generated list of suspicious merges; I haven't spent anywhere close to the thinking that you have on it.--Dallan 17:26, 2 March 2009 (EST)

Thank You - Crandle Family Merges [7 March 2009]

Hello Jrich,

I just wanted to say Thank you for your work to merge the Crandle Family pages.

I am slowly fixing my pages, and changing or adding the sources.

Debbie Freeman --DFree 09:58, 7 March 2009 (EST)

Mary, wife of John Crandall of RI [7 March 2009]

Hello,

This is what was printed in the Crandall genealogy -- "John married (1) (perhaps a woman named Mary OPP) about 1648 in Newport Co., Rhode Island. Mary [?] was born about 1625 in England. She died on 20 Aug 1669 in Westerly, Washington Co., Rhode Island and was buried at the Homestead in Westerly, Washington Co., Rhode Island."

Over the years many well qualified researchers have not been able to prove this name nor has any circumstantial evidence emerged to support that surname choice. Also, at the time the book was written it was thought that John Crandall was from Wales. Research recently published shows that he was not from Wales but from Gloucestershire. The only proven fact is that the wife's name was Mary and her date of death.

A person associated with the Crandall Family Association has written the following: "... John Crandall, baptized at Westerleigh, Gloucestershire, 15 February 1617/8, was the son of James and Eleanor Crandall. "Mary Opp" seems to be fictitious as well. The name "Opp" doesn't seem to exist." --Susan Irish 17:51, 7 March 2009 (EST)

Susan, this is good information that should probably be added to a "Discrepancies" section on Mary's person page or at least on her talk page. It's very helpful info. -- jillaine 22:34, 7 March 2009 (EST)

Sherman sources [15 March 2009]

Hi, Of course, you are correct about the source for Hannah Sherman's year of birth. Unfortunately, when I first started collecting family data I wasn't as careful about getting the complete title of the book or other source. My data on Philip Sherman and family comes from a Sherman genealogy, page 24, that I found at a library. I am still looking for the complete title. Children's dates listed are: Eber b. Dec 1634 Roxbury m. Mary Wilcox {however, current Wilcox research published in NEHGR can't establish the existance of a Mary Wilcox to be this wife}; Sarah b. Oct. 1636 Roxbury m. Thomas Mumford; Peleg b. May 1638 Portsmouth m. July 26, 1657 Elizabeth Lawton; Mary b. Nov. 1639, d.y.; Edmund b. Apr 1641 m. Dorcas Hicks; Samson b. Apr 1642 m. Isabel Tripp; Wm b. 1643, d. 1646; John b Apr(Aug) 1644 m. Sarah Spooner; Hannah b. 1647 m. Wm Chase; Samuel b 1648 m. Martha Tripp; Benj b 1650 m. Hannah Mowry; Philippa b Oct. 1, 1652 m. Benj Chase. --Susan Irish 17:42, 15 March 2009 (EDT)

Caldwell County, Texas, United States. Marriage Books [14 April 2009]

Hello Jrich,

I noticed there's a bit of a mistake in the title for this source: Source:Caldwell County, Texas, United States. Marriage Books... The place hierarchy in the title should be reversed. I'm wondering - before you rename it, can you provide more details on this so I can check if this source exists here already? Thank you!--Jennifer (JBS66) 12:05, 14 April 2009 (EDT)

The title was built by WeRelate. When searching for this source, I put in a location of United States, Texas, Caldwell County, and a title of Marriage Books. The search didn't seem to find anything, though I did not go through the 43000 sources it returned, just the first page. So I asked it to create a page, and what you see is what WeRelate did with it. Perhaps I should have specified the location as Caldwell, Texas, United States in the search parameters, but having just reviewed the source title help page which specifies the reversed ordering, I used the ordering asked for there. --Jrich 12:12, 14 April 2009 (EDT)

I think what happened is that WR's add source for geographic records is programed that when you put in the place covered (and waiting for a few seconds to choose the correct drop-down option), it automatically reverses it for you. You were trying to outsmart it I bet :-) I'm guessing that you may have put in the title reversed and the program - well - messed it all up! Also, is this the rootsweb source you were referring to? [1]--Jennifer (JBS66) 12:21, 14 April 2009 (EDT)

I don't add that many sources, and having been surprised the by having the place get put into the title before (in previous experiences, I had intuitively entered it to refine the search, bringing back less records, not because I thought the source was geographically oriented), I was trying to anticipate what was going to happen. So, yes I outsmarted the system, or more accurately, vice-versa.

No, the site you cited is Missouri, not Texas. The site is [2], but the note there says they are rebuilding. I have no idea if the data that used to be on the Caldwell County rootsweb will be there or not, so didn't want to give this URL until I or someone could verify it.

--Jrich 12:33, 14 April 2009 (EDT)

Regarding the above link - sorry, I meant to post this one instead: [3]. Oh, and you are so going to hate me right now :-) Ready.... United States, Texas, Caldwell. Marriage Books - no inclusion of the word county for the place in the title. If this link is accurate, they specify the dates being 1848-1893, you might want to include that in the title, like you did for your other source today. --Jennifer (JBS66) 12:43, 14 April 2009 (EDT)

Your new comments about sources [23 April 2009]

Hi

I liked seeing your points about sharing sources. You pointed to two ideas that you've encountered to the effect that you shouldn't share your sources because

1. It will make people come to you for the information, and so will improve their genealogy
2. Somebody will learn something that only you know (and we can't have that can we?)

The first time I heard people making these points I didn't realize they were serious. They are so non-sensical to my way of thinking that I thought they were making a joke. Unfortunately, that's what they really believe. So sad.

Frustrating isn't it. Q 10:27, 23 April 2009 (EDT)

Are such people really here on WeRelate? I haven't encountered such yet? Wow. You're right: this is not the place for them. jillaine 13:34, 23 April 2009 (EDT)

Haven't encountered them here, but I have encountered them on selected mailing lists---lists for areas with lots of PG type folks, and where I woudn't expect to see neophytes. Q 13:44, 23 April 2009 (EDT)

Oh, I don't think it's neophytes who want to hold their data close to their chests; I think it's previous (pre-Internet) generations of pretty serious/experienced researchers. I run into this all the time. But I have not seen it here at WeRelate yet. jillaine 14:06, 23 April 2009 (EDT)

Beardslee/Beardsley [13 May 2009]

jrich, I have seen many references to this famiy that indicate the ee spelling was used for the first 2 or 3 generations, I think rather than eliminate it, it should be kept as an alternate spelling.--Scot 11:56, 12 May 2009 (EDT)

Sorry, I was just merging pages off the duplicate list. As a general rule, I don't get too fanatic about colonial spelling. It was so variable, and with many families, it was determined as much by the town clerk as by the family itself. So in merging two pages named Beardsley and Beardslee, I would generally favor the modern spelling. But I think adding Beardslee as an alternate is fine. It may avoid the creation of more duplicate pages in the future. --Jrich 12:10, 12 May 2009 (EDT)

Excuse the butt-in, but My personal rule for things like this, is that you use the spelling associated with a persons primary records. If he (or the clerk) used "ee", that's what you use, even if later generations adopted a different spelling. If his personal records use a variety of spellings, and none can be given precedance over the other records, then you follow the usually accepted convention among researchers who have dealt with the person. If there's no concensus view, then you either use your personal preference, or you use the modern spelling, assuming there's a concensus there. Q 15:52, 12 May 2009 (EDT)

Do you favor the spelling in their birth record over a different spelling in their death record? The first occurrence in the document or the last? If the child is named differently than the parent in a birth record, which one takes precedence? The minister's return (who maybe knew the person) versus the town clerk's spelling in a marriage license? What if, like some of the older records, the names were Latinized?

Colonial spelling was phonetic. Especially names. Writing was not a universal skill. The only primary record that maybe says anything to me is a signature or other document written by the person themselves. Which of course requires seeing the original document which is not something I get to do often. My goal in WeRelate is put data here so people can find it. Do they know the original spelling if they haven't seen the original document? All things considered, I feel no real need to preserve the colonial spelling versus a modern spelling, except as mentioned, namely that putting colloquial spellings in as an alternate name might help searching work better and prevent creation of duplicates since some people do use it. --Jrich 16:08, 12 May 2009 (EDT)

You might not feel the need to preserve the spelling, but if the records consistently make use of one spelling, or predominantly so, then the spelling to use is the one best supported by primary records. An arbitrary choice based on modern usage, is just that: arbitrary. Focusing on just a few records usually gives an incomplete answer. Usually what's needed is an exhaustive search of the primary records. If that's been done, and there is simply no basis to chose one spelling over another, then it doesn't make much difference, any choice will be "wrong". And no, while many folks were not literate in colonial times, a good many were and definitely showed a preference in spelling their name. I can point to families in southwest Virginia (where I have at least attempted exhaustive searches) the spelling of the name is often quite distinctive, and you can use the variations in spelling that did occur, to tell which person a record does apply to. The surname "Edmondson" was often spelled "Edmiston" for certain persons. Col John Edmiston, for example, consistently used the Edmiston spelling, though there are occassional instances where another variant was used. He was locally important, and I suspect the clerks of the court took pains to get his name right as he expected. Other family members used the Edmondson spelling, but both spellings continued on consistently in certain lines. But to draw conclusions like that requires exhaustive data collection. Most folks stop with one or two records, and so can be mislead. Q 17:08, 12 May 2009 (EDT)

Some of the town clerks spelled at a elementary school level. Why preserve their spelling? It may be arbitrary to prefer modern variations, but it is also arbitrary to choose one town clerk's spelling over another. The only person that can pretend to have any real authority is the person themselves. Thus Person:Thomas Prence (2) and not Thomas Prince, since that is the way he signed his name.

I sure wouldn't trust spelling differences between two variations of the same name before the 1800s as a reliable identification, except to the extent it correlates to a specific town clerk and hence to a specific location. Thus Person:Benjamin Skillings (2) is recorded as Benjamin Skillion because he is Marblehead, and "Mr. Skillin" in Willis' History of Portland is Person:Benjamin Skillings (3), not because the name is spelled differently, but because the record is in Maine. (And my gr-grandmother spelled it "Skillin" but I use Skillings in WeRelate because that is what other people in MyRelate use and I know it is all the same family.) --Jrich 18:31, 12 May 2009 (EDT)

Even if the people were literate, spelling was not yet standardized. The first American Dictionary wasn't published until 1828 by Noah Webster. Many of the spelling variants are still in use today even within related families such as Mead/Meade Smith/Smythe etc. I have a family in Virginia by the name of Sullivant. I first though it a misprint, but soon found they used this spelling consistantly for generations, though I doubt this form survives today. Wills are predictably inconsistant as they were often dictated even if the testator was literate, he could have been too weak to put pen to paper. Often a name could be spelled multiple ways within the same document. I tend to try to use the spelling the individual went by, if known and include as alternate other, or modern spellings if used by descendants. I don't think it a big issue though, as a good search engine that employs fuzzy logic will probably find the entry. User delijim has been editing some of my pages for a family, Scotch-Irish in origin, named Doak, I have seen some discussion that it may be the same as Doig but no proof is offered. I'm not sure there really is a right or wrong here. It is interesting to see the evolution of spellings or even names over the years. Of course, many non English immigrants have Anglicized, but that is another issue entirely. There is an old Dutch family from New Amsterdam that began as van Kouwenhoven the dropped the van, then became Couwenhoven and is now universally (I presume)to be Conover.--Scot 18:37, 12 May 2009 (EDT)

Yes, all that's true enough. So your answer is to use the modern spelling, and ignore the contemporary records because they are automatically wrong. That's a legitimate approach, I think, only when an exhaustive search of the records gives an inconclusive answer. If you've done an exhaustive search, and can't reach a conclusion, well and good. But most folks don't do an exhaustive search. Relying on the convenience of assuming the spelling is wrong because "they were mostly illiterate, and the clerks weren't much better", is the easy way out. But then, different folks do genealogy differently. Q 18:49, 12 May 2009 (EDT)

That's not what I said at all. Read my post again before you flame me.--Scot 18:54, 12 May 2009 (EDT)

I see no flame there. If you do, I'm sorry. Nothing was intended. Q 19:00, 12 May 2009 (EDT)

I don't think there is a right or wrong, and if one has done anything approaching an exhaustive search, it is pretty obvious what accepted practice is, and that is probably the best answer. The main purpose is communication with others. My positions above are based on fears that insisting on historical spellings will get in the way of being a useful page. In researching the Larrabee family, some get recorded as Leatherby, and some spellings end up as Tetherly. What I know is that they are all the same family, and feel it is clearer by orders of magnitude to title the page Larrabee, giving the transcription/abstract using its original colloquial spelling. Using the modern name basically communicates to everybody, whereas the historically accurate name may be inaccessible to large numbers.

However, if the spelling of the name in the title is used that doesn't fit all the evidence, there are many ways to address the issue: adding the variant spelling to the Surname page, adding it as an alternate name, noting it in the narrative, or giving a transcription of a source. --Jrich 21:12, 12 May 2009 (EDT)

I guess its a matter of what is seen as acceptable practice. Q 21:19, 12 May 2009 (EDT)

My original point. If 2 different spellings were commonly in use, both should be retained to show that they are the same family.--Scot 12:14, 13 May 2009 (EDT)

van Aken - Thank You [17 May 2009]

Hello Jrich,

I wanted to say Thanks for the help. I appreciate it. Debbie Freeman --DFree 10:29, 17 May 2009 (EDT)

Wilk and Sibley [26 May 2009]

Hello Jrich

I was notified this morning that you had made some changes or updates to John Wilks and Mary Sibley. I clicked on the link to see the changes and I see the information in red which I think is your updates but I don't think I'm reading this correctly because I don't see how the changes are different than what was already there. Do you have a moment to teach me how to read the edit screens so I can understand and better collaborate with members on werelate who I share ancestors with. Many thanks, Deanna--Deannabullock 12:33, 26 May 2009 (EDT)

Category complaint [8 June 2009]

Regarding this statement: Third, this is a task that should be automated if it is going to be done. Assuming this is a way to flag pages for future cleanup, it is too large for one or even a group of people to do. It will be done unevenly, and possibly unfairly. Look how many duplicates remain. Let's finish that task before we start (and eventually abandon) some other crusade.

For your information, although I am not sure why I need to explain my edits on WeRelate to you; I merged pages last night and it was getting late and I was tired of merging so I decided to search for and edit pages that were sourced with One World Tree. Since the policy is to remove these sources from merged pages, which I did not propose, I removed the source but thought it would be a good idea to show where the information came from, so I created the category which was vigorously opposed to by you. Your approach in asking me about the edits and category were not perceived by me as an impersonal objection to my decisions. I don't have any problem with someone asking me politely about why I used such and such a category.

Anyway I deleted the category and the source, so I am now consistent with the merging approach.

I volunteer on WeRelate and I don't appreciate you telling me how to use my volunteer time. What exactly does this mean "before we start (and eventually abandon) some other crusade".?

I assume we are all here and volunteer because we like the idea of the Wiki and WeRelate. Happy to work with you; but would very much like to clear the air, which is getting quite stuffy for me.--Beth 19:57, 8 June 2009 (EDT)

There was absolutely nothing personal in my remarks. I didn't think what you were doing was necessarily good to start with (see Using GEDCOMS as Sources for my views), and I thought you were misusing categories. As a member of the WeRelate community, I do feel I have an equal right to voice objections to your edits, especially if they touch a page I am watching, but even if they don't.

If there was an edge in my remarks, which I thought there wasn't, it probably was a result of thinking your changes appeared to be somewhat punitive. You could have just deleted the source. So, first, using categories seemed to be a way, not of marking the page as needing more work, since you removed the source yourself, but of permanently reminding the offending contributer they had erred by using a sub-par source. And, second, you made sure to note the same thing in the narrative section where it came up right at the top of the page, as if inclusion in the category wasn't enough.

Using the category also had the side-effect of losing some of the information from the source citation. In the example I saw, the contributor appeared to have named the Ancestry tree they used, which presumably could enable somebody to go look at the tree if they had access to Ancestry, and maybe it was even one of those few trees that have sources. By putting the page into a category instead, there is no way to communicate this tree name. So information was lost.

I looked at the category page, and something like 15 pages belonged to the category. As there are over 1 million pages in werelate, it would probably take longer than most person's patience to complete the task you started. Thus, unless you have the cooperation of the community at large, as is the case with the merge project, this is likely to be a crusade started and abandoned. I do sympathize with the dislike of under-justified genealogy. --Jrich 21:15, 8 June 2009 (EDT)

I definitely perceived an edge but probably just my Southern interpretation. So we have 2 different viewpoints; I don't have a problem with that. I perceived what I was doing as helpful to show how the page was originally sourced but following the guidelines for the merging of pages and you perceived it as punitive. I did not look at it as another "Crusade" but spending some time on editing a few pages to improve the pages. While I was on the pages I also combined the same multiple sources into one if they existed. I also edited some pages the other day and added sources from a book I own but I did not edit every page that might be referenced in the book. It is not a point of unfairness but just in editing the pages that one has time or finds the time to improve upon. So I will continue with my edits and may even create more categories and will expect your comments.--Beth 21:31, 8 June 2009 (EDT)

Thanks! for What Links here... [9 June 2009]

That is so exciting! Thanks for the tip on "what links here." I had not noticed it before (I haven't been here very long). I'm going to run right out and play with that little feature! (really, you'd laugh if you saw me; I'm all fidgety and ready to quit work so I can go play with my sources...)

Thought it best to write you directly so as to not clutter up the watercooler. I'm still trying to learn the protocols for wiki-ness...

Thanks again, Brenda--Kennebec1 15:40, 9 June 2009 (EDT)

Wikipedia source AND content entries... [18 June 2009]

I don't think you know what you're agreeing with in the discussion on Susan Irish's talk page. I think your claim is that a wikipedia content extraction obviates the need for an explicit wikipedia source. That wasn't the question here. In this case, the question was whether the content extraction is needed if the source entry is present.

Other questions that you seem to be opening:

  * The "wikipedia is lame" argument.  Sometimes it is, but I've always found it more useful than what we had - if anything - in WR to begin with.

  * WP isn't a primary or "real" source.  Sure, but very little is - it's always a question of degree.  Even a birth certificate relies on the sworn statements of humans - people do screw things up now and then.  The only way to deal with this is to get as many reasonably available and commonly used sources included so that a thorough analysis can occur of what is good/useful/correct and what isn't.  Further, the secondary sources are typically where we start - leading us to the primary sources.  It just can't be better to be devoid of sources than to use a secondary source.

  * It's a web site, and web sites come and go.  Yeah, that's true for individually hosted sites, but WP - or something containing it's content - is here to stay.

If you want to carry this debate further, great, please take it to the watercooler or source discussion place.--Jrm03063 16:14, 18 June 2009 (EDT)

Wikipedia is, and always will be a secondary source. Often a very good one perhaps, at least for subjects famous enough to be included, and one I have used, but still secondary. I never even came close to saying it was lame and that is not part of my thinking nor argument.

But it is secondary and so it has the same limitations that other secondary sources have. Just as an example, on one of the pages cited, for William Stanley, 6th Earl of Derby, the Wikipedia page only cites two websites. No published histories, etc. The only contemporary evidence referred to is to support whether or not he wrote some of Shakespeare's works. The genealogy information is asserted without proof or reference. Neither of the cited websites seem to give any proof or references either. I know family trees on worldconnect that provide more genealogical proof than that page.

I was responding to Susan's use of the word redundant, not whether she wanted the template or the source citation to be eliminated, or whether she mistook the template for a redundant source citation, or something different. I have run across pages where the only material on the right side is the narrative sucked in from Wikipedia with a message identifying it as such, followed by a separate citation of wikipedia as a source. It strikes me as redundant. If you have good primary sources, the narrative from Wikipedia can help tie them together and summarize, but the source citation of wikipedia is not really necessary. And if you don't have good primary sources, you still don't even if you cite Wikipedia, so why not let the narrative speak for itself. A Wikipedia citation is not a substitute for primary sources, whether it be baptism registers, the books Wikipedia is summarizing, the wills, transcriptions of letters, etc.

Wikipedia's strength lies in the number of eyes that review it. WeRelate will have that strength in its own right one day. But Wikipedia's reviewers may have subtly different goals. I suspect many Wikipedia authors have no genealogical training, and perhaps are not even used to doing genealogical research. As a trivial illustration, I would like to suggest that the second daughter Elizabeth, of William Stanley, was named after her mother, not after "her deceased older sister". (The current Wikipedia assertion just begs the question, "who was the older sister named after?") Or more seriously, do they present all not-yet-disproven genealogies, or only the one they distilled out of several works as the most likely? For example, on Person:Thomas Prence (1), Wikipedia says he had 3 wives. Actually, that is one answer that we can rule out, since he named wife Mary in his will. His second wife was Mary. So he either had two (Patience and Mary) or he had four (Patience, Mary, Apphia, and Mary). I have read strong arguments either way, an open question in my mind, though the answer of 4 is more accepted (by the Great Migration Study for example). But, regardless, no hint of a controversy on the Wikipedia page, which simply states an impossible answer as if it was fact.

--Jrich 18:30, 18

Source pages with links [27 August 2009]

Hi, it would be a great help if you could handle the pages with links while I am doing the deletions. If you can here is the latest one.--Beth 19:40, 26 August 2009 (EDT) Source:Past and present of the city of Decatur and Macon County, Illinois

I am a little worried about this. I have used some sources numerous (hundreds?) of times that had multiple FHL numbers. Sometimes I took the time to remove the FHL number, sometimes not. When I did not, I usually selected the lowest FHL number figuring it probably will show up on the list first and most people will use it. If all the cases of this create duplicates, that is going to be a lot of work, which I thought could/would have been automated??? --Jrich 20:16, 26 August 2009 (EDT)

Probably you should post your concerns on the source renaming page. I have not been involved with the selection of page deletions, so I am not quite sure of the criteria used. I am only deleting the pages after they appear on the Speedy Delete page to help Judy and Solveig. My volunteer task is the Duplicate Project review and I just did this today to help since so many pages are ending up in the Speedy Delete. --Beth 20:30, 26 August 2009 (EDT)

Beth & Jrich -- You may notice that a great many -- probably most -- of the pages in "speedy delete" have FHL film numbers. Those are not being copied over to the page that is kept. Information on actual reprint editions is being merged into the kept page. We're not bothering to keep the film numbers because (1) you can't tell what's actually on a film just by looking at the number (so you have to go to the catalog anyway), (2) different printings of the same edition of the same book have different film numbers (so you would have to separate out and label the numbers), (3) many pages don't have film numbers and just link you to FamilySearch anyway (which makes a lot more sense), and (4) we want to get this thing finished! So: Don't worry about the film numbers. :-) --Mike (mksmith) 21:26, 26 August 2009 (EDT)

I am not worried about film numbers at all. I was worried about the links to the multiple pages that are now duplicates. One or the other is getting deleted, right? That leaves a lot of dangling links. It seems like it should be handled by a redirect, or by updating the links automatically. Some pages with film numbers are going to have say 100 links to it. I don't want to have to go update 100 pages to point at the duplicate page... --Jrich 22:29, 26 August 2009 (EDT)

Well, Dallan said (or agreed with someone else, I forget) that it really doesn't hurt anything. At worst, it leaves the orphaned page with a red link. If we try to repair all the links to all the duplicate pages we're merging, it's going to take another six months to finish. So it's just another thing to shrug off. I suspect he can come up with a script to search out the surviving page and re-link to it (since the system already knows what the page is supposed to be), but that's for later. --Mike (mksmith) 15:19, 27 August 2009 (EDT)

Well, actually Mike probably as your were typing this Dallan now says not to delete any sources with links. Hard to keep up with this source renaming business, isn't it?--Beth 15:24, 27 August 2009 (EDT)

Not to mention that he's a couple hundred duplicate sources too late. --Mike (mksmith) 15:28, 27 August 2009 (EDT)

Thanks for fixing the page with links. None of the last batch had any links. If your linked page gets deleted let me know and I can restore the page. --Beth 22:39, 26 August 2009 (EDT)

Source Renaming Piece on Your User Page [31 August 2009]

Jrich,

You've written an extensive piece on your User page with your thoughts about the Source renaming going on. I admire that you moved this off the working page and your reasons for doing so. Yet by placing it on your User page, it does not invite comment. Was that your intention? -- jillaine 08:37, 31 August 2009 (EDT)

Okay, elsewhere you said to respond on your talk page, so I'm doing so. Just a few things:

• Re design: I'm less concerned about the page titles now than before, although your point there makes it clear that we will have to have some really clear help text. I'm more interested in working out a better display of the Source pages, and was happy to see that Dallan is open to that.
• Re webpages as sources, you seem to be focusing on web sites of family trees/gedcoms. Is that true? Because I absolutely do not understand the current situation about webpages *generally* to be as you wrote:

Now, it appears they are supposed to be created as MySources, meaning they will not be returned in a typical search, unless you think they will be of interest to other people.

This is what makes me think you're actually talking about web pages containing family trees/GEDCOMs (as opposed to web pages containing, for example, transcriptions of vital records or something). So assuming that you *are* discussing web pages containing family trees/GEDCOMs, I think your point about exiling them to MySources resulting in reduced search results is wise and should be considered. At least in terms of documentation. I think this topic alone is worth discussing on the appropriate Talk page.

• Lumping together sources that are not identical on one source page. Yeah, I think we're not completely resolved about this one and that this may come back to bite us. But maybe not. We'll find out.

• Too many source pages -- especially the Census pages. I am SO with you on this, and I know that others feel the same way. My own use of census source pages is at the year-state level (i.e., 1900 U.S. Federal Census - New York), and then adding more specific info within the citation specifics, but I could easily see just one source per federal census year. Doing it at the county level is insane in my opinion, but I don't think we're going to win this fight-- there's too much that has already been done. Finding the appropriate census source record with the search engine is insane. And to align my GEDCOM's census sources with WeRelate's would require that I change hundreds if not thousands of records in my database. Ain't gonna happen, so I leave my census source citations as MySources.

-- jillaine 09:32, 31 August 2009 (EDT)

Thanks [31 August 2009]

Hi thanks for the support. Looks like she does have another user name and I can find no record of any deletion.

I have had several issues about me "messing with their trees" over the last few weeks. I believe that we need to post a message on the main page of WeRelate clearly stating that users' pages are part of the WeRelate community and may be edited by any user and also mention the license under which we operate with a link to the license definition. --Beth 17:53, 31 August 2009 (EDT)

Mary Freeman (Hinckley pages) [29 October 2009]

Looking at Person:Mary Freeman (1), I gather from looking at User:Butterfieldjv contributions that they are no longer here (all are dated 2007), so I think it's just you and I (and whoever else...) looking at these pages. So I've decided to go ahead and remove the AF# and the citations to the GEDCOM, as they are clutter and not very helpful. Do you think the invalid death date should remain on the person page, since it is commonly cited? Or should it be removed and just remain referenced in your sources for the later death date?--Brenda (kennebec1) 11:02, 29 October 2009 (EDT)

I will happily leave it to you to do whatever makes sense to you, it is peripheral to me. (Not that it isn't interesting. I wonder though if the oft-mentioned marriage to Mary Demond is just a misspelling of Mary Freeman? I haven't found any evidence of her yet, but don't have that many Maine resources.) Reasons for leaving the wrong date as an alternate date, possibly with a note saying it is wrong, would be so future searches using that wrong data get a hit, come to this page and see the correct data. Or delete it and explain why on the talk page, so you have noted that the data exists and was rejected if you want to be thorough. Or simply delete it. I doubt it would get put back unless someone ignores the sources altogether, because they seem pretty conclusive. --Jrich 11:16, 29 October 2009 (EDT)

I often leave incorrect dates for the reasons jrich cites. What I will add, however, is {{cn}} in the "Description" field of the event fact. This flags the date as requiring documentation. Alternatively, if you want to be stronger in your language, you could enter "unsubstantiated" in the same place. And I will also often include a note in the narrative section, such as "The alternative date of [death] is commonly cited in online GEDCOMs but without any supporting evidence." Jillaine 11:27, 29 October 2009 (EDT)

GEDCOM Export Ready [6 November 2009]

The GEDCOM for tree Default is ready to download. Click here.

Hattie Nickerson [21 November 2009]

Thanks for the abstraction of the Hattie Nickerson article. Much appreciated.--Neal Gardner 11:59, 21 November 2009 (EST)

Gabriel Wheldon [24 November 2009]

Jrich,

I see that you're the most recent/primary contributor to the Gabriel Wheldon page. I've recently been delving into Gabriel due to the marvelous new REGISTER article, "The Origin of Gabriel Whelden of Yarmouth and Malden, Massachusetts (Oct 2009), wherein the Basford baptisms of his children are found and discussed, as are his wives. I'd like to update Gabriel's page with this information.

Currently, you've got all the "candidates" for wives on the main page. I'd like to clean that up and move the Indian princess and Mary Davis theories to the Talk page, and have the Talk page be the place where all the myths are included, leaving the main page for what IS documented.

What do you think?

-- Jillaine 07:57, 24 November 2009 (EST)

Wow, footnote 38 cites a website! Would that be allowed on WeRelate?

tsk tsk ;-)

Please change it how you like. I don't own it. That said, the only thing I think the article shows is that Ruth was born in England and Gabriel was probably living in England until 1637. As a result, I don't think a reasonable claim can be made for Ruth to be of Indian descent any more.

Now some people would say that this is sufficient to invalidate the whole Bearce document. I thought it was pretty clearly invalid before, but find people cling to it anyway, which is one of the reasons why such a long genealogical discussion was put on the main page to start with. The article actually presents nothing on the identity of his second(?) wife Margaret, and so disproves nothing in regard to Margaret.

Further, the article says that we don't know if Jane was the mother of all his children. They were unable to find proof of Mary Davis, but that is not disproof. I think it has the same status as before: questionable. Until a marriage record to Jane is found, I don't think you can rule out Mary Davis.

Jrich, please say more about how you come to this. I'd like to understand your view of different records. Here's what I see:

1. A 1637 legal document cited by the recent NEHGR authors, where an actual wife's name is mentioned-- i.e., Jane.
2. An IGI contribution stating a specific marriage in a specific town on a specific date -- Mary Davis, m 3 August 1617 in Arnold, Nottingham, England. But analysis of the Arnold parish records revealed no such marriage. Therefore, the only thing supporting it is an unsourced IGI contribution.

How can this IGI record even be "ruled IN"?

Not so much ruling it in (it's already in), as not ruling it out - yet. I agree it seems unlikely, but not all records of marriages survived, and we don't know the provenance of that IGI record. Where did the submitter get their information? Maybe it's a real item and they confused the town where his real estate dealings were, with where his marriage was? 20 years ago, all this information was kept in notebooks and on note cards, and things like sloppy writing, corrections, and just plain mistakes were probably easy to make. So when there's a precise date, I tend to think there's something there, perhaps all wrong, but something. I find it hard to believe people just make up data. Match simply by name to individuals that are completely wrong, yes! Copy dates wrong, yes! Confuse one event's date with another, yes! (Just look at footnote 3: a prominent genealogist James W. Hawes misreporting a date.) But, did you notice that one of the supervisors of Thomas Wheldon's will in 1610 was named Henry Davis? That might be an interesting family to investigate. (Did you notice that one of the witnesses of that same will was named Richard Taylor?) --Jrich 19:19, 24 November 2009 (EST)

I *did* See that Richard Taylor witness and got VERY excited about it. I immediately communicated with Howard Hoff (?), the Register editor, asking him how I might get my hands on the parish records they reviewed. He responded with "what?! It's such a common name, why would you get so excited?" I have too much evidence of when I've followed a whacky line like this that it leads me to great finds. But he doesn't know that... yet! ;-)

The gap between Thomas and Katherine suggests a first wife may have died, or else Gabriel moved temporarily. Both of these would suggest there is data we don't have yet. Jane is mentioned in 1637 when the last child is born 1630, plenty of time to get remarried. It still remains that there is no daughter named Jane, hinting at least, that maybe she wasn't mother of the children.

I did notice that...

There seems to be a fairly steady string of children from about 1617 to 1630, suggesting only one wife during that period. But overall, I think what we see is equally compatible with four wives (unknown, Mary Davis, Jane, Margaret) as with the two wives (Jane, Margaret) hypothesized by the article. --Jrich 10:13, 24 November 2009 (EST)

Okay, thanks. I'll work on the page and the talk page, attempting to reflect all you're saying here. You've probably seen I'm working on the children pages, etc. already. Jillaine 10:31, 24 November 2009 (EST)

I was not advancing a theory of four wives. I don't think this is proposed by any serious genealogist.

Mmm... you said it's equally compatible. To me, that translates to a possible theory. It makes sense. Let's propose it and see if it's worth pursuing. It's a theory. And, I actually did find a reasonably serious genealogist suggesting it here. -- Jillaine 17:14, 24 November 2009 (EST)

I was merely presenting a superficially plausible scenario that was consistent with the little we know about Gabriel Whelden's wives, trying to illustrate how flexible and open we must remain regarding his marriages.

I don't think it's that superficial. It's plausible enough for consideration. And proposing it on his page indicates we're being flexible and open regarding his marriages. -- Jillaine 17:14, 24 November 2009 (EST)

Basically, unless I am forgetting something, we know he was married to somebody by 1611, his wife was Jane in 1637 and his widow was Margaret. Between 1611 and 1637, there is 25 plus years where lots of stuff could have happened, and anything about wives in this period is guessing.

And the only documentation we have is a named wife, Jane, in 1637.

This is a nit, but, genealogically speaking, your words "soundly disproven" might be too strong.

Point taken; I softened the language. Jillaine 17:14, 24 November 2009 (EST)

I strongly doubted the Indian Princess scenario when I read Jacobus' rebuttal. I became total convinced once I saw the Bearse document and realized how little proof it presents, how unsophisticated its argument was. But Jacobus did not prove who Margaret was. Mostly he presented circumstantial evidence to show that it is unlikely, and because other cited facts turned out to be false, concluded this probably was too. I think it could be classified as unlikely, not credible, unbelievable even, but I am not sure disproven is accurate. I think to achieve that, someone would have to prove who Margaret was. --Jrich 16:09, 24 November 2009 (EST)

Help on adding an image [3 December 2009]

I did watch three videos. But maybe I'm not getting the idea of how to add an image. I uploaded a couple images. But I am unclear on how to connect them or make them appear on a page.

Can I add some images to this?

http://www.werelate.org/wiki/Henry_Wolinsky--Hwolinsky 12:35, 2 December 2009 (EST)

Once your image(s) is uploaded, it's available to be linked to. On the Person page (or any other page) where you want it to appear, insert the following style of link:

[[Image:Name of Image.jpg|right|250 px]]

That will load the image. Note the double-brackets, and no space after the first colon. "Name of Image" is, of course, the name of your uploaded image. I like to push the image to the right so the text will wrap; if you don't want that, omit the "right|". Likewise, the size of the image may need to be constrained, depending on how large the original upload was; 200-400 pixels is a good size, but you can play with that. If the original upload is just the right size already, you can omit the "250 px". If you want to display several images, skip a space after the last close-bracket and do it again.

I've deliberately omitted discussing the "Images / Add Image" section down near the bottom of the page, frankly, because it's really not necessary. The code I've given above is easy and more tweakable, and the section at the bottom simply adds more instances of the images you want to display in a near-thumbnail size, which isn't particularly useful, I don't think. --Mike 11:43, 3 December 2009 (EST)

Field pages [16 December 2009]

Nice work adding sources to the Field pages, JR. Thanks. Jillaine 09:25, 16 December 2009 (EST)

Next step: Review your GEDCOM [22 December 2009]

You're not done yet!

WeRelate is different from most family tree websites. By contributing to WeRelate you are helping to create Pando for genealogy, a free, unified family tree that combines the best information from all contributors.

Now that you have uploaded converse.GED, your next step is to review what your pages will look like, review any potential warnings, and combine (merge) people in your GEDCOM with matching people already on WeRelate. You need to review your GEDCOM before it can finish importing.

Click here to review your GEDCOM

Once you have finished your review and marked your GEDCOM Ready to import, one of our administrators will review your GEDCOM and finalize the import. This usually happens within 24 hours. You will receive a message here when the pages have been created.

--WeRelate agent 18:33, 22 December 2009 (EST)

converse.GED Imported Successfully [22 December 2009]

The pages from your GEDCOM have been generated successfully. You may now:

• launch the Family Tree Explorer to navigate your tree
• view your network -- If you matched families in your GEDCOM to existing families, find out to which other WeRelate users you are related.
• view related pages not in your tree -- If you matched families in your GEDCOM to existing families, find out which people you are now related to that you can add to your tree (takes awhile to display for large trees).
• view a searchable list of the pages in your tree -- The searchable list will be available about an hour after your tree has been imported.

For questions or problems, leave a message for Dallan or send an email to dallan@WeRelate.org.

--WeRelate agent 21:43, 22 December 2009 (EST)

Why changed?? [22 January 2010]

Hi! I got the following message from Werelate....and I wonder why the changes have been done.

Please answer me!

Thank you!

Torill

Toristor,

"Person:Josep Leavitt (1)" has been changed by Jrich at 09:56, 22 January 2010. Edit summary: merge into Person:Joseph Leavitt (7) in merge of Family:Joseph Leavitt and Sarah Bradbury (1) - review/undo

View the changes: http://www.werelate.org/w/index.php?title=Person:Josep_Leavitt_%281%29&diff=0&oldid=8597693

View the current version: http://www.werelate.org/wiki/Person:Josep_Leavitt_%281%29

Leave a message for Jrich: http://www.werelate.org/wiki/User_talk:Jrich

We are currently in the process of combining duplicate wiki pages for the same person into a single page containing information from all contributors. If you are unsure why your pages are being merged with others, it is most likely a result of this project. Read more: http://www.werelate.org/wiki/WeRelate:Duplicate_review--Toristor 17:45, 22 January 2010 (EST)

Oh Boy! Looks like the form letter that WeRelate sends out needs editing. Out of curosity, I clicked on that 'read more' link and it goes to a blank page! Will you be reporting this to the powers that be?? I don't know if anyone can change that except Dallan. --Janiejac 22:34, 22 January 2010 (EST)

The email that was sent to Toristor was probably OK. It looks like Toristor didn't leave a space in-between his signature and the cut/pasted text from the email, so I believe only the copy posted here is corrupted. Which is no big deal since the link wasn't really intended for me, except to give me context of his email. I responded to this user directly, thinking that was simpler. --Jrich 23:05, 22 January 2010 (EST)

Thanks for all the £ [8 February 2010]

jrich,

thanks for all the £s. My bank account is feeling much better! ;-)

-- Jillaine 23:15, 8 February 2010 (EST)

Children of William Ward [10 February 2010]

Jrich,

I think I've found sufficient evidence to support that at least the first five children of William Ward were by his first wife-- whatever her name was. The primary evidence (to date) is that William's 1686 will which refers in the plural to sonS and daughterS by his former wife (and still living in 1686). If plural in both, that would take us through child #5, and possibly #6, although I'm less confident of that.

Unless you vociferously object, I'd like to pull them off of the second marriage's page.

-- Jillaine 11:06, 10 February 2010 (EST)

That's fine with me, as you have some justification and have added a bunch of good information. It might be worthwhile to add a note to both Family pages though, replacing my obnoxious banner, just to make sure people don't create duplicate children because their sources place all the children under Elizabeth, etc. That is probably why there were duplicates of many of them before, and a good argument for why marriages and children need to be listed on Person pages, even if you still have to go to a Family page to edit them. --Jrich 11:19, 10 February 2010 (EST)

Thanks. I'll get to this soon.

-- Jillaine 15:44, 10 February 2010 (EST)

What Makes WeRelate Different [3 May 2010]

Hi Jrich, would you mind if I used your "What Makes WeRelate Different" article and feature it next week? I'd have to create an article and of course cite you as the author. I think it contains some great comparisons with other sites and good recommendations for other researchers.

Let me know. Thanks and best regards,

Jim:)--Delijim 16:56, 3 May 2010 (EDT)

If you want. I am sure there is lots more that can be said about the subtle differences between simply making one's work available, versus true collaboration, so also feel free to take any of the ideas and write an article of your own if you wish. I was just trying to capture one passing thought... --Jrich 18:03, 3 May 2010 (EDT)

Thanks, I'll use your thoughts as the "core" of the article. :)

Best regards, have a great week!

Jim--Delijim 18:04, 3 May 2010 (EDT)

Family:Joseph Kilgore and Penelope Treworgy (1) [25 May 2010]

Hi

Is Family:Joseph Kilgore and Penelope Treworgy (1) one of yours, or were you just lending a helping hand? In anycase THANKS. normally I wouldn't be dealing much with someone in Maine, but as it turns out YDNA evidence seems to show that Joseph is close kin to the Kilgore's in PA, MD, and South West Virginia. And since the Maine line points back to a specific location in Scotland (Fife), I thought we might get a clue as to where the other Kilgores came from as well. Q 09:27, 25 May 2010 (EDT)

I have done some work with the first generation of the Treworgy/Trueworthy family (apparently Welsh), but know nothing about Kilgores. I just saw the name and thought I could try to connect Penelope to the immigrants. It appears James -> John -> James -> Penelope, since she appears to be named after the younger James' mother Penelope (Spencer), but there isn't much hard evidence. --Jrich 10:15, 25 May 2010 (EDT)

Queens vs Nassau Counties [7 June 2010]

Have the powers that be decided that we use the current locations and not the location as it was at the time? I noticed you have changed Person:Jacob Willets (1) from being born in Queens to Nassau. But "Nassau County was born on January 1, 1899 and the Towns of North Hempstead, Hempstead and Oyster Bay, including what would later become the Cities of Long Beach and Glen Cove, secede from Queens County to form Nassau County." That whole area is geographically complicated enough without our changing original info too!

I always need all the help I can get, so I'm glad for any help you give. I'm just fussing if this is the policy! Sometimes the original info is all I have and I don't know what changes might have taken place since then. I think my frustration with WR is showing. Too many things don't work for me.--Janiejac 15:05, 7 June 2010 (EDT)

I changed it because the field was red, since it named a place for which no page existed. The name in the location field is, bottom line, only the name of the place page describing the place. The place page for Westbury uses Nassau county. Since WeRelate used the Family History Library to create the initial place pages, they adopted de facto the FHL convention of using the name of the place as it existed in 1900, to make more predictable what the right name is. The history of the place is intended to be explained on the Place page, giving historical names, county changes, etc. (For example, I just added Lusum as an alternate name for Jericho so searchers for Lusum will find the correct page.) There have been multiple discussions about this on WeRelate and there are reasons for both approaches, but using historical names would result in multiple pages for Westbury and probably would result in some portion of users picking the wrong one. Having only one page for Westbury limits that possibility. It also prevents the appearance of a person being born and dying in different places just because county boundaries changes, which is a common occurrence everywhere, not just on Long Island. I am not defending this convention here, since it predates my involvement in WeRelate, just trying to make it more reasonable. Personally, I don't think there is a perfect answer, that this issue is inherently loaded with ambiguity no matter what you do, but I find this convention workable. --Jrich 15:29, 7 June 2010 (EDT)

Hannah Hobart [31 July 2010]

Published sources have Hannah Hobart's parents as Peter and Rebecca, not Elizabeth. Why the change to Rebecca? --Joeljkp 23:09, 31 July 2010 (EDT)

As I was just explaining on Hannah's Talk page, the proof is on the parent's page: Family:Peter Hobart and Elizabeth Ibrook (2). --Jrich 23:14, 31 July 2010 (EDT)

Latest edit - Thank You & interesting [18 August 2010]

Hello Jrich,

I enjoyed reading your latest addition/edit. It made me curious and I tried to locate an article or help page on WeRelate on "how to" or "advice page" on doing good and/or proper genealogical research on ancestors that were American Colonial Ancestors. No luck, do you know of such a page in WeRelate that I missed? Or could you suggest one off site? Thanks Debbie Freeman --DFree 12:41, 18 August 2010 (EDT)

It would probably be a good thing to add, with hints on where to find things, etc. It would be nice to shorten the learning process (or else I'd suggest paging through the 30+ years of Mayflower Descendant or read some articles by Jacobus). But sometimes I wonder if (depressing thought) certain experiences are necessary to sensitize one enough to be receptive to the lesson? I am sure there are books that talk about this, but I am not personally familiar with any. I could point to the GPS (genealogical proof standard), but it's more of a what-to than a how-to. --Jrich 13:20, 18 August 2010 (EDT)

--- Hello Jrich, I did find online a book called "Researching your Colonial New England Ancestors" by a Patricia Law Hatcher. I do not know enough to judge the usefulness of the book though. Take Care, Debbie Freeman --DFree 13:58, 18 August 2010 (EDT)

family pgs with no info [19 August 2010]

Thoughts concerning your comment "If you know somebody's parents' names, but nothing else, do not create the Family page, merely note the relationship in the notes on the child's page, and leave it for another researcher to create a robust Family page." I have not uploaded my main db yet, but I have many such 'families' because it was necessary to know which Robert or William Jackson was mentioned. The fact that he was 'son of so-and-so' is needed. Now when I upload my GEDCOM, these family pages will automatically be created. My preference would be to not create person pages for the father and mother, but I don't know if the system allows for creating a family pg but not a person page. --Janiejac 01:37, 19 August 2010 (EDT)

I believe you are right, in that the GEDCOM upload processes creates a lot of the empty pages. The process could be helped tremendously by just attempting to find an approximate marriage date, or place. If they have a child born in 1683, it is probably safe to say they were married before 1683, and that is sufficient to let people working in the 1700s or the 1800s or the 1900s know that this is not a page they need to consider. Similarly, even if the marriage place is the rather broad, say "England", that helps people who are looking for people who were living in New England at the time. Of course, there is always the challenge of assuming too much, so you must do this carefully. And it is always a challenge defining the borders of a family tree (if you do the father, do you need the grandfather to help define the father?), so things are always a little ragged there. --Jrich 09:13, 19 August 2010 (EDT)

Merge of jonas and olive Newton [21 October 2010]

I noticed that this merge did not pick up the source info for some of Olive's children. If you want that info you might try merging again.

Jim--Tarbet 06:27, 21 October 2010 (EDT)

I'm not sure what you are referring to. The diffs in the history logs show no loss of information, except Peter, where the useless UID was deleted on purpose. There were no source citations, and the Personal Narrative on the four children were not changed, so no sure what source info you think is missing? I did notice that Peter now has two wives named Mary Bixby because you had created two different Peter pages, each one married to its own Mary Bixby, and since I was merging the two different parent pages, only the redundant Peters got taken care of. But I was getting too far afield from where I was working, so left if for you to clean up if you care. It works easiest if you merge the duplicate Family pages, not the duplicate Person pages. --Jrich 09:14, 21 October 2010 (EDT)

Newton [21 October 2010]

I was very happy to see the changes in source material you were adding. I had just never seen this done before and was curious about the terminology and the process. This is my first WIKI, and almost everything that happens here is new to me. Thank you for you explanation of the reasoning behind your work with the Newtons. It makes good sense and is appreciated, as I know that I lack good and sufficient sources in many cases. I also thank you for your prompt reply.

Thanks for explaining.

Jim--Tarbet 13:53, 21 October 2010 (EDT)

Moses Newton & Sarah Howe [30 October 2010]

jroch, Thank you for your input for this family. It certainly goes deeper than I had been able to go. I would appreciate it if you would add the entire comment you made on the family talk to the comments section of their page. Your comments enhance the page and deserve to be included.

thanks again

Jim--Tarbet 20:45, 30 October 2010 (EDT)

It's on the Talk Page. People should be able to see it there. As soon as definitive proof either way is found, it will be obsolete, so that Talk page is probably the best place for it. It's too bad that the Talk page isn't more prominent, as a lot of what ends up on pages probably belongs there. But, since there is no actual evidence for my scenario, what is needed is to know if there is any evidence connecting Sarah to Thomas Howe? All that is presented is essentially that Thomas had a daughter named Sarah (i.e., the birth record) but nothing to say that it was his daughter was the one who married Moses Newton. --Jrich 23:53, 30 October 2010 (EDT)

Moses and Sarah Howwe [1 November 2010]

In her book "The Newton Genealogy" E. Leonard says this about Moses and Sarah, "He married at Marlborough, December 11, 1695, Sarah How, daughter of Isaac and Frances (Woods) How* of Marlborough, where she was born January 28, 1675. She died in Southborough, December 4, 1733. "Wife of Moses." This would indicate that Sarah was not the Daughter of Thomas or But rather Isaac Howe.

Jim--Tarbet 11:04, 1 November 2010 (EDT)

That is the father, who also married a Sarah How. But the page I was questioning, and have now changed, is the son Moses who married a Sarah How in 1725. You had created this page with a birthdate in 1697 that matched the daughter of Thomas Howe and Sarah Hosmer. But I see now that you relied on the Newton Genealogy, p. 166, where "I suppose [she was the] daughter of Thomas and Sarah (Hosmer) Howe", even though on a different page she talks about Pelatiah Rice marrying a Sarah Newton who is daughter of John Howe. Just shows you have to check all secondary sources, even good ones. --Jrich 11:35, 1 November 2010 (EDT)

Sarah How [1 November 2010]

Have you been able to connect John, Thomas and Isaac? Are they brothers, cousins?

Jim--Tarbet 15:57, 1 November 2010 (EDT)

Have you determined if her name was HOW or HOWE?--Tarbet 15:59, 1 November 2010 (EDT)

The Howe Genealogy I have been citing on the various Howe pages (original 1880 by Daniel Wait Howe, updated edition by Gilman Bigelow Howe in 1928, reprinted unchanged in 1985) is pretty complete and the vast bulk of the fact are found in the vital records, so probably pretty reliable.

• Isaac is John^1 -> Isaac^2 ==> Sarah Howe b. 1675 who married Moses Newton Jr
• John is John^1 -> John^2 -> John^3 ==> Sarah Howe b. 1699 who married Moses Newton III
• Thomas is John^1 -> Thomas^2 ==> Sarah Howe b. 1697 who m. James Brown

so Isaac and Thomas are brothers, and John is their nephew. How or Howe is immaterial, it is colonial spelling. It was almost always spelled How in the 1700's but nearly all the modern generations use Howe and that is how it is spelled in most of the literature. As a researcher you have to look for and deal with both. --Jrich 17:38, 1 November 2010 (EDT)

Peter Folger [3 December 2010]

Cotton Mather describes Peter Folger as an "Able Godley Englishman who was employed in teaching the youth in Reading, Writing, and the Principles of Religion by Catechism, being well learned likewise in the Scriptures and Capable of Help in religious matters."

At Nantucket he was chosen clerk of the court and recorder July 21, 1673; he also surveyed lands for the settlers, and was regarded as scholar of the community.

The varied employments of Peter Folger prove him to have been as versatile as industrious; to him, at least, "the knowing Folgers lazy" could not have been applied; and if there was ever any foundation in fact for the character which the little Nantucket rhyme has fastened upon his family, it must have been earned by a later representative of the name.

His mantle fell upon some of his descendants, and he bequeathed to them decided ability.

"His son Eleazer and Eleazer, Jr., were intelligent literary and mathematical".

Peter Folger died in 1690; Mary, his widow, in 1704.

Abiah Folger, the youngest child of Peter Folger, and the only one born on Nantucket, married Josiah Franklin, of Boston.

Benjamin Franklin, son of Josiah and Abiah (Folger) Franklin, married Deborah Read, of Philadelphia.

Source: "Early Settlers of Nantucket Their Associates and Descendants" compiled by Lydia S. Hinchman - Philadelphia - Printed by J.B. Lippincott Company, 1896

Early Settlers of Nantucket, p. 48

--Sandyebauer 12:49, 22 November 2010 (EST)

I am not sure why this was posted here. I have no interest in the Folger family, and if I changed his page, it was merely because I was trying to add sources to under-documented pages. I have seen this passage since books.google.com is usually the second or third place I search for information about colonial people, and it should be posted on Peter's page, not here. --Jrich 11:36, 3 December 2010 (EST)

Alice (Paine) Strange will analysis [19 February 2011]

Hi,

Excellent job in summarizing the people in the will. I had tried several times over the years to get a good diagram of these relationships but kept getting lost in the detail. --Susan Irish 13:14, 19 February 2011 (EST)

Kelley History [6 April 2011]

My name is Bernard Kelley, my email is tavernmaster926@frontier.com I'm tracing a unique line of Kelley from Maryland in 1774 to Ky in 1804. If you have a male kelley relative that would do a DNA test at family tree DNA , it may link you to this line. My DNA is on file so if you match I will be contacted. If you have any questions please email me.

                                                                   Thanks
                                                                   Bernard--Bernard 22:01, 5 April 2011 (EDT)

Kelley History [6 April 2011]

My name is Bernard Kelley, my email is tavernmaster926@frontier.com I'm tracing a unique line of Kelley from Maryland in 1774 to Ky in 1804. If you have a male kelley relative that would do a DNA test at family tree DNA , it may link you to this line. My DNA is on file so if you match I will be contacted. If you have any questions please email me.

                                                                   Thanks
                                                                   Bernard--Bernard 22:01, 5 April 2011 (EDT)

Thanks [12 April 2011]

I'm finally trying to get started actually using We Relate. Thanks for your guidance. It's appreciated! KaJoH--KaJoH 16:51, 12 April 2011 (EDT)

style guide [22 April 2011]

Hi Jrich,

Thanks for adding your explanations on the bio style guide. I incorporated some of them onto the main page, and in places where your comments give us good direction, I added a note basically inviting people to post only if they disagree - otherwise we keep those rules. There are some places where neither of us has a good theory yet - but if you get a chance feel free to add - so I've left those more with questions for discussion. --Amelia 01:12, 23 April 2011 (EDT)

duplicate source?? [3 May 2011]

I just created a new source here: Source:North Carolina, United States. North Carolina Marriage Collection, 1741-2004

Someone had previously created a similar source but made it county specific: Source:Edgecombe, North Carolina, United States. North Carolina Marriage Collection - Family History Library, 1724-2004

Perhaps they are not really duplicates; the first one covers all counties and is available from ancestry.com. Maybe that FHL reference covers only Edgecombe County. Are both these sources OK as they are? --Janiejac 15:13, 3 May 2011 (EDT)

Unlike the previous sources we were discussing, I have no particular knowledge of these. While they seem to cover different areas, I certainly can't vouch that the FHL one was done correctly and they both probably amount to a transcription of some underlying source. kennebec1 might be a good person to ask since she is organizing sources and probably has a good understanding of how to make things work easier, or Amelia would probably be able to summarize the philosophy better than I. If Dallan hadn't started displaying citations on the pages, instead of titles, I'm sure this would be a bigger topic of conversation, but the citations hide alot of the details. --Jrich 16:36, 3 May 2011 (EDT)

St. Peter's Parmentergate [26 May 2011]

You could at least have asked before removing details/website regarding St. Peter's, now please leave it alone. No tact; no results.--Neal Gardner 12:57, 26 May 2011 (EDT)

1) I removed them as unnecessary, since they had nothing to do with Nicholas Nickerson's baptism or his family, don't mention or shed any light on who his parents were, when he was born, baptized, or where. 2) While they provide background, it did not seem this was the best or proper place to establish how to spell the church's name, there being several other WeRelate pages for people baptized at that church to which this applies just as much, nor did I expect somebody interested in the church's origins would think to look on Nicholas Nickerson's page. 3) It may have been called St Peter's Parmentergate in the earliest days as your sources indicate, and as I was, and am, willing to accept as a spelling, but records contemporary to the baptism that can be found on the Internet list the church as St. Peter's Permontergate and variants, so St Peter's Permontergate is arguably more historically correct as of the date of the baptism, whereas your spelling appears to insisting on a spelling that was used at a different time period. 4) Of the three people contributing to the baptism: you, me, and the authors of the Nickerson Family, they are probably the only ones that actually saw the parish register and they probably spelled it the way they found it, so I argue their source carries more authority. 5) WeRelate has rules for naming and spelling places, but not churches, so given the ambiguity of what is correct, it would seem the best practice would be to accept spellings that are reasonable, and I believe in this case, that are not wrong. Avoiding what may seem to others to be gratuitous changes, may also avoid it being necessary to have such rules. Oh, and your tactful message on Person talk:Nicholas Nickerson (1) probably belongs here. --Jrich 16:20, 26 May 2011 (EDT)

Amos and [19 June 2011]

--Tarbet 21:21, 18 June 2011 (EDT)

Amos and Prudence Newton [19 June 2011]

Thanks for making the changes for the above, However, there seem to be some discrepancy that I cannot explain. Perhaps you can help.

Your changes were based on the will of John Bellows, father of Prudence Bellows Newton. The will stating that Prudence is the widow of Amos Newton. However Amos, who married Prudence in 1749, Married a second wife, Jane Learned Giles in 1758, indicating that Prudence had probably died prior to 1758 and therefore prior to the will of John Bellows in 1772. In addition to the above, the will of Amos Newton was not filed until 1814. In this will he mentions two sons by name, and the rest of his children, without naming them, but no wife. This would indicate that both of his wives had died prior to his writing his will. That being true, Prudence could not have been his widow. Common sense would say that John Bellows, as the father of Prudence should know the status of his daughter, but it would also say that Amos, Husband of Prudence would also know.

If Amos divorced Prudence, prior to his marriage to Jane Giles, Then perhaps John might use the term "widow" to protect his daughter's name. There is no indication that a divorce happened, but it might explain this discrepancy.

What do you think?

Jim Tarbet--Tarbet 21:42, 18 June 2011 (EDT)

There are multiple Amos Newtons. So it is a matter of applying the various data to the right Amos Newton. Ignoring Amos Newton, son of Moses, who is not involved in this, there are two Amos Newtons getting mixed up: one is the son of John, and one is the son of Isaac.

Wills, in my opinion, are the single most reliable source, as they were written based on the information of a first hand informant, were reviewed by the courts, and everybody had a financial motive to get them right. So I think John Bellow's will (on p. 186 of the Newton Genealogy) clearly indicates that Prudence Bellows was alive in 1772 and married an Amos who died before 1772. Therefore she did not marry the Amos who married in 1762 Mrs. Jane Giles (not 1758, that was when Jane married her first husband John Giles) even if the Newton Genealogy gets confused and says so on p. 69. (I was fooled by that statement, and originally thought one Amos married all three - since Amos and Prudence have no known children after 1752, it is not unreasonable to guess that Prudence died, leaving the way open for Amos to remarry Phebe Johnson in 1756, even though there is no death recorded for Prudence - but the will convinced me this assumption was a mistake by showing that Prudence was alive and Amos had died.)

The Newton Genealogy has the right answer on p. 79, showing that Amos, the son of John, married Phebe Johnson and Mrs. Jane Giles. The will of this Amos, the son of John, was filed in early 1815 and mentions no wife because the wife Jane d. 9 months before Amos, March 1814 versus Dec. 1814 according to the vital records of Southborough, so yes, his two wives (Phebe and Jane) had both died by 1815. I don't know when Amos wrote his will, it is not specified in the Newton Genealogy, but death of a wife is certainly the type of even that would motivate him to write a new one, so presumably sometime in that 9 month interval.

On p. 186 and 189, the Newton Genealogy again contradicts p. 69, by saying that Amos, son of Isaac, not the son of John, married Prudence Bellows, showing the earlier statement was probably unintended and somehow missed the editor's pencil.

Which of the Amos Newtons married Prudence Bellows and died before 1772, and which married first Phebe Johnson and second Mrs. Jane Giles before dying in late 1814, is another possible point of confusion. Obviously the assumption of the Newton Genealogy is that because Isaac's son Moses married Persis Bellows, it is probably his brother Amos, the son of Isaac, who married Persis' sister Prudence. I think the names of the children of Amos and Jane, particularly Jonas, Abel and Patience, supports this assumption, since Amos Newton, the son of John, had siblings with those names, whereas Amos Newton, the son of Isaac did not. Another important indicator is that the second child of Amos and Prudence (Mary) is born in Stafford, CT, according to its birth record in the Southborough VRs, showing that Prudence married the son of Isaac.

Does that answer your question or are there other issues I did not address? --Jrich 23:08, 18 June 2011 (EDT)

Estate records for intestates in Essex Co., MA 1700's [3 August 2011]

Hi,

Specifically searching for records of the administration of the estate of Person:Nathaniel Felton (4) online. Are they available? The Felton book that you referenced discusses the administration of the estate here: [4]. Need a source for the death date and can use the book if nothing better is available online. Thanks for your help. --Beth 20:41, 2 August 2011 (EDT)

Source:Essex, Massachusetts, United States. Probate Records of Essex County, Massachusetts stop at 1681 and if there is an online source, I am unaware of it, and can't find it with quick searching. His death in the winter of 1732-3 is mentioned in the History of Salem by Perley, p. 1:242, but gives less detail than the Felton Genealogy, so probably doesn't know any more, and Felton Genealogy may be the best you can do short of ordering some FHL films. --Jrich 23:35, 2 August 2011 (EDT)

Many thanks. --Beth 08:05, 3 August 2011 (EDT)

Cite template [4 September 2011]

Hello. I marked it as being considered for deprecation solely based on the content of the no-include explanation on the template itself. I'll put a note on the deprecation proposal section about arguments against deprecation if you would prefer not being bothered to do that yourself ... you provided information on my talk page I can summarize there. I would suggest that the text of the Cite template description be revised accordingly. Also, I'll have to do some testing of the ref tag in the mediawiki implementation here; it is absolutely not as brain dead as you describe on Wikipedia, where it has effectively replaced Cite, which redirects to Wikipedia:Template:Citation now. --ceyockey 13:51, 4 September 2011 (EDT)

P.S. The tone which you took in your closing line is NOT helpful or appreciated => "Please provide an explanation why the Cite template was marked to be deprecated, and what group decided this should be done?" --ceyockey 13:54, 4 September 2011 (EDT)

Patrollers group [12 September 2011]

Hi Jrich, your user rights have been updated and you are now in the "Patrollers" Group. There is a bit more information about this here. To have your edits automatically marked as patrolled, please go to Settings>Editing and check "Mark edits I make as patrolled". Let me know if you have any questions, --Jennifer (JBS66) 14:28, 12 September 2011 (EDT)

Hannah Eames (1) duplicate families [10 October 2011]

Person:Hannah Eames (1) was merged and the result is that she has two differing sets of parents. Can you help resolve the problem? --Judy (jlanoux) 20:19, 9 October 2011 (EDT)

Nope, if I could I probably would have already. I think both parents are wrong: Anthony Eames and Mercy Sampson m. 1686 and clearly weren't parents of this Hannah, and Great Migration 1634-5 doesn't include either Anna or Hannah as a child of Anthony Eames and Margery Pierce. He shows only 7 children in this family and WeRelate has 12, but many are born in England, and for sanity's sake, I draw a line in the Atlantic and rarely get involved in English sources. If you want to clear the error message about two parents you can deleted Anthony and Mercy and nobody should complain, but it doesn't mean the page will be correct. --Jrich 22:45, 9 October 2011 (EDT)

I will go ahead and delete the Mercy family, I couldn't find any verification for it anywhere. I was inclined to remove both of them, but we can leave the Margery Pierce one if you prefer. I'll put a note about needing sources. Thanks. --Judy (jlanoux) 10:33, 10 October 2011 (EDT)

Thanks for catching errors [27 November 2011]

Thanks!! Still very new to werelate and I must have lost track of which page I was on and/or the relationships got turned around in my mind. Am grateful you caught several inaccurate assignments I made.--Kpb2011 16:56, 27 November 2011 (EST)

Alive and Well [6 December 2011]

I would like to have my name removed from WeRelate

1. 22667

This JonJay is outrageous, posting every thing he finds on the internet.--Gypsy1930 19:13, 6 December 2011 (EST)

The person page was deleted; I'm guessing that you're okay with your name being on your user page! You can also add "{{Speedy Delete|Living}} on any page where the person is living and administrators will delete them after a few days.--Amelia 19:18, 6 December 2011 (EST)

Well, I've lost the thread of this discussion. I assume this is a continuation of the remarks on User talk:Dallan but it seems like some sort of segue from there to here is missing? Anyway it appears Amelia took care of this. --Jrich 20:28, 6 December 2011 (EST)

Breaking templates by adding category on newline [26 December 2011]

Thank you! for pointing out the breakage of templates by adding a new line. I think the majority of the malfunctions would be, based on your comment, in templates now in the Category:Internal formatting templates category. I'll review those over the next day or so. --ceyockey 11:34, 26 December 2011 (EST)

I have removed newlines from most of the templates in the aforementioned category as a precaution. I think that <includeonly></includeonly> when used would probably isolate the content from any edits outside those brackets. --ceyockey 12:10, 26 December 2011 (EST)

Yeah, I haven't fooled around enough to know the precedence of those two operations and how they interact. I rarely touch templates, but some of them, Cite in particular, has at various times in the past caused the following paragraph to print in fixed-width fonts because extra whitespace get introduced at the end (the new documentation template would have helped). Writing templates is not for beginners! --Jrich 12:21, 26 December 2011 (EST)

Howland family and Charles Dickens family [6 January 2012]

Thanks for the correction on the Howland page. I could use some help. Possibly you may know how to find my needed source. I was fascinated by the Charles Dickens featured page. I discovered that his brother Augustus died in Chicago, Ill and his "wife" died there also and left 3 orphans. Of course I just had to find out what happened to the orphans. The daughter of Augustus, Amy Dickens married into this Howland family. I wish to link the two families but am missing one link. According to Ancestry family trees, Zacheus Howland was b. 30 Jun 1747 and baptized 5 Apr 1747 [makes no sense] in Barnstable, Barnstable, MA. He married Mary 'Molly' Palmer on 26 Feb 1768 in Falmouth, Barnstable, MA. He died 16 Nov 1828 in Barnstable, Barnstable, MA. His parents are allegedly Jabez Howland and Elizabeth Percival. I created the page for Jabez Howland but cannot find supporting evidence that this Zacheus was his son. I have the resources to create the other pages to link the families but this is my one missing link. I have checked Archives.com, Ancestry.com, Family search, MA Vital Records Project and I think Footnote. Maybe my searches are incorrect or maybe this data for Barnstable is not online. As I recall the other children of Jabez Howland and Elizabeth Percival are indicated on some of the sites. Any help or advice greatly appreciated. Thanks. --Beth 21:57, 4 January 2012 (EST)

Source:Mayflower Descendant, p. 11:82, has the Will of Jabez Howland of Barnstable which names son Zaccheus who was a minor in 1765 so born after 1744. Since he wasn't married yet, this doesn't prove it is the right one (no grandchildren named, etc.) but the age is appropriate is he was just barely a minor. Source:Hobart, Benjamin. History of the Town of Abington, Plymouth County, Massachusetts, p. 403, says the birthdate of Zaccheus is 30 Mar 1747, which at least puts the birth and baptism in the right order, but I can't find where that comes from. The children of "Zacheus" and Molly, and the parent's deaths are record VR Barnstable p. 236. I'll keep looking. --Jrich 10:16, 5 January 2012 (EST) ]

Thanks so much for this information. I will add the partner of Augustus Dickens and information on the chldren. I have located several interesting newspaper articles to add to their pages. --Beth 20:03, 5 January 2012 (EST)

Yea, you found the records. Busy cooking for sick folks. I did subscribe today to all of the Ancestry records. Was before restricted to US. Tired of trying to find free UK census records; don't seem to find what I am looking for. Also discovered an error in Augustus Dickens birthplace indexed in Family Search. Will upload some images and correct later. I am excited about all of the information you added. --Beth 12:33, 6 January 2012 (EST)

New York Genealogical & Biographical Society [6 January 2012]

This Society appears to me to be both a repository, a publisher and a source. Dick Eastman has posted an announcement that I thought would be good to copy to put into the repository page but . . .deciding how WR should treat NYG&BS appears to me to be uncertain as a search turns up several results. Is cleaning these multiple results up something you would care to handle? I'm not referring to their individual publications, but just to the information about the society itself and their website where info about the publications can be found and/or purchased.

I listed it last night as a depository where one could purchase a book, but it is red so something I did wasn't right. Source:Moorhouse, B-Ann. Kings County, New York Administration Proceedings, 1817-1856, B-Ann Moorhouse, CG, FGBS and Joseph M Silinonte. Deciding how to clean up the duplicates - or if the Society is a repository or not is something I don't care to tackle but it should be done. --Janiejac 10:37, 6 January 2012 (EST)

Probably not the right person to be asking. I wouldn't call the Society a source. I would think New England Historical and Genealogical Society would be a very close analog. They have a magazine Source:New England Historical and Genealogical Register, just like the Record. They published many books, so are listed in the publisher field of many source pages, such as Source:Anderson, Robert Charles. Great Migration: Immigrants to New England, 1634-1635. They have a physical library which is a repository Repository:New England Historic Genealogical Society (Massachusetts) and they have a website which is also a repository Repository:AmericanAncestors.org, holding several digital databases and scans of many magazines (includes a small number of the Record). --Jrich 10:58, 6 January 2012 (EST)

Frost Family [8 January 2012]

Hi:

I see that you made a recent change to the Frost information on this web site. I have not used this web site for a good long time and am not sure what changes you made, but you might prefer to see the family information I am currently showing, including Frost ancestry, at:

http://chignecto.tribalpages.com/family-tree/chignecto/1763/surname/Frost

I would be happy to hear from you in relation to that web site.

Don Chapman--Don Chapman 21:47, 8 January 2012 (EST)

I was just cleaning up a page that seemed somewhat lacking in sources. In the process I was able to link Eleanor Frost to the Sawyer family which I knew from past experience has many representatives already entered into WeRelate. You can see the exact changes I made by clicking the link in the email you got, or going to the page that was changed and clicking on the History link, which will let you compare before and after versions surrounding my edit.

I looked at your website, and it looks very nice. However, for me, genealogy starts and stops with sources and I didn't see any, or if they were there, they were too well-hidden. So, to be entirely frank, even if this was my family, I would probably not be consulting your website. --Jrich 22:24, 8 January 2012 (EST)

Thanks [13 January 2012]

Thanks for your response on my talk page.--DataAnalyst 18:12, 13 January 2012 (EST)

Charles Grinnell [23 January 2012]

Im sorry, I am so new to this website, I want to click "reply" to get back to you and it does not work that way!!!

Im delighted with the info you are providing, but I have tried to access the site you mentioned and the record of marriages boston 1879 and dont find how to get the info you have. Is there a secret to using this? I love researching and would love to get into this!

I have an Ancestor.com web page (The Drew A. Sawyer family page) that has tons of info collected over the years. Part of my family came to Gloucester in 1635 (william Haskell from England)and there is loads of info on that. Is this something that can be imported into WeRelate? I am a member of the Haskell genealogy society.

Also have collected many census pages of relatives like Grinnell that give a wealth of info. Do you use these? That is where I found Delia Grinnell , kids and her parents living in 1900.

Thank you so much for your help. Drew Sawyer dsawyer1@san.rr.com--Drew Sawyer 15:29, 23 January 2012 (EST)

Chas Grinnell [24 January 2012]

I think some things are comming together ..thanks to you! First, I believe the birth you found in 1861 for Elzrie Leahon would have been Alice's sister Elsie...just mispelled. Also after you found Bridget Lehan birth at almost the exact time as Delia's birth with the same parents mentioned, my guess would be Delia was "Bridget Delia" or Delia Bridget"...in any case one in the same. Which would make sense from the story passed down from my Grandmother Edna, that they were decended fro a "Bridget Lane"...But we never saw Lane in writing, and verbally Leahon could be pronounced as "Lane". That might explain a lot.

Never did find out what happened to Chas Grinnell....in 1900 census Delia was listed as married but no mention of where she misplaced her husband to!!

Thanks for all your efforts! Drew--Drew Sawyer 19:03, 23 January 2012 (EST)

Question about Savage.... [3 February 2012]

I'm thinking about a we-relate based transcript of Savage. As a starting point, I was looking at the "Full Text" versions at the internet archive, such as this. I can write some code that processes it into pages, creates a useful index and so forth. I was wonder though - is that version definitive? Thanks... --jrm03063 09:54, 3 February 2012 (EST)

I cannot really answer this. One would suspect this is an OCR rendering of one of the scanned images also available from this site, but I don't know if it is, or if it was contributed by a user from a different source. Obviously their OCR isn't very good since the title comes out "A GENEALOGICAL DICTIONARY OF THE FIRST SETTLERS OF MAY ENGLAND". So one problem would be that it would probably need a careful proofreading versus a scanned image of the book. Then I know that in volume 45 of NEHGR, there was printed a couple of installments of corrections to Savage, which many websites who give transcriptions of Savage, choose to incorporate (useful, but usually done too transparently for my tastes). --Jrich 10:31, 3 February 2012 (EST)

The text definitely has its problems - but bad OCR is faithful in terms of being a disinterested observer. My approach would be to make the pages as faithful to the original (line breaks, weird abbreviations, warts and all) as wiki formatting allows. In an ideal world - the header at the top of every transcribed page would have a link to an image of the original. Instead of incorporating additions and changes, I would add links at the bottom of each page to appropriate sections of the additions and corrections. If a page had so many changes that it was tough to understand without building a modified version - I was thinking that such a modified/devivative version should go elsewhere - perhaps at the top of the discussion page for the original unmodified page. I don't see this as a task that any individual could complete - but maybe I get it started and define a reasonable process - such that folks who want to cite particular pages of Savage would clean up the page they care about, in the process of hyperlinking it to people they're working on. --jrm03063 10:56, 3 February 2012 (EST)

Well, perhaps one could try to argue that Savage was a better genealogist than, say Cutter, but since he was one of the earliest, he ends up making more mistakes. It is not particularly a source I like seeing people rely on without adding more primary or modern sources to confirm it. His writing style values paper more than effective communication, and would be particularly susceptible to the mayhem caused by bad OCR, which may be disinterested, but works only to make things worse, never better. Personally, I would think time would be better spent transcribing some probate records (for example), which are not already available on the Internet, and adding them to the appropriate Person pages. Unlike Savage, probate records are rarely wrong, since people were financially motivated to get it right, and an impartial referee, in the person of the judge, was checking their work, all in a more or less contemporary timeframe. But diversity makes things robust. --Jrich 11:24, 3 February 2012 (EST)

In the sense of really good purist genealogy, I definitely see your point. Spending a little time working through the additions and corrections that were actually published at the time certainly makes the point that a work of this scope is bound to have its problems. Still, I'm coming from the point of view of the rookie who wants to do a relatively good job just finding the basics of their lineages to begin with. Once you start needing to prove things, of course it's definitely a different place. Put differently, whatever Savage's limitations, there are still an awful lot of pages that are devoid of even that (yes, I've created a bunch of them!). --jrm03063 11:46, 3 February 2012 (EST)

I was just trying to suggest some thing to do that would be moving things forward instead of copying a work that was already done and available on the Internet (here and here, for example, besides the archive.org you mentioned and books.google.com). Nobody's going to discover anything they can't now. How much better to make available some primary sources that aren't available. It has nothing to do with "purist genealogy" whatever that means (I am hardly a slave to forms or formula as you should know based on past discussions, and if you are referring to my preference for primary evidence, that comes from a desire not to mislead the readers of the pages with sourceless legend and propagated errors when I can help it). Further, each entry in Savage is so short, and more or less independent of the others, that to the extent he is valuable, the entire entry can be, and often already is, placed right on the individual's page. --Jrich 16:18, 3 February 2012 (EST)

I get your point. I'm going to reach out to Dr. Kraft on his effort, to see if he would allow his transcript to be used. What I really want here is the ability to have the source link back to the pages in our database. I don't want to do the whole thing (I don't need the typing exercise), but to put in place a process by which folks - who are using/citing Savage - can update the source with links to the appropriate corresponding WR pages. --jrm03063 17:31, 3 February 2012 (EST)

Benjamin Butterfiled m Sarah Bates? [10 February 2012]

Firstly, I am a novice, so this will probably be a question you have answered a dozen times before...

I noticed that you removed this marriage...where did I go wrong?

Doug--Dughall 12:31, 10 February 2012 (EST)

Replied on user's page. --Jrich 12:46, 10 February 2012 (EST)

Vital Records of Chelsea, Massachusetts, to the Year 1850 Volume Two [13 February 2012]

Am I losing my mind? I downloaded volume two from Google Books just last night. But I went this morning to add the link for volume two to the source page, and I can't find the free version. --Pkeegstra 07:56, 12 February 2012 (EST)

I don't think there is a volume 2. Volume 1. Do you mean volume two of Documentary History of Chelsea? That has 2 volumes (links on Person Talk:Elizabeth Watts (40)). --Jrich 09:27, 12 February 2012 (EST)

Losing my mind or too little coffee this morning, yeah. For some reason this morning I thought both were two-volume works. Thanks for setting me straight. P.S. If you want to see something sad, look at this family. I've been trying to maintain minimal order in New Amsterdam, at least keeping the obvious duplicates out when I find them. --Pkeegstra 16:04, 12 February 2012 (EST)

That page is part of a GEDCOM dump and run. Uploaded Sep 13 2007 and the user never returned. The best thing would to just delete the entire GEDCOM.--Scot 17:03, 12 February 2012 (EST)

That family is now on my ToDo list. They at least have a context of better documented New Amsterdam people. I'll drop the useless data for them ASAP. Can you get me the list of the whole GEDCOM and I'll see if there are other pieces too far gone to be worth putting on my list? --Pkeegstra 05:58, 13 February 2012 (EST)

You can go to the user's page User:Tfb6972 and click Contributions in the left hand menu. --Jrich 08:38, 13 February 2012 (EST)

Elizabeth Moore Lines, Acquackanonk, Essex County, New Jersey [3 March 2012]

I am beginning research about Elizabeth Moore and Anthony Lines. Elizabeth Lines of Essex County, New Jersey is named as one of his children in Benjamin Moore's will proved in 5 Jan 1828 in Albemarle County.

You posted previously about Benjamin Moore:

A self-published manuscript "Moore" by Arthur Clayton Moore identifies the parents of Benjamin as "John Jackson Moore, Jr" and Sarah Platt of Essex County, New Jersey. While a "John More of the Township of Acquacknunk [Paterson, NJ] in the County of Essex" did name a son Benjamin in his will dated 30 Sep 1793, proved 7 Nov 1805, there are other facts that may suggest his son Benjamin was not the same person. More research is needed.

From this I assume that you have researched Elizabeth Moore Lines and the New Jersey connection. I am looking for information about Elizabeth Lines (birth date, marriage date, death date, burial location) and about Anthony Lines. I've posted information about Anthony Lines found so far in his listing in werelate.org. I have not found any marriage record for Anthony Lines and Elizabeth Moore. No listings have turned up in the indexes to the local church records of the region (collections of the Holland Society of New York). I have also not found any will probate in the standard listing of court proceedings for New Jersey. This means that I have research to do in the local archives in Passaic, Bergen and Essex counties and some work in Trenton. Finding his will is the principal objective and his known death date 25 Jul 1840 should help locate the local records in the newly formed Passaic County (1837).

Do you have any additional information about the New Jersey connection of Benjamin Moore?

Do you have copies of the court proceedings of the court actions in Virginia regarding Benjamin Moore's will. Do these provide references to Elizabeth Lines or her affidavits?

Also, a speculative thought: Anthony Lines was the son of a Palatine German immigrant, Conrad Lein, and lived in a Dutch and German community in Bergen County, New Jersey. Isaac Moore seems to be associated with German Americans in Augusta County (Zumbro, Koiner, etc). It may be that the Moore line is German in origin rather than English.--Jejones 13:23, 1 March 2012 (EST)

I have very little. From 1830 onwards, the distributions are to "Benj. Lines in the right of Elizabeth Lines". The problem referred to, as you may have seen, was a book by Littell that (without evidence) said John Moore had a grandson William, s/o Benjamin (here). Benjamin does not name a son William in his will. William married his cousin Rachel and survived Benjamin from what I seem to find, so should have been in the will. Of course, the book could be wrong about who William's father was, Benjamin could have given him his portion already, or something else entirely. I am working on different things - slowly, but not specifically on Elizabeth Lines. There were probably Moores in every county of New Jersey, perhaps Elizabeth Lines led A C Moore to Essex county and he happened to find one with a son Benjamin. Only half the proof needed has been found. Need to show it is the right Benjamin. In fact, it is not even clear that Benjamin's father was named John, that was just a hunch that led to a man who had a son named Benjamin as near as I can tell. --Jrich 14:30, 1 March 2012 (EST)

Agreed. I am following a bit of a Missouri line with this research in needing to be shown all of the proofs/documents. This leaves me with Benjamin Moore and no earlier information. I hope that the research into Elizabeth Moore Lines will produce information of the link to the Moore family in New Jersey (and even that fact I am reserving judgement about).

Benjamin M. Lines is most probably the son of Elizabeth Moore Lines. He is born in New Jersey but is in Virginia in the 1830s as proved by his marriage to Jane Ballard on 15 Nov 1832 in Albemarle County. His listing indicates that Elizabeth Moore Lines died prior to 1830.

What connects Elizabeth Lines with Anthony Lines? Have you seen any documents that lists them as a married couple/proves that Anthony was her husband?

Elizabeth Moore was probably 20 years younger than Anthony Lines and would have been a second or third wife. Fanny Lines Simonson (1789-1869) shows up as a likely daughter of Anthony Lines and her birth date leaves no possibility that Elizabeth Moore was her mother. Possibly significant is the detail that both Fanny Lines Simonson and Benjamin M. Lines were buried in Presbyterian cemeteries (Caldwell, NJ and Waynesboro, VA) suggesting that the marriages and baptisms might be found in Presbyterian church records.

I have only done the most cursory searching for Elizabeth Lines to see if it led to an easy answer. It sounds like you are way past me. Right now I am looking for evidence of the Benjamin Moore in Essex county to see if something can tie him to Virginia. It seems easier than starting over with a survey of all New Jersey counties. I have ordered films of some deeds, but it is just so hit or miss whether the deed will add the genealogical details we researchers want that I don't know if it will be productive. --Jrich 12:19, 2 March 2012 (EST)

I even have reservations about New Jersey - for me it is still not proven. We know that his grandson listed Benjamin Moore's birthplace as New Jersey and we know that Elizabeth Moore Lines was born in New Jersey and lived in Acquackanonk, Essex (after 1837 Passacic) County, New Jersey. Aquackanonk was a bustling little transportation hub serving Manhattan in the late 1700s - early 1800s. It then was the site of some of the earliest railroad construction in America. The location had movement and so the location of Benjamin Moore's family home is very much up in the air.

Savage Transcript About [8 March 2012]

I recall and appreciate your reservations about Savage as a high quality source of genealogical info, but I really feel like it's too ubiquitous to ignore (for purposes of the WeRelate target audience). Also - as you've chimed in on some of the discussion - it's important to start to nail down errors so that they don't keep recurring. I would appreciate your review of the tentative practice document for the transcript - with a particular focus on technique for designating defective content in Savage. Thanks!--jrm03063 11:29, 8 March 2012 (EST)

It's ubiquitous because people like the idea that here is one source with all the answers, and thus it becomes a re-occurring source of mythology and error as it gets used by people looking for easy answers without bothering to check more modern or more primary sources. It is not that I think Savage was a bad genealogist, but so much research has been done since then, and genealogy is so much more rigorous now, that nearly everything he did has to at least be redone to modern standards, if not corrected. So, I do not favor anything that seems to imply it is a good source to cite. From my perspective, it will be good to mark the errors, because it will quantify the actual extent of the problem. But how to do that is better left to people more in tune to the spirit of your project. It seems like errors would still need to be documented on Person and Family pages to avoid having them re-entered. --Jrich 12:45, 8 March 2012 (EST)

I won't presume to dispute your opinion - but you might consider looking some of this over on the basis that it is an example of bringing in a significant transcription and dealing with the inevitable march of knowledge. We certainly havn't tried to do anything like this before. I am sure you can imagine other content that you hold in higher academic esteem, which could present a similar set of technical challenges. Thanks - whatever you decide to do. --jrm03063 13:27, 8 March 2012 (EST)

Savage re:Thomas Doggett [18 March 2012]

I saw your remarks on the issue of Savage mistaking one Thomas Doggett for another. I've noted the error in the transcript and supported that by quoted you on the corresponding discussion page (for which your review and/or expansion would be appreciated). I've also tried to add a note about Savage being mistaken on this issue on pages where the error seems most apt to recur (while superior source material should be a sufficient protection against the error being re-introduced, I don't think we'll ever regret being explicit). --jrm03063 20:11, 17 March 2012 (EDT)

One About is as Good as Another (Precision with Dates) [18 March 2012]

However, a further Caveat, if you see the date written as Feb 11, 1731/32, is this Feb 22, 1732, Washington's Birthday. I would imagine that there are many cases where people have converted the 11 day difference in secondary sources written after 1752.--Scot 14:13, 18 March 2012 (EDT)

Yes and probably many of those don't know it was only a 10-day difference in the 1600's because 1700 was counted a leap year under the old system, but not under the new system, adding to the total of surplus leap days already celebrated that had to be undone. So morale of that story is: read the introduction and hopefully the author explains his policy and follows it consistently. But if you go back to original records you tend not to have that problem (except dealing with age at death across the changeover) since they tended to use the legal date at the time. --Jrich 14:47, 18 March 2012 (EDT)

William Holbrook, husband of Hopestill Read [9 April 2012]

Hi Jrich,

Didnt mean to make a duplicate there for William. Just adding stubs before I go back and add all my sources and sometimes Im not checking well enough if they've already been created (note - not uploading a GEDCOM).--DMaxwell 09:16, 9 April 2012 (EDT)

Jeremiah Horton Fix [24 April 2012]

Nice!! Thanks (although he's not one of mine).--jaques1724 23:03, 24 April 2012 (EDT)

Lucky search. Not mine either. Thought some Hortons of Connecticut (Person:Abigail Horton (23)) are of interest, which is why I looked. --Jrich 00:54, 25 April 2012 (EDT)

Beginner goofs [2 May 2012]

Hi.

I appreciate your comments regarding my message, I'll try and correct the deficiencies.

As I mentioned in the initial e-mail, I am not just a beginner, but know little about "formal" genealogy methodologies. My friend, a "Hyde", had been pondering about her family history (she's 78 and most close relatives are gone), and I offered to do some basic research to see what I could dig up on-line. Once I hit some 80 names, and filled up about 20 pages of a MS Word document in which I tried to organize the information so she could follow it, I determined that I needed some organizational help. Looking around, I found the WeRelate site, and thought it might be a way to quickly organize the information which I had collected, which is to a large extent based on Census records and others from Family Search. I had NO IDEA that anyone would "jump in" so quickly with such useful information about some of the names!! The link to the entry for "ROBERT H HYDE" in the Oklahoma history/mug book was just fabulous, and she will be delighted to have this much information all from one place (And I know how unreliable these information in these mug books can be!)

My current objective is to try and interest her into continuing this research, both to satisfy her own curiosity about her family, and also to provide her a a hobby/interest which will allow her to occupy her free time (TV's a vast wasteland!). I think if I can get her interested, she can do a "professional" job expanding her family data. She is a retired university professor, and I am sure she understands the need for proper documentation of sources, etc.

I did retain and document sources for most of the names posted in this initial "Tree", and I did include them (at least in brief form) in my initial MS Word document. Much of this initial information has been derived from the FamilySearch/LDS web site, e.g., Census and Birth/Death Index records. I was rushing to put together enough of a structure so that I could show her what a "Tree" would look like, and thus determine if she would have an interest in continuing with the research.

Specific replies to your observations.

1. My use of the [1], [2], etc. as part of the name was to give me a systematic way to track which of my names made it from my original MS Word document to the WeRelate database. Adding them to the "Title Prefix" field seemed like a good way to isolate them until I was sure all my initial data was transcribed, and it was my intention to eventually remove them once that was done.

2. I did not identify many sources in this initial push, mostly because of the reasons noted above, AND an uncertainty as to how to format them ,etc. It's obvious I need to study some other entries made by experienced researchers - it's unfortunate that there seems to be no other HYDE or DARROW people in the WeRelate database at present, as that would be an obvious place to begin.

I have many questions. For example, is the inclusion of the page from the 1900 Census appropriate on the entry of ROBERT H HYDE, or is it redundant since it is obvious that the information is available at several locations on-line?

3. The manner of entering the "unnamed children" was a definite kludge on my part, but I wanted to reserve locations in the tree to remind me about people/names I knew I needed to look for. I appreciate your comments, both in e-mail, and on your User page, about the annoying characteristics of incomplete or anonymous names. I'll change per your suggestions.

4. The "Living" people have been deleted; they were really part of an experiment to see how WeRelate developed multi-generational trees.

5. Your reaction to the part about "never cleaning it up" is of course, correct. My comment was based on my uncertainty as to whether this sort of activity would appeal to my friend. If she turns out to have no interest, then I have no motivation to continue. I suppose at that time, I would have the alternatives of (a) leaving it as as, in the hopes that it might be useful to someone else, even without proper source references, or simply deleting the entire set of family data. I have absolutely no idea which would be the most appropriate solution, and hopefully this will not be a decision that would have to be made.

Enough rambling for now. Am off to show her what I have discovered.

Mike--MML1942 17:34, 2 May 2012 (EDT)

Deborah Hunt [13 June 2012]

thanks for the clarification on her birth date!--Khs2000 01:56, 5 June 2012 (EDT)

Thanks for fixing Joseph Hunt - I added him and forgot to put in the details--Khs2000 10:37, 13 June 2012 (EDT)

Note [6 June 2012]

Jrich, I am fully aware of the rarity of middle names before the 19th century, although they were more common in Southern states in the 18th century (and in fact I have several in my tree, one dating to a child born in 1736). I simply wrote down what I had in my old sources (a transcription of the birth record, which at one time did read 'Josiah B Brown'). My area of specialty is the Scott family of Iowa (my mother's family), so I am not always familiar with the ins and outs of other families that I am not researching. Based on that marriage date, I was right to have some doubt about the William and Rebecca couple (who, like I said, seem to connect to none of the Brown or Prentice lines) who seem to be completely unresearched. Another note I wanted to make to you is that some of the lines that are unsourced online often are sourced by items no where online, such as those from County Historical Society histories. Nearly all of the ones I have had in my tree I have been able to track down the source for; an exception to this might be the Batterson Family Bible, which no longer is online but I am trying to get a copy so the Batterson lines can be sourced.

I also have a favor to ask. Please do not assume that I am an internet newbie when it comes to genealogy; I already have one book in progress and two others on the drawing board, so I have some level of expertise. I have started to rectify the stubs of mine that you dislike so much, a few at a time.--DMaxwell 00:17, 6 June 2012 (EDT)

I respond to what is on the page. I am sure when sources are added there will be less misunderstandings.

It is unfortunate nobody has thoroughly researched this line. It happens. Gives you something to do.

William Brown Jr. b. Salem 1666 to William Brown and Hannah Curwin, m. Boston 1694 Rebecca (---) Bailey, widow of Rev. Thomas Bailey (1655-1689). Thomas and Rebecca had children in 1686, 1687 and 1688 before the father died, suggesting the marriage was about 1685, hence the mother born maybe 1665? Perhaps (i.e., speculation) they are the William and Rebecca Brown of Sherborn who had 1697 son William, 1699 son John, 1701 Rebecca, 1703 Mary, appear to have moved to Mendon and in 1707 son Samuel, 1710 Daniel, 1713 Abigail. Presumably the son William, b. 1697, is the one who married Rebecca Prentice in 1719. The older couple being in their early fifties, I tend to think Josiah is the son of the younger couple. William Sr. died 1727. The records are recorded, whether they go together is the issue. Some work with probate files might offer clues. --Jrich 10:19, 6 June 2012 (EDT)

What amazes me is that this appears to be an unresearched New England line. I didnt think there were many of those left. So I was probably justified in leaving the DOB off Josiah's page. My hope was that there was some literature on him, but it doesnt look like it.--DMaxwell 10:54, 6 June 2012 (EDT)

Re-emphasizing the speculative nature of tying these disjoint records together. There also appears to be a daughter Elizabeth Brown b. in Newton to William and Rebecca in 1695. Besides fitting together, I don't see the presence of other William-and-Rebeccas that could account for the various births, but a lot of research is needed to move this out of the realm of speculation.

None of this, even if all true, says anything about whether Josiah, s/o William & Rebecca, was the one who married Mary Holbrook. He is no better, or worse, a candidate than he was without this. --Jrich 14:24, 6 June 2012 (EDT)

Since you are good at finding things. [12 June 2012]

I wonder if you might be able to help me with a conflict over John Lee of Guilford, who married Elizabeth Crampton, and from this couple I descend from. Many trees claim is the same man born in Northampton Mass on 2 Jan 1657. The problem is that they cannot be the same man. Two different death dates exist for him (one in 1711 and the other in 1718, the latter I believe is the correct one), two families, etc. This post explains in part why this cannot be the same man:

http://genforum.genealogy.com/crampton/messages/543.html

I've found some vague posts online that say he is actually the son of Hugh Lees of Saybrook Colony, but no reference is shown. The trouble is that he cannot have had children with both Liz Crampton and Sarah Loomis. I also seem some trees claim a third wife and family. No one seems to have sorted him out, and there is scant information on this Hugh Lees.--DMaxwell 10:52, 12 June 2012 (EDT)

I have plenty of stuff to work on already. Besides, solving problems like this is the fun part. You may want to consider where you are searching for answers. Internet posts are rarely able to solve controversies because they just keep spreading disinformation. These can only be resolved by finding primary information (based on vital records, wills, other contemporary documents) on which to anchor facts, and throwing away virtually everything else. You probably want to read American Genealogist, vol. 45, p. 16-17. Basic conclusion is that John Lee of Guilford m. abt. 1686 Elizabeth Crampton, John Lee of Westfield m. as his second wife Sarah Loomis (first wife was Sarah Pixley). It also mentions a third marriage which might be the third one you referred to, John Lee of Farmington to Elizabeth Loomis, which is a different John Lee and Sarah's cousin. --Jrich 14:26, 12 June 2012 (EDT)

I find the internet is useful to see if there are 'issues' with certain lines. The trouble with this one was there was little literature on the Lees. If I accepted everything printed, Id have a ton of wrong lines on my own.--DMaxwell 14:30, 12 June 2012 (EDT)

Also, that article doesnt seem to solve the issue of the two different John Lees. The Northampton one is not the same as the Guilford one. That was the problem I wanted to find the answer to. Notice in the article she says John Lee of Westfield did not marry Elizabeth Crampton. I also pulled up the older NEHGS record, it doesnt mention a wife other than Elizabeth. I hoped to be able to separate the different John Lees instead of the chimera we have now.--DMaxwell 14:49, 12 June 2012 (EDT)

I disagree, the article does solve the issue of two John Lees, by clearly identifying the marriages of each, and making them distinguishable as separate persons (and a third one was well). The post you provided the link for asked, "THE QUESTION IS WHICH JOHN LEE DID SHE [Elizabeth Crampton] MARRY?", and that question was answered by showing she did not marry John of Westfield. There is, by the way, more evidence. You might want to try and find the vital records of Westfield, MA. I suspect the Barbour Collection of Connecticut Vital Records will at least list the births of children, and may name a mother, though it is clear by the imprecise marriage date that no marriage record for John of Guilford has been found. Also, by the way, there is at least one other John Lee, if not more, beyond those three. Anyway, it was hardly meant to be a complete answer, just something to show it is not really an 'issue'. --Jrich 16:10, 12 June 2012 (EDT)

Wells family sources [2 July 2012]

Thanks for adding sources to a few of the Wells family pages. I havent been able to work on any of these lines much due to power outages we're having here almost daily in Ohio.--DMaxwell 18:59, 2 July 2012 (EDT)

Don't leave! [10 August 2012]

Jrich,

I know you and I butted heads at first (I wrongly felt I was being talked down to), but I appreciate your style and your willingness to help out with lines not that of your own. I came around to your viewpoint and stopped leaving 'stubs' for months on end and instead adding proper sources straight away. Cleaning up the world of online genealogy - with all its myths, distortions, and sometimes outright lies might seem as impossible as draining the Pacific Ocean sometimes, but you were on the right track and doing a good job of changing this.

Perhaps take a break, but please do not vanish. You are one of the top 5 contributors that I have run into on the sight and it would suffer without your input.

Take care,

Daniel Maxwell--Daniel Maxwell 05:46, 10 August 2012 (EDT)

You'll be happier if you only fix what you can do with good grace; the stuff that bugs you - well, leave that to someone else to work with. Trying to fix the world - or drain the Pacific - will exhaust you and frustrate you. You have a lot to offer but only if you can do it with good grace. Cut back on correcting everybody unless they ask; you'll be happier and so will those you feel you have to correct. Now how do you figure I learned that . . . I live with my son-in-law who doesn't appreciate my 'helpful suggestions'. Leaving is not a good option, learning to live peacefully together works better. --Janiejac 06:26, 10 August 2012 (EDT)

Adding my voice to the "don't leave" chorus. We've probably butted heads, too, at points. And yet I respect the dedication you've demonstrated to quality content. Recently, for example, I was enjoying the back and forth about the Merriams. You helped clarify things for me.

I'll echo Daniel's suggestion that a break might be in order because if you're frustrated all the time, then yeah, that's no fun. But please reconsider leaving altogether. I'll also try to harmonize with what I'm reading between Janie's lines: finding a way to collaborate that is less confrontive/combative will benefit you, everyone and the site. I totally get your commitment to quality. That is evident. It's just sometimes you leave bruises and skinned knees in your wake. I often read your comments to others and think, "ah, jrich, take a breath... or two or five..."

Ultimately, you make the call as to how and where to spend your resources. But just know that you have contributed a great deal here. Thanks.

Jillaine 12:14, 10 August 2012 (EDT)

Regarding some of your recent edits [2 October 2012]

I have observed your recent edits to Samuel Andrew and William Leete. Please be aware of the etiquette guidance that indicates:

"Also, if someone else changes a page you have contributed to, please don't just revert their changes! Leave a message on the Talk page associated with the page to initiate a conversation (that's what Talk pages are there for :-)."

Your edits seem to be at odds with this guidance. I would appreciate it if you would be more careful on this in the future. --jrm03063 10:08, 2 October 2012 (EDT)

There was a moreinfo on the page before your edit, and no need to erase the person's narrative and replace it with the wikipedia summary, except for your personal agenda (why you don't spend you time improving genealogy on wikipedia instead of bringing their less specialized stuff here is beyond me). It seemed to me that it was your edit that was rather disrespectful since you threw away some of the information that was there.

We've had the discussion about wikipedia before and a rehash of that discussion doesn't belong on a person's talk page. But since then, besides continuing to find many errors in their genealogical work, some just reflecting their lack of genealogical knowledge (like the birth date on Person:Thomas Putnam (22)), some so bad as to be laughable if they weren't being brought to WeRelate (like crediting Person:Mary Walcott (2) with two overlapping marriages), there have also been problems with WeRelate's out of date cache and issues involving better articles in foreign wikipedia (meaning they are not the single authority even in their own universe). Wikipedia is the generalist, we are the specialists. Therefore on a mature page (not all our pages are there yet) they should be further reading (a link the reader may follow if they wish) and nothing more.

I think it is you that needs to be more careful, to use good sources, and to care about finding good genealogy, more than some unthinking drive to include unreliable wikipedia templates on all possible pages, especially when it means replacing two paragraphs of narrative with a two line wikipedia entry as you did recently. There is too much urban-myth genealogy available on the Internet already, and advocating the use of sources merely because they are available and easy to access is not productive of good genealogy. This is a genealogy site, and just because it uses similar methodologies to collect its information as wikipedia, does not mean they share a common purpose or overlapping material. --Jrich 10:46, 2 October 2012 (EDT)

Overlapping material is a bad choice of words. Some of the material is clearly overlapping. What I meant was common presentation, meaning that one form, or a single subset of the available content, does not serve both purposes. --Jrich 12:22, 2 October 2012 (EDT)

Just to be clear - are you saying that you were aware that these were recent edits of mine - and that on the strength of your sole opinion - without any effort to discuss what I had done and why - you reverted them? --jrm03063 11:23, 2 October 2012 (EDT)

I was notified of changes made to pages I was watching, I inspected the changes, I decided they made the page worse (and in fact, seemed disrespectful of the material that was previously there), and changed the page to reflect what I thought was a better presentation. (I inspect all changes I am notified of, and frequently make changes, additions, or adjustments.) In this situation it meant, in the one case, restoring the narrative that you partially erased because the new version lost its coherency, and moving wikipedia after the narrative as a link for further reading, because those of us who are not wikipedia users cannot change or correct wikipedia material, or add footnotes to it, so it is inherently better to have our own narrative which can be narrated and documented to genealogical standards. Oh, and I actually did some research, adding sources in one case, and discovering the use of copyrighted material by a third-party in the other, which I converted to a link just like I did wikipedia, so the material is only a click away. No, it was not a reversion, but no, I made no effort to discuss them with you, as you did not make any effort to discuss your changes before making them. After all, genealogy does not work on opinion, it works on sources, and wikipedia is a marginal genealogical source, easily made superfluous. --Jrich 12:22, 2 October 2012 (EDT)

Now I've got one for you [5 October 2012]

As I noticed before, we seem to share the Holbrook line of Weymouth, Mass. One issue I had that I noticed was that you deleted Elizabeth (Pitts?) Holbrook's name from her page:

Person:Elizabeth Pitts (3)

Not sure how you reached that conclusion. If you look at the history, select the revision from 26 Dec 2008 (before I made any changes), the name was already missing. It appears to have happened during the two merges. Incidentally, this is not my line, just a page I added to, along the way. I'm sure I've slipped up somewhere along the way, but as a general rule, if I can't prove Pitts wrong or at least shown it unlikely, I wouldn't have removed it, even if I agree with Davis that it isn't proved (similar to widow Judith Smead having daughter Mary Denman).

By the way, the Joseph Neal book is available on heritagequest. If your local library has access to heritagequest.com, your library card number will usually work from home by going through the library's website. Every once in a while it has a useful source and the convenience of using it at home makes it worth the effort of getting a library card. The searching capabilities are limited relative to, say, books.google.com, but if you know the page you want, it works well enough. --Jrich 10:02, 5 October 2012 (EDT)

..perhaps prematurely. Normally Id have no problem with removing false parentage but this one seems to have some real meat to it. It would seem that Mrs Elizabeth Pitts did die in New England and that Mrs Holbrook was her daughter. The trouble is I cant find much info on this supposed Mrs Elizabeth Pitts to really say whether or not Pitts is a remarried name or if William Holbrook's wife was indeed a Pitts as born. My policy in these situations normally is to assume she is also a Pitts unless we have evidence to the contrary. Joseph Neal Ancestry (the main source for the Holbrook line) isnt available right now so I cant see what he wrote about it, Im not sure if he was covered anywhere else. I've seen some trees claim a Pitts colonist as her father but I dont know if this is in any way true. Your input would be appreciated.--Daniel Maxwell 06:37, 5 October 2012 (EDT)

William Holbrook, bp. St Johns, Glastonbury, Somersetshire, 12 June 1620 [Joseph Neal Anc 131]; m. (1) by 1655 Elizabeth Pitts (on 1 August 1655, "administration to the estate of Mrs. Elizabeth Pitts deceased is granted to W[illia]m Holbrooke & Elizabeth his wife," who presented an account of what "my mother Mrs. Pitts oweth to me & to others in her sickness & health" [SPR 3:26]); m. (2) about 1696 Abigail (Wright) (Sharp) Clapp, daughter of Richard Wright {1630, Lynn) and widow of Robert Sharpe {1635, Braintree} and Thomas Clapp {1638, Weymouth} [TAG 67:38; GMB 3:2072-74]. - Thomas Holbrook sketch in The Great Migration, 3:352-53.

Capt. William, bapt. in Glastonbury June 12, 1620; m. (1) Elizabeth, daughter of widow Elizabeth Pitts; m, (2) widow Abigail (Wright) (Sharp) Clapp (See Wright.) … - William Holbrook sketch in Massachusetts and Maine Families in the Ancestry of Walter Goodwin Davis, 2:290 [originally in The Ancestry of Joseph Neal, 131].

Note that Anderson makes the leap, based on Davis, that Holbrook's wife was Elizabeth Pitts. Davis just gave us the baptismal name, Elizabeth, and that she was daughter of the widow Pitts, but left open whether her father was the unknown Mr. Pitts or a prior husband of her mother's--jaques1724 08:01, 5 October 2012 (EDT)

Thanks Jaques. The Joseph Neal book is 'check out' on open library and I had no other means of getting it. I just wondered if anything else is known about this Mrs Pitts, so we might be able to see what the evidence is for her having a prior marriage for or against. I had no position either way but wondered if there was any more literature on this woman.--Daniel Maxwell 08:47, 5 October 2012 (EDT)

Sarah Thorne & Jas Jackson Thanks [24 October 2012]

Thanks for editing the sources on the family page for Family:James Jackson and Sarah Thorne (1). I very carefully changed MySources for Sarah on her person page before I merged the two pages, but it appears that those changes did not follow over to the family page! Is this a bug or just something I should have known and taken care of? (Obviously I didn't check the family pg before I left the site.)

The sources on their family page now look much more complete. I was surprised that you didn't delete the source that didn't have the correct info. But then I realized if you had just deleted it without comment, I wouldn't have known the citation was in error. I'm still learning...--Janiejac 09:46, 24 October 2012 (EDT)

No, sources on the Person page do not get copied to the Family page. Nor, probably, should they, since the sources on the Person page may describe one of the spouse's childhood or other event that has nothing to do with the marriage or family represented by the Family page. It creates some ambiguity and/or duplication when deciding where to cite sources, unfortunately. --Jrich 10:32, 24 October 2012 (EDT)

Davis [12 November 2012]

I am so sorry! Yes, you are so correct that Eleazor could not have been over a hundred years old! I was just so excited to find the missing link - I had the history from myself up to James and then of course Dolar down to Simon. I found the following on someone else's FREEPAGES GENEALOGY ROOTSWEB: (and it does list date of death 27 Oct 1831 as that of both father and JR son)

Eleazer Davis [Parents] was born on 11 Aug 1722 in Concord,Middlesex,MA. He died on 27 Oct 1831 in Holden,worcester,MA. He was buried in Oct 1831. He married Sarah Ward on 27 Jul 1748 in Holden,worcester,MA.

Sarah Ward [Parents] was born about 1727 in of Holden,worcester,MA. She died in 1825 in Holden,worcester,MA. She was buried in Jul 1825 in Holden,worcester,MA. She married Eleazer Davis on 27 Jul 1748 in Holden,worcester,MA.

They had the following children:

  M i Asahel Davis was born on 5 Mar 1750. He died on 9 Mar 1810.  
  M ii Eleazer Davis Jr. was born on 22 Mar 1751. He died on 27 Oct 1831.  
  M iii Bela Davis was born on 12 Apr 1753.  
  M iv Samuel Davis was born on 24 Jan 1756 in Holden,worcester,MA. He died on 24 Sep 1778.  
  F v Lucretia was born on 4 Jun 1758. She died before 8 Jun 1798.  
  F vi Sarah Davis was born on 10 May 1760. She died on 6 Mar 1830.  
  F vii Dorothy Davis was born on 7 Oct 1762.  
  F viii Mary Davis was born on 11 Aug 1764.  
  F ix Molly Davis was born on 11 Oct 1764.  
  M x Jonathan Davis was born on 22 Apr 1767.  
  F xi Lydia Davis was born on 22 Aug 1769.  
  M xii James Davis was born on 22 Jun 1772.  
  F xiii Lucy Davis was born on 18 Mar 1777. 

This will teach me to find double proof of things and to document my sources. I am a very beginning beginner and just wanted to help if anyone else was trying to link the two parts of the chain. I'll be more diligent, but I thank you for working on this for me! (looking more closely, the dates for Sarah Ward would have her having her last baby at 50 and being 98 at the time of death... not very common then)

Kate--Kaybella 22:55, 11 November 2012 (EST)

It is not the number of sources, but the quality of the sources that matters. Primary sources (recorded contemporary to the event) are most reliable to avoid assumption and mistakes that masquerade as facts. And so, actually, the vital records of Holden (the records kept by the town clerk as required by law in Mass since sometime around 1650) show that Lucy was indeed Eleazer's and Sarah daughter, so Sarah did have her last child at about age 50, and she died at age 97, which is often described as in her 98th year. If this is the website you used, I checked all the sources given there for Eleazer, except #1 which I don't have access to, and the birth date doesn't come from any of those. (Chalk up the wrong death date to a lack of analysis, because the source they cite says age at death 82, which plainly doesn't fit the person being described.) Assuming the birth date comes from #1, Davis, Marie Ray, Dolar Davis of Massachusetts, and Some of His Descendants, p. 21, I'm not sure where that book found it, because it is not in the Concord records, or in records of nearby towns, or listed in any of the genealogies describing this family that I have checked. Usually when one source has a date and none of the other common sources do, especially in a case like this where it appears to be self-published (as opposed to, say, a well-known genealogist, or scholarly magazine that vettes its articles before publishing), it is important to hold your acceptance until you access that source to see if they provide any basis for their assertion. (Not that some great finds don't originate in self-published sources, but the odds are low.) --Jrich 10:32, 12 November 2012 (EST)

Davis [12 November 2012]

Also, I apologize again, but I hit a wrong key and spelled Eleazor with an N at the end, and then tried to fix it but could not figure out how. Is it possible to delete any entry with that incorrect spelling?--Kaybella 23:03, 11 November 2012 (EST)

I renamed the family page to match the person page. (WeRelate has three independent namespaces: the names on person pages, the names of person pages, and the names of family pages. The only process for keeping them in sync is manual intervention.) --Pkeegstra 07:41, 12 November 2012 (EST)

Thanks [15 November 2012]

Howdy Jrich, noticed you helped out on a few Parmenter families that I added. Thanks for adding the records. Best regards,

Jim:)--Delijim 16:37, 15 November 2012 (EST)

Edward Doty [22 December 2012]

It grieves me to see him linked to a set of parents as the authorities do not recognize his parentage. Why proliferate fraudulent genealogies???--Gypsy1930 12:06, 22 December 2012 (EST)

As you should know, those parents have been on that page a long time, even before 2009 when you edited this page [5]. As you will see if you do a diff on my edits today [6], it had nothing to do with his parents. I was merely adding what I thought was important information about his probate showing who his children were. --Jrich 12:16, 22 December 2012 (EST)

I did some looking into his parentage, an issue I was never concerned with, and hopefully what I found has assuaged your grief somewhat. It wasn't anything that you couldn't have done yourself anytime in the past three years. --Jrich 17:52, 22 December 2012 (EST)

I am sorry if I offended you. I am delighted with the info you added. I only made the comment because you are volunteer staff and much more knowledgeable about making changes on WeRate. PEACE--Gypsy1930 22:00, 22 December 2012 (EST)

I am not "staff" though I guess everybody that contributes to this site is pretty much a volunteer. I respect the spirit of your frustration, just that I had nothing to do with it. I was trying to debunk some other apparently false claims (see Family:Job Randall and Elizabeth Doughty (2)). --Jrich 22:26, 22 December 2012 (EST)

template on Flora [23 December 2012]

I responded on Person talk:Flora Miller (4), but yes, it was a demo, and is currently linked from the Watercooler.--Robert.shaw 22:47, 23 December 2012 (EST)

Thanks! [14 January 2013]

I have noticed the work you have put into people connected to Mary Lovell Curtis [7] like her brother in law Turner Reed [8] and many others. I am fairly new to doing genealogy, so I just wanted to say thank you; it has substantially improved the level of scholarship for the research. Forbes72 16:44, 13 January 2013 (EST)

That's good to hear. Don't know if you followed things all the way to father of Abigail House and wife of Isaac Reed, but these are interesting cases. --Jrich 11:41, 14 January 2013 (EST)

Relation? [8 June 2013]

Hello,

I saw that you made contributions to my Wheeler and Bigelow sides of my family trees. I was curious if you and I are related. My grandfather is Earl Wendell Ladd B. 03 Apr 1935. His mother is Bernice Ethel Bigelow B. 11 Jul 1897, wife of Orange Nolan Ladd B. 13 Nov 1906.

Bernice Bigelow is my great grandmother.

Thanks!

Lauren Ende (nee Ladd)--LEnde1018 19:08, 8 June 2013 (EDT)

I have some Wheeler ancestors, but not these. To be honest, I thought the pages needed some work. My mission is to impress on people that sources are not optional when working in a collaborative environment. --Jrich 00:07, 9 June 2013 (EDT)

Relation or Just Knowledgable? [13 June 2013]

I saw that you and I watch about 20 pages in common. Are you related to them (Sprague, Rogers, Woodworth) or are you just knowledgable? I just discovered this site. I have two notebooks my mom compiled full of my ancestors going back to the first century AD that I'm going through.

Susannah--Srbarker 20:33, 13 June 2013 (EDT)

See the topic immediately preceding. Once I spent two weeks trying to find which one of two women with the same name was involved in a particular marriage. Finally, I ran across a probate document that proved one answer was correct. It was published in a magazine in 1909 as a "note", i.e., long before the Internet was developed; in fact, long before the Internet developers were born. Unfortunately the wrong answer was published in the 1800's. Both sources, however, were freely available on the Internet. I then did a quick survey: i.e., searched google for the name and birth date, and found that 51 of the first 100 websites showed the answer that had actually been debunked in 1909. Some showed no marriage, some even showed both marriages for the same woman, and the rest, only something near 40%, showed the right answer. In other words, you are more likely to find the wrong answer on the Internet. Since then, I have been crusading to show that it is not enough to say that you know something, you must say how you know it as well. --Jrich 22:52, 13 June 2013 (EDT)

Something happened to nomerge template on Samuel Wright talk page [2 August 2013]

You recently merged two talk pages - Person Talk:Samuel Wright (27) and Samuel Wright (65) - and the nomerge template on the Talk page now refers to a non-page (Person: title of this page). Not quite sure how that happened, or what it should be. Could you check this out? Thanks--DataAnalyst 14:51, 2 August 2013 (EDT)

The nomerge template was introduced to Samuel-27 by the merge, so came from Samuel-65. Looking at the history of the talk page for Samuel-65, the oldest version of that page shows the same corrupted nomerge (here). My guess is the creator had copied that nomerge out of a Help page, and not entirely comprehending the process, left it in the original form without customizing it to the correct name. So no idea what merge he was trying to prevent. --Jrich 15:21, 2 August 2013 (EDT)

Family:John Bowne and Hannah Feake (1) edit on 8/27 [27 August 2013]

Hi, It seems to me that some of the narrative deleted does not appear on John's or John and Hannah's page. Can it be put back? Thanks,--Sheri 17:53, 27 August 2013 (EDT)

When I compared the old version and John's page, whose section seems to be the only one containing information that wasn't directly transcluded, or merely repeating a fact or a source citation, it seems like everything is substantially there already, including the links to wikipedia, etc. In any event, it is hard to recreate because it was a mass of transclusion and cites that were not portable without excessive amounts of work that are detrimental to collaboration by multiple people. --Jrich 18:19, 27 August 2013 (EDT)

Washburne Conflicting Data info [27 August 2013]

Thanks for catching that. I'm sure there are going to be more references like that as User:DataAnalyst is working to upload my Jackson database. (I had no idea how to divide up the db into small enough segments.) The Conflicting Data page that is referred to about Person talk:Unknown Washburne (1) is on my website here: http://www.jacksonfamilygenealogy.com/pages/conflictingdatarobertjackson.htm.

I hesitate to link over to that page because I am getting on in years; the website may not remain many more years. I have not posted the whole article on that page; only an excerpt, and I don't think the way it is written up right now is the way it should be presented on WeRelate. The article is copyrighted so I can't just copy it. And right now I don't feel up to redoing it. Would you be willing to work on something that could be posted to WeRelate about this? There are so many charts "out there" still saying Robert's wife was Agnes Washburne that I feel it is necessary to present Mr. Macy's conclusions in some fashion.

If doing this won't fit into your schedule right now, perhaps I'll feel more able to do it myself a bit later. Or maybe someone else will read this and decide to do it. It needs doing. Just wanted you to know about it and encourage you 'have at it' if you want. --janiejac 21:17, 27 August 2013 (EDT)

OK. Just did some simple copying based on the stuff already on Robert's page. Elaborate on it if you wish. Ultimately, anybody serious about this family simply has to read the article first hand!!! Happens to also be a good lesson in general genealogy thinking. --Jrich 23:23, 27 August 2013 (EDT)

Family tree of timothy Phillips and Freelove Stone [23 September 2013]

Hi, I noticed you made some citaitons/ corrections to my additions on this tree. Sorry if I am making a mess. I am only interested in this tree as it is my mother's line. I will be making additions and corrections as I go on. As I get closer to my own family I am afraid I don't have the records only dates passed down if even that, so it make take time. Sorry for my inept usage of this site i only just joined.

Regards susy--Susyfreelove 21:16, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

sources and editing [24 September 2013]

Sorry. You appear to take this all very personally. I promise you that I am doing my best. Who made this site anyway because it terribly difficult to use and I am having trouble editing dates, towns and sources. I can assure you that all the people I am adding are from my personal tree and they are legit. However place names and dates will need correcting and citations added. I don't think i am doing any harm because I know these people I have put are real and legit and hopefully I will receive some help along the way. I appreciate you linking me up to my great great great grandfather Llyod and all the info along with it. However on his brother tombstone in Orange mass, was the name Alvoid. And I have the dates of his death from the stone but I can not edit this on the page.:(--Susyfreelove 22:26, 23 September 2013 (UTC)

thank you for the Llyod connection and citations. :)--Susyfreelove 00:10, 24 September 2013 (UTC)

Baptism - Christening - Birth [25 September 2013]

Yes, the GEDCOM standard does appear to use the terms baptism and christening interchangeably. The broad non-specific nature of the definition accommodates the different and widely varying practices of all religions. It is not meant as as a defacto one-size-fits-all standard. To apply it as such diminishes the wonderful and rich diversity of our religions.

A case in point is the Minor/Miner family baptisms of 15 Sep 1751, when four Minor children ranging in age from a few months to a few years old were baptized in the First Church of New London, CT. Clearly, this was not a naming ceremony, but rather a ceremony to bring the children into the church and its belief system. To note these ceremonies in the WeRelate record as a christening is not historically correct, nor would it be consistent with Connecticut VRs, church records, and the independent conclusions of multiple genealogists.

Consider Hans Landis, the Swiss Anabaptist Minister martyred in 1614 by the civil authorities of the canton of Zurich, Switzerland. He is emblematic of an entire religion based on when and how many times a person of faith should be baptized. The Anabaptists (meaning twice baptised) later evolved into the Mennonites, Amish, and numerous other offshoots all with their own distinct timing and religious dogma surrounding baptism. Neither the term nor pracice of christening (as in a naming ceremony) is used by any of these faiths.

Next steps:

1) WeRelate data entry protocals should be adjusted to accomodate the diverse and unique practices of all religions. 2) The baptism entry should be used when applicable. In my opinion, it should be on par with the christening entry; that is, neither baptism or christening should have preference. 3) More attention needs to be paid to the distinction between baptism and christening, including the use of christening as a defacto birth record - a practice that should be avoided if for no other reason than accuracy in my opinion.--Frank 13:12, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

!! I have moved this discussion to datanalyst's page where it started to keep it one spot. !! --Jrich 14:22, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

Free Census Images [6 November 2013]

Could you please put a short description on the Watercooler on how to change the ancestry fee-site image references into free images? I have hundreds of such references and kept them this long only because I didn't know there was a reliable free alternative. I expect other folks might want to know as well. Another thing that might be helpful, would be to add an expanded usage tip on the appropriate census source pages.

Thank you. --jrm03063 14:57, 6 November 2013 (UTC)

Thank you [9 November 2013]

Thank you for resolving the problem with Josiah/Josias/Jonah Cowan. Q 12:56, 9 November 2013 (UTC)

Additional analyses. [30 December 2013]

Example: Latest addition to page Family:Uzal Wardwell and Grace Unknown (1) - Gives me an opportunity to thank you for your ongoing efforts in attempting to unravel anomalies in the records. I may not always agree with your conclusions, but they definitely help to advance the discussion.--jaques1724 18:46, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for the kind words. Our conclusions aren't actually very different so I appreciate all the work you do. I just don't want to remove pitons until I am sure I know the best way to the top. --Jrich 19:40, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Ezekiel Brigham/Martha Bigelow [30 December 2013]

Is Ezekiel Brigham (1) the correct husband for Martha Bigelow (6) in your opinion? I can't match the birth dates...--Frank 23:00, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

After only a quick look, I think so. For example, see [9]. Age at death (I assume this is what you mean by matching birth dates) is high unreliable. Every one has at least one or two years of slop (do they mean of that age, or in that year, the latter meaning one year less than the former). Then it is always to the best recollection of a third party (actual person too young at their birth so dependent on being told by parents, then their survivor is told by them). Then you get memory problems and the tendency to inflate. This is the only Ezekiel Brigham listed in americanancestors'org's collection of vital records as born anytime between 1715-1725. But it would always be great to see if you can find a will, or deed, or something that ties Ezekiel of Grafton to his parents... --Jrich 23:25, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

The reference you so kindly provided is enough to link them together I think. The mention of his second wife, Millicent, is consistent with the headstone where all three are buried.--Frank 00:30, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

In the meantime I'll keep my eyes peeled for a better 1st hand source.--Frank 00:32, 31 December 2013 (UTC)