TMG-L Archives

Archiver > TMG > 2008-09 > 1221659991


From: Terry Reigel <>
Subject: Re: [TMG] Death Reg. Sourcing Sorrows from a Long Time Lurker
Date: Wed, 17 Sep 2008 09:59:51 -0400
In-Reply-To: <BLU0-SMTP22D58A6F3F51378AE0BEDFED4C0@phx.gbl>


Bill Bienia wrote:

> From what I've been able to determine, the online image
> copies may not be 100% identical to the original film in
> two ways: 1) some pages are missing, and 2) some images
> have been enhanced by Ancestry for better readability
> online (content remains the same[?].)

A valid point, and grounds for identifying which copy you used in my view.

> Another consideration is the indexing, the online indexes
> are not identical to the indexes at the archives - the
> Ancestry indexes were not created from the Archives
> indexes.

I think the indexes provided by Ancestry, and some other on-line sources, are great. But I don't understand what they have to do with citations. Once you find the right page, whether by a great index or going through page-by-page, it's the page itself that provides the information, and which you should cite. Once you have identified the page, someone else should be able to find it in any other copy of that source.

> There should be two different source templates within
> TMG, one template for the online image database at
> Ancestry that indicates, "(Citing Archives of Ontario
> film...)" ...

I see that language in EE for census images viewed on Ancestry, and to me that is very misleading. I understand "citing" to mean that your source has examined a record and drawn some conclusion about what it says. That's what the the author of a book does when he makes a statement and provides a citation. But when we talk about images Ancestry hasn't drawn any conclusion - you do. All Ancestry has done is provide a copy (for better or worse, as you note above). I think one should note that you saw an image and what type, whether it was a photo copy, archive microfilm, or online, but I think the "citing" terminology should be reserved for cases where you are actually using a source that cites another source.

Terry Reigel

This thread: