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Archiver > TMG > 2008-09 > 1221924481


From: Terry Reigel <>
Subject: Re: [TMG] NARA as a publsher - was RE: Death Reg. Sourcing Sorrowsfrom a Long Time Lurker
Date: Sat, 20 Sep 2008 11:28:01 -0400
In-Reply-To: <200809201513.m8KFDU7c001927@mail.rootsweb.com>


Lee Hoffman wrote:
> Cheryl Freeman wrote:
>> I'm catching up on the list today, and I've read this
>> thread with interest, as I am reading EE and changing
>> many of my souces.

> I'll ask the rhetorical question. Why are you changing
> your Source [Definition]s?

I'd agree. In may cases I prefer the formatting in Evidence! But generally I use a modified version that suits me better anyway. <g>

> First, there _is_ a difference between viewing film
> (produced by the National Archives (NARA)) and viewing
> the images on Ancestry.com. By and large, they appear
> the same (especially in the non-enhanced views of
> Ancestry.com). But the enhancement has the possibility
> of making changes to the data. In most cases, viewing a
> census page image (one on film and one on Ancestry) would
> show the same as the corresponding film. But that may
> not always be the case. The enhanced view has been
> changed. In what way we do not know.

I agree in theory, and at least once found the Ancestry image much clear than the photocopy I had made at the Archived (I can't now recall how clear the image on the viewer was). But generally I find that's a non-issue. Still, I record which version I viewed, as noted in my previous post in this thread.

> As to the "publisher" of the census data, the NARA is the
> Repository of the _actual_ census data. On the other
> hand, it produces the films that we use and in that
> sense, is also the publisher. If you look at the actual
> census page then you should cite the NARA as the
> repository. But, if you view a film produced by the NARA
> then you would cite the NARA as the publisher.

For the most the originals are destroyed from what I've read, so we only can see the films or an image made from them. <g>

> I prefer the publisher route myself, but (for the reader
> of a printed citation) --- is the NARA a repository or a
> publisher? In printed form, you can't tell the
> difference (although possibly you could infer one or the
> other). So it really doesn't make a lot of difference.

That's what I was trying to say in my previous post - mostly it's the way I enter the data in TMG, which you can't tell the difference in the finished footnotes. Although, if you really think the Archives are the publisher, I'd think one would use the convention of placing the publisher's name in parens, which I've never seen done for census cites.

Terry Reigel

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