Quick Lessons 3 & 4: Flawed Records and NARA Citations & Finding Aids

In March, DearMYRTLE started a new series of Hangouts on Air where she and Cousin Russ and the other panelists discuss the Quick Lessons found on Elizabeth Shown Mills' website Evidence Explained.com. Each week the panelists and any viewers who wish, post their analyses of the current Quick Lesson two days before the Hangout. The Quick Lesson is then discussed live at 12 noon (Eastern) Wednesdays and archived on You Tube within about 24 hours.

Here are the questions DearMYRTLE asks us to consider when studying each QuickLesson:

• How does your research 'thinking' compare to the ideals posed by ESM?
• What part of this QuickLesson inspired you to take a different course of action?
• Has there been a research breakthrough after studying this QuickLesson?

Although I haven't yet encountered flawed records in my research (aside from minor inconsistencies) and I haven't done any research at NARA (The National Archives and Research Administration), these excellent lessons are well worth studying.

In QuickLesson 3, Elizabeth Shown Mills gives us four things to consider while researching:

• Why was this record created?
• Does the record hold the intended information?
• What laws affected the creation of these records?
• What is the historical context?

Reading this QuickLesson will absolutely impact my thinking going forward. I learned to consider the legal perspective fairly early, but I hadn't really considered the other factors, I may have noticed them, but I wasn't deliberately seeking out this information. I will definitely look at these questions going forward in my research.

QuickLesson 4, dealing with NARA Citations & Finding Aids, deals with more than just NARA; it is also a lesson in citing records when you don't have all of the information that books like Evidence Explained and the Chicago Manual of Style say should be cited.

To get to the answer about citing specific documentation a reader received from NARA, Elizabeth Shown Mills' lesson also guides the reader through some of the records available at NARA, their citation guide and even some of their own terminology. It is a great lesson that teaches us both about citations and about the records available from this terrific resource.

I haven't done any research at NARA yet but I am definitely motivated to find a reason to look for records there to see if they have anything to help me answer my current research questions.

The next QuickLesson is Analyzing Records. Hopefully I'll have a post about that in a few days.

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Elizabeth Shown Mills, “QuickLesson 3: Flawed Records,” Evidence Explained: Historical Analysis, Citation & Source Usage (https://www.evidenceexplained.com/content/quicklesson-3-flawed-records : [April 30, 2016]).

Elizabeth Shown Mills, “QuickLesson 4: NARA Citations & Finding Aids,” Evidence Explained: Historical Analysis, Citation & Source Usage (https://www.evidenceexplained.com/content/quicklesson-4-nara-citations-finding-aids : [May 14, 2016])

Quick Lesson 2: Sources vs Information vs Evidence vs Proof

In March, DearMYRTLE started a new series of Hangouts on Air where she and Cousin Russ and the other panelists discuss the Quick Lessons found on Elizabeth Shown Mills' website Evidence Explained.com. Each week the panelists and any viewers who wish to, post their analyses of the current Quick Lesson two days before the Hangout, the Quick Lesson is then discussed live at 12 noon (Eastern) and recorded on You Tube.

I am in the process of catching up and decided to write a post myself related to Quick Lesson 2 to get my thoughts and understanding in writing.

Sources are the places we look for information. They are the family bibles, the vital records, the obituaries. This Matthews genealogy is a source.

What you are looking at is a copy but I have the original, so this is an original source or record. It is in good condition and it is legible. The handwriting and paper match a hymn to which my great-grandfather, Arthur Matthews, signed his name. Both the hymn and genealogy passed from his son, my grandfather, to his son, my father, to me. The date indicates that it was written a little more than two months before Arthur's death.

This source contains information; it states the names of Arthur W. Matthews' parents and siblings, their places of birth and death and where they were living as of Sep. 26, 1915. This information is merely content. We have not yet drawn any conclusions as to the accuracy of the information, we are just saying that this is information, raw data, or as Elizabeth Shown Mills says, "assertions".

If I am looking for the birthplace of Mark Matthews, my 2nd great-grandfather, this source offers direct evidence of that; it states that Mark was born in Coleford, Somersetshire, England.  That isn't to say that Coleford is his true birthplace, however, just that this source offers Mark's birthplace directly, just as it does the name of his wife and seven children (actually there were at least eight).

As for proof of any of Arthur's assertions, no one source can offer proof of anything. Proof is an argument that I will have to make after more sources have been found, more information gathered, more evidence analyzed.

My great-grandfather has provided some good leads, but the reasonably exhaustive search continues.

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 Elizabeth Shown Mills, “QuickLesson 2: Sources vs. Information vs. Evidence vs. Proof,” Evidence Explained: Historical Analysis, Citation & Source Usage (https://www.evidenceexplained.com/content/quicklesson-2-sources-vs-information-vs-evidence-vs-proof : [April 26, 2016]).