Five Things You Should Know…

When we find a genealogical record we like to wring it dry of evidence, pulling every piece of information we can about our ancestor from it. However, we may miss some obvious clues if we don’t understand some basic facts about that record.

Michael Hait has posted an excellent article entitled “Five things you have to know about every record” on his blog Planting the Seed. What are the five things? They are:

  1. Why was the record created?
  2. Who created the record?
  3. Who provided the information?
  4. How did you get the record?
  5. What are the alternatives?

Head over and check out his post. You might learn something. I did.

Cite This Page:

, "Five Things You Should Know…," A Pennsylvania Dutch Genealogy, the genealogy & family research site of Kris Hocker, modified 6 Aug 2011 (https://www.krishocker.com/five-things-you-should-know/ : accessed 19 Mar 2024).

Content copyright © 2011 Kris Hocker. Please do not copy without prior permission, attribution, and link back to this page.