TMG-L Archives

From: Terry Reigel <>
Subject: Re: [TMG] "Generic" Sources - was Repositories
Date: Mon, 01 Jan 2001 10:14:51 -0500
References: <00e801c0738d$2820e000$fb72ed18@lhnhome>

Niesen wrote:

> I tend to work with sources repeatedly for different people. For example,
> the Grand Rapids Herald newspaper (a source) might have obits for thirty
> different relatives because they all lived there. But the date of
> publication would be different for each one. So is that 30 sources? Yikes.
>
> <In fact, I make each birth certificate a separate source, and that works
> fine for me.>
>
> It sounds like, from what you're saying, that every single source you come
> across goes on the master source list as a new item. Doesn't that defeat
> the purpose of having a master source list? I thought by having a master
> source list, input time would be saved because you could use the same
> sources repeatedly. You seem to be suggesting creating a new source every
> time. Then why have a master list?

Upon reflection, I think there are some considerations that have not been
recently discussed when trying to decide whether to create multiple vs. generic
sources. Namely, how many times a specific source (that is, one piece of paper)
will be cited, and how much detail you want to record to identify it. Two
examples may help:

When I use a birth certificate, I generally cite it as a source for the child's
name and birth tags, for the two parent tags, for each parent's name tag, and
usually for both parents' birth tags - a total of 8 cites. In the source
definition for the certificate, I usually show the name of the child, issuing
agency, agency address, certificate number, date recorded, and date of my copy.

Obviously, I don't want all this to appear 8 times in the footnotes of my
report. If I used a generic source, I'd have to put all the info in the CD and
have it appear each time. Or, I could guess which tag will print first and put
it only in that cite. The latter is a bit risky since I use both ancestor and
descendant type reports, so I never know which tag will appear first. So for me,
making each certificate a separate source works best -- I get the Full
footnote/Short Footnote feature to take care of this for me.

By contrast, when I find someone in the SSDI, I usually cite it only twice, for
the birth and death tags. And I record only the name, Soc. Sec. number, and date
of access for the source. So I don't mind nearly so much the duplication in the
footnotes. In this case I use a generic Source for all SSDI cites.

The point is, if you are picky about how your citations look in reports, the
decision about separate vs. generic sources should consider both the number of
cites to each individual source and the complexity of those cites.

Terry Reigel

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• Re: [TMG] "Generic" Sources - was Repositories by Terry Reigel <>