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Archiver > TMG > 2005-06 > 1118589084


From: Terry Reigel <>
Subject: Re: [TMG] New User Needs Help with Tags for Probate and Censuses
Date: Sun, 12 Jun 2005 11:11:24 -0400
In-Reply-To: <20050612023337.25454.qmail@web50310.mail.yahoo.com>


On Sat, 11 Jun 2005 19:33:37 -0700 (PDT), Carol Lucian wrote:
> Thanks Terry and Teresa for your help with sources!

You're welcome, Carol.

> I would like
> some suggestions as to how to enter the various documents
> found in a person’s probate file. In one courthouse,
> where I have done research, some of these boxes are
> packed with documents! I am a new user, and I’m not sure
> what tag type I should use.
<SNIP>>
> I think I would like to see these documents listed on the
> Person View of the individual after the death or burial
> tag. I don’t know if that’s a good idea or not, as it
> keeps adding years to a person’s age after their death,
> so I would like to get some idea of how other people
> handle them.

Carol, you've asked a very good question. The problem is, in part at
least, you are the one that has to answer it. <g>

In order to really answer your question, you have to decide why you
are entering all this information into TMG. Some possible answers:

- It seemed like a good idea (not likely to help much in giving
direction <g>)
- To organize all the stuff I have.
- To give more order to my research efforts.
- To be able to produce well-documented reports.
- So the kids (grandkids) will know where they came from.
- To produce flowing narratives that some might actually read.

In fact, you probably agree with several of these, and perhaps more.
Since the way you input data constrains how it can be viewed and
output, it's helpful to know the objective when deciding how to enter
the data.

It would be possible to create a tag for each document you find. Being
able to read all the data from the person view without opening the
tags is more difficult - it would help if you set the view to more
than one line per tag, and even more if you turned on "item tips,"
which display the entire contents of the tag when you hold your mouse
cursor over it.

But this is not really the way TMG was intended to be used, nor the
way most users would approach the task. Doing so really makes each tag
about a source document. Most users regard a tag as being to record an
event - something that happened to the person. The documents are then
recorded as sources, and cited for each event for which they provide
information.

Using the more conventional approach, you would create either:

1) A Source for each document, or

2) A Source for the whole file, and then mention the specific document
in the Citation Detail when you cite the source.

And then cite the documents for each tag that they support. Commonly
the might include:
- name tags for the deceased, his or her spouse, and the heirs.
- relationship and marriage tags between the above.
- death tag

And, when there is other interesting information about the family, you
may want to create other tags as well to record that.

But to address the confusion again between sources and event tags..
TMG includes, and user often use, tags for census, wills, and probate.
One could view each of those as documents, and thus conclude that the
tag is about the document. I think that's a mistake. I think it's
better to view them as events, which we have documents to
substantiate. In my view, the reason to create those tags is because
it tells us something that was going on with the person or family, and
thus allows us to conveniently describe that to our readers (thus
revealing my bias toward leaving a readable record - users with other
objectives may see this differently).

The census tag allows us to record that the family was in a certain
place, and perhaps who was living there and other details of interest.
In those cases where it's the last event recorded for a person, it
also serves as a proxy for a tag that says "died after this date" or
"was still living as of this date."

A will tag provides an opportunity to record the testator's
intentions, which are sometimes of interest themselves, and often
something of an insight as to the living conditions - an old English
will that prominently features the "feather bed and furnishings" gives
an idea of how little they had compared to modern families. Likewise,
especially in absence of a death date, it serves to show that the
testator and those mentioned in the will were still living at that
date.

A probate tag is especially useful if there is no known death date, as
it can serve as a sort of proxy for it - that's why the default
probate tag is in the burial group. But it also can serve to record
all sort of interesting information about the deceased and the family
that doesn't fit elsewhere. I've used it to describe apparent long
final illnesses (based on large doctor bills) squabbles among the
heirs, and large "send off parties" (again, based on the bills).

In each of these cases, I treat the documents as sources, and cite
them in various other tags which are designed to record specific types
of information - names, birth, relationships, etc. - I don't repeat
that information in the census, will, or probate tags. Others prefer
different approaches.

In the case of probate files, if property was sold, I often make a
separate property sale tag. And I created a separate tag to show that
my GG-grandmother at the age of 62 decided she needed to add a kitchen
to the home she had lived in for 20 years, based on the probate
record.

As for the tags themselves, I use the standard Probate tag only when
all I know is the date and place, usually from a secondary source.
That's to take the place of a missing death tag, or to leave a notice
that the probate records can be found when I get to them.

When I have actual records I use a custom will tag (in the other
events group) with a sentence of:

His will was probated <[D]> <[L]>< [M]>

Then I put all sorts of interesting information that doesn't fit in
other tags in the memo.

> I would like to see the census entry for the whole
> household on the Person View of the head of household
> along with the ages, birthplaces, etc. of each member of
> the household.

You can do this, but you would have to list all that information in
the tag Memo. To view it without opening the tag you would have to
turn on "item tips." And, depending on the sentence you use, narrative
output may be strange.

> And on the Person View of each of the other
> people in the household, a sentence stating that they
> were enumerated in so-and-so’s household, along with that
> individual’s age, birthplace, etc.

Tags are not designed to produce "sentences" in the Person View -
sentences are for narrative output. The person view provides a
condensed view of the data in the tag - date, place, and memo, as much
as fits in the space you allow. To provide something like you want
would require creating a separate census tag for each member of the
household. That's much more work than entering all the household
members as Witnesses. The census tags described on my site, for
example, are designed to create the type of information you describe
in narrative output, but don't make it that easy to see in the Person
View - you have to open the tag and see who the witness are. Even
then, I put details like ages of household members in the citations to
the census as a source in the Birth tag, not in the census tag. Others
do it differently.

> Many of my censuses
> are before 1850, however. It seems to me, that if the
> sentence for the Census Tag was simply [M], it would be
> very easy to do. Would this cause all kinds of problems?

If your objective is simply to view the data on screen, ignore what's
in the Sentence and enter whatever you want to see in the memo. But if
you want to output narrative reports, this approach is going to yield
output something like this for a person with 1830 and 1840 census
record:

John Smith was born 3 Mar 1799 in Goochland Co. Virginia. with 2 males
under age 5, one male aged 20 to 30, and one female aged 20 to 30.
with 2 males aged 10 to 15, one male aged 30 to 40, one female aged 10
to 15, and one female aged 30 to 40.

Note that there is no indication that the census details actually come
from the census, which years they come from, nor where it occurred. If
you want to create narrative output, a sentence more like this would
be better:

[P] appeared on the [Y] census < [L]><, [M]>

You can still enter all the details in the memo, but this way the
narrative makes sense.

Terry Reigel

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