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Monday, February 11, 2013

Creating the Land Record Source Citation in RootsMagic 6

After I posted Entering Deed Information into RootsMagic 6 (7 February 2013), I received an email from reader Jeff asking:

"I saw your post about "Entering Deed Information into RootsMagic 6". I also saw your citation based on EE using RM6. I was wondering if you could share the Field titles?..."

I'll be happy to, and in the process of working on this a bit, I discovered another source citation template for these land records in RootsMagic 6 that may be better.

1)  Here are the Source Template fields for the "Digital Archives" template that I used the first time around (although I have edited several fields since then):



The Fields in the "Citation" tab above are (with my entries):

Master Source:  New York Land Records, 1630-1975 (FamilySearch) - Digital Archive 
*  Collection:  New York, Land Records, 1630-1975
*  Website Creator:  Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints [not sure this is necessary]
*  Website Title:  FamilySearch
*  URL:  https://familysearch.org

Source Details:
*  Access type: [I chose to leave this blank, the default is "accessed"]
*  Access date:  2 February 2013 [this is when I accessed the image]
*  Item type:  digital images
*  Item title:  Erie County New York Deeds, 1844-1850, Volumes 78-79 [this is the specific volume within the larger collection]
*  Page:  Image 184 of 792, in Volume 78, Page 396, Samuel Vaux deed in Aurora, N.Y. from Seth Sprague, 1845 [this is the specific image, page and a short item description]
*  Credit line:  [I chose to leave this blank]

2)  Another RootsMagic source template that I could have used is the "Land Records, State (online images, by database)" template.  Here is the "Edit Source" screen with the same information added to the template fields:



The Fields in the "Citation" tab above are (with my entries):

*  Master Source:  EE-New York Land Records, 1630-1975 (FamilySearch, Land Records)
*  Jurisdiction:  New York
*  Database title:  New York, Land Records, 1630-1975
*  Repository: New York Land Office, Batavia, N.Y.
*  Item type:  digital images
*  Website Creator:  Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints [not sure this is necessary]
*  Website title:  FamilySearch
*  URL:  https://familysearch.org
*  Credit line:  citing original records in New York Land Office. New York, Land Records. Holland Land Office Museum, Batavia, New York

Source Details
*  access type:  [left blank, default is "accessed"]
*  Access date:  2 February 2013
*  Item of interest:  "Erie County New York Deeds, 1844-1850, Volumes 78-79," image 184 of 792, in Volume 78, Page 396, Samuel Vaux deed in Aurora, N.Y. from Seth Sprague, 1845 [this is the specific book, image, page, with a short description]

3)  In  hindsight, I think the first source citation template for "Digital archives" is the most appropriate for this specific source.  It is designed for a website that has many record collections.  The second template above  for "Land Records, State (online images, by database)" appears to be for a State Archive with one or more databases.  Frankly, either can be used for this specific source citation.

4)  Since I created two source citations above, I'm keeping them in my database.  Here is the "Citation Manager" screen with the first source citation highlighted:


You can see the "Source Name," the "Details," and the source quality information in the upper part of the screen, and the crafted source citations (for Footnote, Short Footnote and Bibliography), plus the Source text/comments and Research notes/comments that I added to the different tabs on the "Edit Source" screen.

The resulting Footnotes from the two source citation templates are nearly the same:

From 1)  "New York, Land Records, 1630-1975," Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org : accessed 2 February 2013), digital images, "Erie County New York Deeds, 1844-1850, Volumes 78-79," Image 184 of 792, in Volume 78, Page 396, Samuel Vaux deed in Aurora, N.Y. from Seth Sprague, 1845.

From 2):  New York, "New York, Land Records, 1630-1975," digital images, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org : accessed 2 February 2013), "Erie County New York Deeds, 1844-1850, Volumes 78-79," image 184 of 792, in Volume 78, Page 396, Samuel Vaux deed in Aurora, N.Y. from Seth Sprague, 1845; citing original records in New York Land Office. New York, Land Records. Holland Land Office Museum, Batavia, New York.

As you can see, the differences are small - the "New York" term at the start of 2), the placement of the term "digital images" and the use of the "Credit line" in 2).  I could have added the Credit Line in 1) as part of the Source detail, but I would have to remember to do it every time I made a source citation.  I like it better in the Source comment field.

There are quite a few Land record source templates in RootsMagic 6.  I used two of them above.  Are there others that are more appropriate?  Which source citation template would my readers use in RootsMagic 6, or in any genealogy program, to document this deed transaction?

Thank you to Jeff for asking the question so that I can provide the answer to all of my readers, especially RootsMagic users.

The URL for this post is:  http://www.geneamusings.com/2013/02/creating-land-record-source-citation-in.html

Copyright (c) 2013, Randall J. Seaver

1 comment:

  1. Hi Randy,
    I am curious as to why you decided to put Erie County New York Deeds, 1844-1850, Volumes 78-79 in quotes? The quotes would indicate that this is the title of the deed book. The cover was not microfilmed so I don't know if that is really the title. Typically deed books have the county name and a single number. IMHO adding the words, "deed in Aurora N. Y" is not necessary to find the deed. If this was important to my narrative it would be in the body and not the citation.

    I am also curious as to where you found the "citing original records... " came from? When I looked at the records the images came from FHL microfilm 590047. Looking up the film number the records came from the Erie County Clerk's office.

    If I was writing this citation the first half would look like yours. The second part would be: Erie County, New York, Deed Book 78, p. 396, Seth Sprague & Lucy his wife to Samuel Vaux; FHL microfilm 590047

    I wouldn't use the word volume as that is implied by the number after book. If I chose to use volume it would be abbreviated as vol. For page numbers, I use p.

    Sincerely,
    Ann Gilchrest

    ReplyDelete