Citing Genealogy Sources

Wedding invitations, birth announcements – how do you cite these sources in your family tree program?

I was recently at my mother in law’s and she has a whole drawer full of announcements from the various cousins about the latest weddings and babies.  Talk about babies!  There must have been a dozen in the last year.

My laptop was out, my family tree program fired up and I was systematically working my way through the announcements, entering as I went.  I always enter a source but I must admit I haven’t been very consistent about the format.

And there IS a standard format .

A good genealogy buddy, Thomas MacEntee has compiled a research log (in part from Evidence Explained by Elizabeth Shown Mills) that has many basic source citation types for archival items.  This log is entitled Genealogy Source Citations Reference Guide and is available as a pdf file.

Here is an example of how one would do a family record such as a wedding invitation or birth announcement.

 
Private Holdings: Artifact
 
[Compiler] [Artifact Name] [Creation Date] [Current or Last Known Owner] [Owner’s Location][Year Owned]

Thanks Thomas for putting together this resource!

Author: © Joan Miller - Luxegen Genealogy.

The Luxegen Genealogy and Family History blog presents the family history stories of Joan Miller.