A Genealogy Researcher Learns About Sources

Many a family history researcher wants genealogy guidelines to be black or white. That’s theory. More than once this RecordClick genealogist has listened to lectures on how research should be done – usually, that lecture is about the theory. Theory and reality. Sometimes they are the same thing. Sometimes they are not.

The reality is that there are gray areas. When the genealogy researcher comes to primary, secondary sources and tools, there are often gray areas.

Primary resources are preferred by a genealogy researcher because they are the documents created at, or closest to, the time of the actual event. For the genealogy researcher, a newspaper may be either a primary or secondary resource.

Secondary sources are, for example, indexes that refer the genealogist to a primary source, or articles or items written about an individual or created after a person’s death. An encyclopedia is considered by genealogists to be a secondary source.

A tool is a guide that gets the genealogy researcher to a primary or secondary source.

Let’s take the journey of a genealogy researcher and see how these three types of sources work for the ancestry search.  This process and various sources are found in the death records of the movie actor Tom Mix. Tom Mix was born in Pennsylvania in 1880, yet he was considered a real cowboy. His movie career spanned over 20 years in the early days of motion pictures. He made more than 250 movies; most of them were silent films.

The genealogy researcher will see that a primary source of information is his death certificate. This document may be found on the Arizona Department of Health Services web site. Tom Mix died in an automobile accident in October 1940.

Secondary sources abound. These may be used by the genealogy researcher as sources, but the one must keep in mind that there may be better, more reliable sources for documentation. When this professional genealogist was in school, teachers often cautioned against using an encyclopedia as a source. These encyclopedic volumes provided general background information, but usually did not have enough specific details to make a report unique.

Indexes are another way for the genealogy researcher to find information.  These sources are more general and give the genealogy researcher the opportunity to view a number of options before honing in on a specific person or place. This BLM – GLO index shows the number of Daniel Boones (By the way, THE Daniel Boone explorer and frontiersman, died in Missouri in 1820.) who had original land patents in Missouri:

Image	Accession	Names	Date	Doc #	State	Meridian	Twp – Rng	Aliquots	Sec. #	County
	MO0100__.129	BOONE, DANIEL	1/14/1836	4669	MO	5th PM	041N – 010W	NE¼NW¼	26	Maries
	MO0690__.388	BOONE, DANIEL	10/1/1840	8667	MO	5th PM	040N – 010W	W½NE¼, Lot/Trct 1	5	Maries
	MO1350__.381	BOONE, DANIEL	5/1/1843	16600	MO	5th PM	048N – 033W	SW¼NW¼	20	Jackson
							048N – 033W	SE¼NW¼	20	Jackson
	MO5650__.436	BOONE, DANIEL	11/1/1859	25508	MO	5th PM	029N – 025W	NE¼SE¼	7	Lawrence
	MO0170__.404	BOONE, DANIEL M	12/5/1833	1828	MO	5th PM	048N – 033W	W½SE¼	4	Jackson
	MO0180__.032	BOONE, DANIEL M	12/5/1833	1956	MO	5th PM	048N – 033W	NE¼	4	Jackson
	MW-0120-235	GOOKINS, WILLIAM, BOONE, SARAH, BOONE, DANIEL W	12/1/1858	39482	MO	5th PM	066N – 032W	S½SE¼	18	Worth
	CV-0103-460	WHEELER, CHESTER, BOONE, DANIEL

Finally, there are tools to be used by the genealogy researcher that may be helpful for the family historian but are not to be considered primary or secondary sources. Two favorites of this genealogy researcher are the

• Online Searchable Death Indexes and Records, deathindexes.com. This site is created and maintained by Joe Beine. While it is in no way a primary or secondary source of information, it is an excellent tool that leads one to online death records.

• Cyndi’s List, cyndislist.com, developed and hosted by Cyndi Howells. This site links the genealogy researcher with hundreds of web sites and is another fine tool.

There are many web sites including that are excellent tools for the genealogy researcher. Most are not, however, primary or secondary sources. They are tools that will provide information, ideas, and direction. They will lead to the primary and secondary resources for the genealogy researcher. It is the use of primary resources that ensures the most accurate documentation and lets others know where the information is located.

A recent trend at a few websites is to add more information and suggest possible family members to the user without adequately citing where the original data was found. The genealogy researcher must be cautious about accepting this type of reference without documentation. A web site is a tool and data on the web site needs always to have a primary or secondary source to back it up.

When you hire a genealogist at RecordClick, you get a family history researcher who will pursue various primary sources and will provide you with accurate records about your family and its history. You are special and we take pride in the ancestry research we do for you.