The 1840 census of Marion County, Alabama, presents a situation I had never seen before. I had visited that census in search of one Benjamin Foster. I found on him p. 59 (reverse), line 1, with a white family of 10 and 25 enslaved people assigned to his household. Curiously, in 1850, he is enumerated again in Marion County, at which time is property valuation was set at $300. Hmhh. What happened in that decade to the Benjamin Foster family? ...

We love the fact that billions of records from around the world are now available to us in one form or another, to access with our device of choice. That convenience comes with an inconvenience: citing the stuff can be so doggoned confusing.

Every researcher has heard this advice: To prove a point, we need multiple sources: multiple sources, independently created. Not multiple sources that all copy each other. Decades ago, we were told that we needed "three sources that agree." In recent years, that "instruction" has been streamlined. Supposedly now, all we need are two. If that’s been your guidance, forget it ....

Family meetings were a vital step in the succession (probate) process in the parts of America settled by the French, They were convoked when minor heirs or disabled heirs were involved. Bouvier's 1856 Law Dictionary explains the particulars this way:

We love those published abstracts, don’t we? Those databases. Those quick, cheap, and easy sources that save us the time spent combing old records or the costs of ordering them. But, as with all love affairs, verify before you trust is a wise idea.

What's the difference between analysis of a record and source identification?

For us to simply attach a document to a person's profile, without any discussion, is to send that document out into the world, naked of all identification or explanation that is needed to make a decent claim. ...

Someone just shared with me the image attached to today's post. Talk about all-in-one packaging! The image captures the URL, which tells us that it came from the website of the Library of Virginia. It captures the library's identification and description of the document, so we know ...

We can not just take a record at face value. We must always study the context of the information. Never mind this document that seems to say Moses Hornsby married again about 1797. He didn’t. When we put this one-line entry about Moses into the context of all the other entries on this page—their construction and their wording—we’re left with a totally different interpretation of the record.