County Death Certificate - marked for Genealogy Use Only

By Linda Rogers on Sat, 01/22/2022 - 00:48

Forums

Hello,

I have a death certificate from New York State.  I wrote to the county office (Monroe County) to request this certificate.  It is a copy of a Certificate of Death issued by the New York State Department of Health.  At the bottom of the certificate it says:  This Certificate must be filed with the local registrar within 72 hours after death.  On the side of the certificate there is a green stamp that says:  Genealogy Use only not an official copy.

I have started to use Zotero to input my documents and cite them properly.  I don't like the way the program cites the source, so I am creating a note called EE citation and will copy and paste my citation there.

Below is my citation for this source.  I really struggle with vital records and I want to make sure they are accurate.

           Source List Entry

           New York. Monroe County. Death Certificates. Vital Records Office, Rochester.

           First Reference Note

          Monroe County, New York, death certificate 2793 (1931), William J. Rogers, Vital Records Office,           Rochester. This is stamped for Genealogy use only, but it is a copy of the original certificate.

           Subsequent Note

            Monroe County, New York, death certificate no. 2793, (1931), William J. Rogers

Another question I have is do I need to list all 3 components of this when I am citing this certificate?

Thank you for your help,

Linda

 

 

Submitted byEEon Sat, 01/22/2022 - 09:19

Linda, that works fine.

I'm not sure I understand your intent when you ask "do I need to list all 3 components of this when I am citing this certificate."

  • Question 1: By components, do you mean the three different formats (Source List Entry, First Reference Note, Subsequent Note) in which a citation is presented? 
  • Question 2: When you say list, what list are you creating? 

If the answer to Q1 is yes, then EE's answer is  yes and no. Each of those three formats or citation types serve a distinct purpose. Each is used in a different context throughout the database, or piece of writing, you are creating. (Only the Source List Entry will appear on a "list" in your finished product. The First Reference Note and Subsequent Note will appear as footnotes or endnotes in your finished product.)  When we use a new source and craft a citation for it, we create those three formats. Once done, we don't have to create or use three formats at each reference to that source. See EE 2.4  (Citations, Types of), for an explanation of the function of each.

Since you are explicitly using Zotero, I might also ask: Do you have Donna Cox Baker's Zotero for Genealogy, which demonstrates how to adapt Zotero to Evidence Style citations—or Evidence Style to Zotero?   Zotero was designed for students and academic writers; it focuses primarily on simple, published sources rather than the complex manuscript materials that genealogists use and must critically analyze. Baker, who is both an academic writer-editor and a genealogist, has many suggestions for wriggling additional data into the Zotero format.

 

Hello,

Thank you for your quick response.  Sometimes I probably overthink things. 

I use Legacy software for my family files.  It does a good job of formatting the sources correctly (if I enter them properly).  My ultimate goal is to use Scrivener and Zotero to write a family history book. I would like the ability to attach the sources from Zotero as both footnotes and endnotes.  I watched a webinar from Colleen Robledo Greene on Managing Citations & Sources Lists in Zotero.  She prefers to add a note to each document, book, etc. with the correct EE format.  I do have Donna Cox Baker's Zotero for Genealogy.  Wonderful book.  I just get lost trying to figure out how to enter the source in the proper boxes in the info tab in Zotero..

Here is how I have entered the information in the Info tab of Zotero:

Item Type:  Document

Title: Monroe County, New York, death certificate 2792 (1931), William J. Rogers, Vital Records Office, Rochester.

Publisher: Monroe County. New York. Vital Records Office, Rochester.

Archive: Monroe County. New York. Vital Records Office, Rochester.

Loc. in Archive: death certificate no. 2793, (1931), William J. Rogers

Below is how the citation and bibliography will look on output:

Citation

“Monroe County, New York, Death Certificate 2792 (1931), William J. Rogers, Vital Records Office, Rochester.” (Monroe County. New York. Vital Records Office, Rochester., n.d.), death certificate no. 2793, (1931), William J. Rogers, Monroe County. New York. Vital Records Office, Rochester.

Bibliography

“Monroe County, New York, Death Certificate 2792 (1931), William J. Rogers, Vital Records Office, Rochester.” Monroe County. New York. Vital Records Office, Rochester., n.d. Death certificate no. 2793, (1931), William J. Rogers. Monroe County. New York. Vital Records Office, Rochester.

My concern is the EE output and the Zotero output look totally different.  I want to make sure that what I use is correct.

Thank you so very much!!

Linda

 

 

Submitted byEEon Sun, 01/23/2022 - 09:01

Linda, your concluding "my concern ..." is valid. That is why my last comment was that Cox "has many suggestions for wriggling additional data into the Zotero format" rather than suggestions for "enabling Zotero to produce citations for complex historical manuscripts that are thorough enough for both identification and credibility analysis."

Beyond that, EE does not and cannot give advice on the use of any of the software or citation programs. Each has its own limitations. While each is designed by brilliant software engineers, there are significant disconnects between the IT world's concept of data management and the needs of researchers who work with complex historical materials.

Green's stated practice of creating her own Evidence Style citations in a free-form note is one followed by many researchers regardless of the software they use—be it Word, Scrivener, or a relational database. At my personal website HistoricalPathways.com, under the "Research" tab, all of the research papers posted there are created in Word with free-form citations. Ditto for the published papers from peer-reviewed journals that are posted under the "Articles" tab.

Structured software gives new researchers confidence that they can "get it right" so long as they use the software's templates—at least "right" by that software's concept of what's needed. Experienced researchers who have learned the basic patterns for citing historical materials—and historical materials now delivered electronic—often find it quicker and less stressful to write the citation free-form rather than trying to wrestle the data into structured templates that don't fit the material.

Isn't is wonderful that we have options, so that we can choose what works best of us?