Church records (imaged online database)

Welcome, Scott.

You do not indicate which EE template you are using or which section(s) of EE have caused you to doubt your draft, but Template 10 “Online Image (No Named Database)" is appropriate for this record set. Section 8.13 “[Church] Record Books: Cited by Exact Title” and 8.21 “Online Images” provide various models.  It may also help you to review the QuickStart Guide: Manuscripts & Online Images tipped into the front of EE, where the basic elements of a citation are reviewed.

Your draft citation captures most of the needed information—but there are some missing information and duplication of details as noted by others in your Facebook query. For the record set you are using, an Evidence Style citation would be this:

LAYER 1:

Our Lady of Peace Roman Catholic Church (Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada), “Our Lady of Peace Church, Baptismal Register,” page 59, entry 21, James Henry McGarry, baptized 28 May 1871;

LAYER 2:

imaged, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:33S7-9YWZ-H8W?i=30&cc=1927566 : accessed 27 May 2024) > Canada, Ontario Roman Catholic Church Records, 1760–1923 > Welland > Niagara Falls > Our Lady of Peace > Baptisms 1858–1910 > image 31;

LAYER 3:

imaged from FSL microfilm 1312082.

ASSEMBLED AS:

        1. Our Lady of Peace Roman Catholic Church (Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada), “Our Lady of Peace Church, Baptismal Register,” page 59, entry 21, James Henry McGarry, baptized 28 May 1871; imaged, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:33S7-9YWZ-H8W?i=30&cc=1927566 : accessed 27 May 2024) > Canada, Ontario Roman Catholic Church Records, 1760–1923 > Welland > Niagara Falls > Our Lady of Peace > Baptisms 1858–1910 > image 31; imaged from FSL microfilm 1312082.

ISSUES:

• Geographic location: Note that the city and state that appear in the author field should be placed in parentheses. It is not part of the name of the author. The church is the author. The church’s location is parenthetical information that further identifies the church and can be dropped in subsequent citations.    
• Identity of volume: The draft citation does not identify the specific register you've used. It jumps from the identification of the author to the page number. The specific register always has to be identified; that church will have numerous books with a p. 59. If an exact title appears on the cover, as in this case, then that title is copied and placed in quotation marks, because you are quoting it.  (For this issue, in addition to 8.13, which covers titled registers, also see 8.14 “Record Books: Cited by Series & Volume Number.”)
• Date of record: When citing a manuscript record, the date or year of record is almost always needed. Although your citation has two sets of years included, those are year ranges that your provider applies to a whole collection of registers. Neither of them give a reasonable idea of the date or year of the record itself.
• Database title: Your draft tells us that FamilySearch has created a titled collection called “Canada, Ontario, Roman Catholic Church Records, 1760–1923.”  When I go to FamilySearch.org > Search > Records and enter that quoted title in the search box that asks for “Collection Title,” I get no results. When I use the “Browse All Collections” option on that page and scroll down to Canada, Ontario, R….., I get no results.  FamilySearch has no such named collection.  See Template 10’s “Construction Notes: No collection or database title.”
• Path: FamilySearch has three ways of presenting images: (1) in a named database/collection; (2) in a highly organized menu system that requires us to follow a path; and (3) as simple  images of one roll of microfilm, not connected to anything else. When using materials accessed via a path—as with this record—we should include the path and its waypoints. We can discern the difference between type 2 and type 3 by the wording that appears above the image, in the “frame” of the image,” as flagged in red on the image below.

Yes, the URL will take us directly to the specific page, but when typing (or cutting/pasting) long URLs, a character is easily lost or a hidden space added that can make the URL unworkable. 

• Image number: This needs to be included as the last waypoint on the path.
• Citing ….:  We use a “citing ….” layer to identify any additional information the provider gives us about the identity of its source. If that information has already been included in our citation, then we don’t need to repeat it.  In the case at hand, the additional information that FamilySearch provides is the identity of the microfilm from which it made its images.

As an aside: I also noticed there was another child baptized that same day, and only one. Often in such cases (but not always, of course) there is a connection between the two sets of parents. Keeping the other family in mind as we pursue ours may lead us to additional records with information not in the records created by our own family.