Tracking People Who Disappeared

13 January 2015 James Young, let us say, married Margaret Martin in 1810 in Pennsylvania, according to a pastor's daybook in the local university archives. (The names are fictitious, so don't rush off now to comb all your favorite online databases for Pennsylvania.) You have found no Pennsylvania record for the couple thereafter. ...What might you have done wrong or overlooked? ...

Provenance (A Two-Bit Word for "Is This Stuff Really Worth a Plug Nickel?")

29 December 2014 EE's discussions of many materials—from artifacts to databases, from records to digital images, and even traditions—encourage us to consider the provenance of the material we use. Simply put, the term means "chain of custody" or "history of ownership." Judging the validity of information provided by a source requires us to ...