Citation Issues

Hi,

I'm not at all an historian, but I'm a writer who is extremely interested in history.

I've started a history book that begins with how the earth originally formed (billions of years ago). How do I write about this topic legally, since there are no original documents and I'm not an expert? So far I've been reading multiple websites, and writing in my own words.

Also, what determines when I have to cite websites I've read?

Thanks!

Kara

Dear editor,

In the Netherlands, repositories are increasingly putting their finding aids online including scans of the original records. We use these scans just like we would originals: we browse the finding aid, following the hierarchy down to the document we like to consult, and then instead of asking the archivist to get the document for us, we click through to the scans.

I'm trying to come up with a citation for a book at the HathiTrust Digital Library website:

http://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/011985446.

It is a combination of abstracts of trial court documents in a particular case.  The case was appealed to the Wisconsin State Supreme Court.  I'm not sure whether this book was filed with the Court as part of the appeal or whether it was printed later by the plaintiffs/appellants, who were also the publishers.

I wish to cite the 1895 Wisconsin state census found at Ancestry.com.

The image of the page (that has no number) that I wish to cite has a heading that is not filled in:

"Enumeration of the Inhabitants in the ________________ of __________________ in the County of _________________, State of Wisconsin, on the 20th day of June, A. D. 1895.

Based on the information that Ancestry.com provides, my citation is:

I subscribe to Ancestry.com but used HeritageQuest for quite a number of my citations for images of the US Federal Census when the image at Ancestry.com was illegible or other issues existed.

The images on HeritageQuest are now being sourced by Ancestry.  The images that HeritageQuest had provided *are no longer available*.

This is a concern because:

We just completed a panel review of Genealogy & the Law: Guide to Legal Sources for the Family Historian by Kay Haviland Freilish & William B. Freilich [available at http://www.ngsgenealogy.org/cs/genealogy_and_the_law] on the dearMyrtle Google+ Groups [youtube videos of each session are archived]. After spending 8 weeks it became clear that legal citations were not the same as genealogy citations citing federal & state statutes. I have searched Evidence Explained site and QuickTips #5 has a few examples in the footnotes, but none that actually cite the statute.

I'm wondering when the basic rules for citing titles in EE 2.22 apply to the titles of archival series and record groups. Take the example NARA citation on p. 66 as a case in point. Capitalization is title style, but no quotes are used. Is this exception because the NARA citation guide prescribes titles without quote marks?

---Robert

The citations for State-level Certificates (EE 9.41) list only the year of birth (or death) and don't include the location or county of the birth (or death).

Why is the exact date not used and why is the location (city etc.) or county not used?

I did some head scratching and came up with this citation (First Reference Note) that included the missing information:

I wish to cite a book to show that the publishers of that book were in existence in a particular year.

I do not have that book in my possession and I cannot find a digital copy of that book online.

The information that I have on hand about the book comes from WorldCat.

Here is the citation that I have come up:

I have cited a lot of military pensions for soldiers, widows, and minors. However, this pension contained the widow's application under two different soldiers. The first died during the Civil War and she applied as his widow in 1865. She quickly remarried, and her second husband, also a Union veteran, applied for a pension on his own behalf, as an invalid. The second husband died in 1886 and the widow applied as his widow. She married a third time and applied on behalf of her minor child from the second marriage.