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I've been researching immigration and naturalization documents for several ancestors this weeks. Most of them seem pretty clear what the date of the record would be, but certificates of arrival usually have two dates. It seems that they were often issued years after the individual actually arrived. So which date should be used in the citiation? The arrival date, the certificate issue date...or both?
I've attached an example image of a certificate of arrival found on Ancestry.com, where the individual arrived on Sept. 18, 1920 but the certificate is stamped with a date of Dec. 23, 1926.
Edit: Now that I am thinking about it, I realize that ALL of these naturalization documents actually have two dates (immigration date and document creation date.) I have been citing the date that the document was created/signed for everything else. Now I am second guessing everything!
Hello, Genealogy Jane. Yes,…
Hello, Genealogy Jane. Yes, the two dates have significantly different meanings and both dates need to be recorded. The arrival date is obviously important. The date the certificate was issued is important for another reason: It tells us that something else significant happened in 1926 that prompted "Lasar Brenfen" to request a certificate of arrival. You clipped away the rest of the document, so I cannot discern when his naturalization events actually occurred, but he could have waited years after the receipt of his certificate of arrival before he petitioned for citizenship. Every date and every document in that process is important to the reconstruction of his life.