[WikiEN-l] Age fabrication and original research

[Durova]

On Wed, Sep 30, 2009 at 12:24 PM, Ray Saintonge <saintonge at telus.net> wrote:

> Durova wrote:
> > Suppose for discussion's sake we can fully trust that the brother-in-law
> of
> > Jeane Dixon's nephew has indeed commented upon the matter.  Relatives
> have
> > been known to get their facts wrong.  The more distant, the more likely a
> > mistake.
> >
>
> Your presumption here is that the information came from "the
> brother-in-law of Jeane Dixon's nephew". That may very well have some
> weight in evaluating the information on a death certificate.  The birth
> information in the SSDI could reasonably be from a different source: her
> own application for a social security number.  Other official sources exist
>
> Not a presumption but a direct reference to the opening thread post.  No
secondary source and no other primary confirms his assertion, according to
the opening post.  That's subnotable.


> > My own cousins and I debate the spelling of a grandmother's name.  And
> > certain records are unverifiable because of warehouse fires.  In a few
> > instances I know the later records are wrong because I was present when
> the
> > later data was recorded and the person who answered the questions, who
> was
> > choked with grief, simply misspoke.  Others who were present were jet
> lagged
> > from sudden arrangements to attend the funeral and too slow to react.
> > There's a family member who ought to have a military honor on his burial
> > marker but doesn't, because of that.  I wish I'd had the presence of mind
> to
> > correct the omission when the opportunity came.
> >
>
> Spelling gives rise to a broad range of different errors.  My own father
> misspelled my middle name on my birth record as "Micheal" even though
> his own first name was "Michael".
>
> I may be the only person alive who knows the original spelling of my
father's middle name (hint: if you started kindergarten in 1945 it was
slightly uncool to have a name that was recognizably German).

On census records spelling errors abound.  When census takers went out
> to gather information in a less literate era they were left to their own
> devices when they had to record the name of an illiterate, particularly
> in the case of an immigrant whose name was in a strange tongue. Priests
> who performed marriages often "fixed" names to make them more consistent
> with community norms.
>
> But does any census record, ever, give the 1904 birthdate?  Has any
secondary source determined it was worth repeating?  That would change the
discussion substantially.  What we're discussing is near unanimity.  A
single primary source from the close of her life and a putative distant
relative are all that contest it.  A fourteen year gap would be substantial;
[[WP:UNDUE]] that isn't enough to merit coverage.  Plenty of reliable small
presses would run the story if the nephew's brother-in-law cares enough and
has a good case to make for it.

-- 
http://durova.blogspot.com/