Family Historian User Group

I have a number of press articles (and other media) to be included, but no obvious fact type to enter them under.

In one case I have a story about a train driver's 25 years in the role. That could possibly be entered as an occupation fact?

A house fire destroying the whole property - could that be residence fact?

In another, I have a story about a person being shot on a rifle range by accident. A week later I have an article about his death. Then I have two letters sending donations to a trust fund set up after his death. Should these be entered (some or all) as death facts?

Or should I create new custom facts?

How would others deal with this.

Thanks

Colin

I tend to think about how I would want those facts "revealed"

If you want it to appear in diagrams and reports, adding the detail from the article as the relevant fact (occupation/residence etc), means it will be revealed without adding a custom fact to your diagrams and reports.

If you just want to "hold" the reference and information, there is a lot to be said for creating a custom fact (I tend to use an attribute: "Newspaper Mention". The attribute gives you the additional field which I find useful).

Well, it depends. How are you presenting your research -- report, website, ....?

I only present my research via a website (which isn't based on any FH reports).

I would use the newspaper articles as sources supporting the occupation (train driver) and the (cause of) death and a residence. I would include transcriptions of the newspaper articles in the Text From Source (which is visible on my website). An example (not the same sort of fact): http://www.colevalleygirl.co.uk/tree/g1 ... tm#i142.13

The letters are a bit different as they're nothing to do with his death or his will/probate. I'll be interested to hear how others suggest dealing with those.

I create each article / Newspaper page as a Source. If it's a report of a Burial or a wedding I tend to put the results against the wedding or burial, using it to populate attendees as witnesses. For more generic articles I have a "featured in newspaper article" attribute, so I can include either the full article or the a subset as a note for example I often tweak the sentence so for some of your examples I might say "His death was featured in" etc

Thanks for responses. My research will be mostly in diagrams and reports for sharing with family. No plans for websites or any wider distribution.

Tying them in with existing facts such as BMD or occupation does therefore seem to be attractive, with the catch-all "Newspaper Article" fact to sweep up the rest.

Thanks again

Colin

The thing to keep clear is the concept of Source records of information that via Citations support Facts.
Most Sources can provide information about standard Facts, such Birth, Marriage, Death, Occupation, etc.
Others need a generic custom fact such as Obituary, or News Article for published news, or Communication to and Correspondence from other people for letters and such like.