* Deceased/retired Occupation

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GeneSniper
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Deceased/retired Occupation

Post by GeneSniper »

Hi

Just a quick question, do you ignore the occupation of someone on say a wedding certificate, if it says plumber (Retired) or Plumber (Deceased). I ask because obviously you don't know when they did this job or where it fits into their timeline. At the same time it gives an in site into what they did during their life. If you do put it in, how?
William

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ColeValleyGirl
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Re: Deceased/retired Occupation

Post by ColeValleyGirl »

I put it in with a 'before date' -- either before their death if I have a date for that, or before the marriage otherwise. If you don't think it's obvious why you've chosen that date ypu can add a note.

Same with the death date of anyone shown as deceased on a marriage certificate -- died 'before marriage date' if you don't have any better info. Of course, if the certificate says a father was dead that could be a flat-out lie (to cover up either illegitimacy or a wandering father) or a mistake (in the case of a wandering father.) I have cases of both in my tree -- including my grandfather (who may or may not have been dead when my mother married -- nobody has a clue, but her certificate says he was); my great-grandfather (who definitely wasn't dead when two of his daughters married but they both claimed he was -- although I'm pretty sure they knew he wasn't); and a wholly invented father.
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Re: Deceased/retired Occupation

Post by tatewise »

The general point is that there is almost always a way to capture the data in any type of certificate, etc.
Firstly, it is captured in the Source record as a literal Text From Source transcript &/or a Media image.
Then in an appropriate fact the Date can reflect the 'best information' available and may be a Before, After, Between, From or To date range/period.
When entering Occupation (and other Attributes) I use standardised descriptions rather than a literal copy from the Source document. That allows consistent analysis of what types of jobs my ancestors undertook.
e.g. Always use agricultural labourer rather than Ag.Lab. or Ag labourer or Farm worker, etc.
Tools > Work with Data > Occupations helps manage those consistent descriptions.
Mike Tate ~ researching the Tate and Scott family history ~ tatewise ancestry
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GeneSniper
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Re: Deceased/retired Occupation

Post by GeneSniper »

Would you do the same for a retired entry Helen.

On a totally other subject, to transcribe or not transcribe? Are there advantages to having the information in Text from Source if you have an image of the certificate in the source? Now no mention of Ancestral Sources putting it in automatically if I want :lol: , I just want to know whether there is an advantage to having it in non image form.

In total agreeance about job description Mike, I know that my original job description over the 35 years I worked for the same company changed it's name at least 4 times , but what was done never changed.
Last edited by GeneSniper on 23 Jun 2019 13:39, edited 1 time in total.
William

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Re: Deceased/retired Occupation

Post by tatewise »

Yes, record retired Occupations with the word (retired) added.

There are good reasons for having a transcript.
Some images area almost illegible, or may be in Latin or some other foreign language, so an easily readable version is handy.
Textual transcripts are computer searchable, but images are not.
Text is far more compact than an image, so to save disk space you could ditch unimportant/uninteresting images.

BTW: If using AS to auto-create transcripts, always review what AS produces to ensure it is a literal transcript, because the AS version is just a good guess.
Mike Tate ~ researching the Tate and Scott family history ~ tatewise ancestry
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ColeValleyGirl
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Re: Deceased/retired Occupation

Post by ColeValleyGirl »

I'd record a 'retired' occupation as the occupation with a 'before date' based on the certificate; you might also consider recording a 'Retirement' fact again with the 'before date' (although I personally don't bother). I would NOT record the Occupation as "Occupation (Retired)" because that's not that their occupation was! They were a Plumber (say), and then they retired. Unless of course you consider Plumber (Retired) to be an occupation -- I don't, but suspect some people do. I thunk it's the difference between what a document says [faced with an occupation field, some people will says Retired, some will say Plumber(Retired), some will say None...] and what that document actually tells you about the course of somebody's life.

I always transcribe -- two reasons:

(1) when I publish my tree I can publish the transcriptions (which are my own creation so I own the copyright) but I may not have the rights to publish the images (and I prefer not to anyway).

(2) the transcription is a recording of what I understand the document to say, which is what I've based all the Fact details on -- but I might have misunderstood it, or might have puzzled for days to work out what a particular word is and don't want to have to repeat the work just because I didn't record the results. That's especially true if there are details that that don't result in a fact being created for a particular individual. e.g. a Marriage Certificate where the Bride's address is given as the SameIllegiblePlace as the Groom's, but you know from other evidence that she wasn't resident there at all. Do the deciphering work once; transcribe; annotate the marriage event to explain why you disregarded the Bride's address.
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Re: Deceased/retired Occupation

Post by GeneSniper »

Thanks all. On the point of transcribing. Is it best to list entry's eg Name: Joe Bloggs Born: 25 Dec 1962 Location: Glasgow or write it in a story format, like Joe Bloggs was Born on 25 Dec 1962 in Glasgow to father....? I know FH does this for each fact, but I saw both methods being used when I had looked up transcribing on t'internet and wondered again if there was an advantage when searching Text from Source in FH.
William

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Re: Deceased/retired Occupation

Post by ColeValleyGirl »

Transcribe exactly as the document says it -- in an ideal world: don't correct, don't add, don't subtract.

The answers to this question on Genealogy.Stackexchange.com may help -- there are fairly-widely used conventions for denoting text that you've added or text you can't read.
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Re: Deceased/retired Occupation

Post by tatewise »

The Text From Source transcription should be a literal line by line copy of the original document.
I like to arrange the layout using newlines and tabs and spaces to mimic the document as closely as is reasonably possible.
Unfortunately, FH is limited to plain black & white text all in one font style & size.

Any further explanation or interpretation of dubious parts, etc, can go in the Note box.

The example entry of details you posted go in the Facts, and the story narrative goes in the Sentence of each Fact, or some users like to compose their own narrative in the Note box of each Fact. Those Facts are supported via their Citations to the Source records. In most cases the coupling between the Facts and the Source will be obvious, but if there are any assumptions (where say Names &/or Dates are not an exact match) then they should be explained in a Note field, either attached to the Fact, or to the Citation, or to the Source, whichever is most appropriate.
Mike Tate ~ researching the Tate and Scott family history ~ tatewise ancestry
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steveflanuk
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Re: Deceased/retired Occupation

Post by steveflanuk »

Sounds like I record mine slightly different to other people. I have a custom event called 'Occupation at Death' where I record the occupation from the death certificate exactly as it is recorded, including the 'retired' part.

As regards marriage certificates (and other non-Death related documents), I will usually record the occupation given on the certificate using the Occupation fact, but if it says 'retired' or 'deceased' then I use another custom fact called 'Occupation Recorded As' instead - and add a note if it is relating to a person who has died.
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GeneSniper
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Re: Deceased/retired Occupation

Post by GeneSniper »

Another question on transcribing/adding source citations. When I added a few entries using Automatic Source Citation I presumed that anything I added to text from source would be added to the source citation (Wrongfully as I found out), I later realised I had to add the information to Text from in the Automatic Source Citation yellow bar for it to be added each time or to copy the Source and then it was added if I pasted it in . My question is how do I now go about adding the information to the citations that are transcription free? Is it a case of copying the information I want added, opening each entry individually and pasting the information in or is there another way to add it to all of the citations. Why does this happen with the Text From Source box?
William

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tatewise
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Re: Deceased/retired Occupation

Post by tatewise »

Are you talking about Method 1 'splitter' or Method 2 'lumper' Source Citations?

For Method 1 'splitter' Source Citations the transcript goes in the Text From Source box of the Source record, so nothing goes in the Text From Source box of the Citation and thus most Automatic Source Citation fields would similarly be left blank. Typical exceptions are the Entry Date and Assessment.

For Method 2 'lumper' Source Citations it is not usually recommended to include transcripts in the Text From Source box of the Citation, because that is inefficiently repeated in every auto-created Source Citation.

See glossary:sources#sources_and_citations_-_how_to_use_them|> Sources and Citations - how to use them and follow the links to the details of the two methods.

That may not be the advice you wanted, and you may need to rework your existing Source Citations to meet those criteria.
Mike Tate ~ researching the Tate and Scott family history ~ tatewise ancestry
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