This book is an excellent source and guidebook to helpyou do just that. You should and must document your sources in your family tree. Too manypeople are just uploading their family tree willy nilly to net and everybody just takes it forgranted that it is correct. A good genealogist will at all times documents her or her sources forevery (and I say every) bit information that is included in the family tree.
Primary evidence isthe best source: birth certificates, social security forms, etc. Secondary evidence is good if itis backed up with other forms of proof.
This book will help you find the best source and testthat source against the information that you have. Then it will show you how to include thatinformation style in your family tree.
Please cite your sources in your genealogy and familytrees! For the present and the future!
Information technology has made the exhange of family"research" so much easier in recent years. Everyone wants to be a family historian! Unfortunately,way too many are clueless when it comes to documenting their work. It is all but impossible to gobehind the majority of today's internet genealogists and review the proof of their research. Inmost cases, you may as well start completely over, you can't locate a thing based upon the sourcesthey provide. :(
This is an EXCELLENT, EXCELLENT little book and everyone tracing their familyhistory ought to keep one on their desk - and refer to it again and again. I found Mill's bookconcise, easy to follow, and invaluable for documenting correctly all those tricky sourcesparticular to family history. Buy one!
It is a very good starting point, and will answer many questions formost researchers, but it will NOT solve all your citing problems, and if your research includes manyforeign sources you may find yourself still in the dark.
I would like to see a revised edition,with many more examples and more attention paid to FHL sources, which are vast and varied.