Sunday, February 24, 2008

Adventures in FamilySearch Indexing - Week 31

I kinda sorta did two batches of FamilySearch Indexing today. I had a very knowledgeable reader with 31 years experience offer to review my work before I submitted it this week. As fate had it my batches were kinda difficult to read in areas. I really had to use my indexing tools on the two batches I did. Must of been the same census taker with both batches. Oh, I guess I could of looked and seen that on the census record.

Whenever anything that I do gets reviewed I feel tester's panic. I tell people at work that I just can't type when they are watching. All my skills go down the tube. I didn't have anyone breathing down my neck while I was indexing but I still felt pressure to get it right. I will report back to you on my "grade". It's actually kinda exciting to see how I did now that the actual indexing part is over.

WAHOO! my results are back and here is the verdict on my indexing.
Corrections: [169]
2 = Ira
5 E A = C J Compare the A on line 9
6 Reskan = Feskan Compare the F in Sex field
8 Clair = Olin
9 Darham = Dunham
10 14y = 19y
19 Ayers = Ayres
20 Armina = Armena
31 Reland = Riland
42 A* = Ameret

Corrections: [178]
1 Horvie = Howie Change all family surnames. This is a common error—misinterpret the "w" as "rv" or sometimes "no"
6 A M = A The "M" is part of the Mc in McDonald
10 Bay = Ray Compare the R in Rebecca on line 14
11 Clifton = Clefton Change all family surnames Don't let all the artifacts on the film fool you
21 = New Jersey
34 = Dow
35 N N = W W Compare the W in Wis on line 37
42 = Hugh What looks like an "e" is a flourish on the H
Teaser = Fraser

Renee,
You had no problems with rules which is great. So many don't read the instructions and end up with weird stuff on their records.
These were rather difficult records. I hope that you will be able to see what I am suggesting and that it will help you in the future. I worry a lot about accuracy. Every scribe is a new challenge. I'm afraid that all indexers need feedback and headquarters has been slow to address this. Let me know your feelings about this exercise.
Gosh, I have a lot of errors in those two batches, but it was hard to read. It just goes to show how important it is to have two eyes looking at the records and a third to review it when there are disputes. I take my hat off to all the arbitrators out there. They have a difficult but important job out there. Now I have to go fix my errors and submit my batches.

See ya tomorrow, for tomorrow is always another genealogy day!

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