Advanced Genealogical Skills: A Seminar with Elizabeth Shown Mills - the pledge

Already a week has past since I attended Advanced Genealogical Skills: A Seminar with Elizabeth Shown Mills on April 2 at the North York Central Library in Toronto. The day was wonderful. I am so happy that I was able to attend. In 2005, Hurricane Katrina prevented Elizabeth Shown Mills (ESM) from attending the FGS Conference in Salt Lake City and I had hoped to hear her at that conference.

I am thankful that I have the handouts and the recording of the presentations to review as she packed so much information into the day that it is good to be able to review regularly what we learned. The challenge is of course, to put it into practice.

Near the end of the afternoon, ESM told us "Raise your right hand and repeat after me."  So up went the hands. She spotted someone who hadn't raised their hand. "Come on now _______. "

So here is the pledge we repeated
"I am determined to solve my problems; therefore, I do hereby promise Elizabeth, in front of all these witnesses, that every time I write down a source, I will add an appraisal of that source."

I have printed out these words to post in my office as a reminder.

I know I need to slow down to take the time to look at the first frames of the microfilm that contain the title, author, etc. or to look at the description of a database on an online source or to get all the necessary details from other types of sources, and to write down all the important information and as promised an appraisal of the source.

More in an upcoming post.


© 2011 Janet Iles