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Archiver > NORCAL > 1998-02 > 0886392129


From: <>
Subject: Re: Just the Facts!!
Date: Sun, 1 Feb 1998 23:02:09 EST


___Bravo Larry!_______
Your well reasoned essay could very well serve as the NORCAL-L Manifesto.

Walt G.

_____________________________________wjg__________

Larry Kuttner wrote:
================================================== Maybe this >site an event
from a book or somewhere else, I say that such and such a source >says this
and that no other documentation of the event has been located.

>I think there is room for acknowledged "conjecture" in writing family
histories so >long as it is identified as such. If many people came to SF
via ships and the >Panama Canal and information leads to the conclusion that
this is the most likely >way that the ancestor arrived, then say so, but label
it as conjecture without proof.

>I constructed a history of my gr-grandfather KUTTNER from entries in the SF
city >directories. I was always careful to say that the city directory for
such and such a >year said the following. I never just said that he lived at
such and such an address, >since I really couldn't verify that fact since
anyone involved was long since >deceased. My statement is accurate since I had
a copy of the city directories and >could prove that was what they said. The
fact that I couldn't from person routes >verify that he did in fact live there
was to me irrevelant.

>Genealogists seem to swear by birth certificates, but barring DNA testing how
does >one prove that the listed father is in fact the biological father? I
accept that the >listed father is in fact the biological father since
statistics would prove that this is >the most likely occurrance. But then I
was an auditor and we worked with >accepting the total program from samples.

>What one does with one's work can be said to be your own business and there
>certainly is enough room in the "hobby" for both genealogists and family
historians.

> Lawrence E. "Larry" KUTTNER of Oregon

>Larry Kuttner <>

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