TIP #177 - THE FAMILY BIBLE The following topic was recently discussed in the Ancestry Daily News Letter and got me to thinking that this isn't a topic that I've covered yet. As I've noted in previous tips, our sources can be most confusing. It is possible, in searching for birth, death or burial records to check: 1 - Cemetery records. Tombstones sometimes have inaccurate dates. 2 - Vital Statistics. These can be in error if the physician wrote down the wrong information. 3 - Funeral home records. Believe it or not, these can be entered incorrectly! 4 - Family histories. Open for debate many times when information comes from an elderly family member or poorly kept records. But - how about the family Bible? Surely this WILL be accurate. Well -- maybe! One of the best traits of a genealogist is skepticism! It might look like the answer to our prayers, but we need to be really sure. What can we find in the old Family Bibles? Not only is it the Holy Scriptures, but it was the one recording place that many families used for important family events. Many Bibles have a place to record births, deaths, baptisms, marriages and miscellaneous family data. But is what written the "gospel truth"? What problems can we run into; what questions do we need to ask? These questions are best expressed by Ancestry. 1) What is the publication date of the Bible? If any date entered in the Bible precedes the publication date, it was obviously added long after the event occurred and the veracity of the information -- names, dates and places -- should be questioned. The information should be corroborated with another source if possible. This simply means that someone who owned that Bible, or perhaps an heir, added the information in that occurred in the family before the publication date of the Bible itself. I have the Henry Gorin Family Bible - it has been known as that forever and a day. BUT, it is not his original Bible - it is a transcription into another family Bible owned by his grandson. Thankfully, I have a copy of the family records prepared by Henry Gorin and can confirm that the transcription into a newer Bible was correct. 2) Are all the entries in the Bible made in the same ink? It's possible that the information in this Bible was transcribed/transferred from another Bible. If so, they were probably done some time after the events that they are recording. Every piece of information should be questioned and corroborated with another source if possible. 3) Do the entries in the Bible appear to be written in ballpoint pen? If so, what are the dates? The first patent for a ballpoint-type dispenser (for marking on rough surfaces rather than for writing) was awarded to an American, John H. Loud, on October 30, 1888. Commercial ballpoint writing pens first became available in 1895. However, it was not until the mid-1930s that the first reliable ball-point pen was developed by Lazlo Biro, a Hungarian living in Argentina, who received a patent in 1944 for his development. Ballpoint pens were used during W.W.II and they became used worldwide by the mid-1940s. Therefore, be skeptical of ball-point pen entries in family Bibles prior to the late 1930s or early 1940s. 4) Are some dates or years entered in a different hand or a different ink? Again, this is a telltale clue to later entry by someone else. 5) Are entries made out of chronological sequence? Here is an obvious clue to the data being entered some time after the event. Another clue is that an entry is squeezed in between others in order to force it into sequence. 6) Are there entries in a Bible published in the U.S. for events that occurred in another country? Or vice versa? Unless you can confirm that the person who made the entry in the Bible was in attendance at the event, maintain a healthy suspicion that the data entered was secondhand, hearsay information. Corroborate the data with other sources. 7) Are you familiar with the handwriting of the person(s) who made each entry? If so, can you confirm that he or she was living at the time of the event? It is possible that a well-meaning successor to the original owner decided to enter information in order to make the family record more complete. In that case, he or she may have had unreliable information or made assumptions based on unreliable or hearsay sources. Check handwriting in family Bibles with other known handwriting samples from the person(s) you believe should have been the one(s) to have entered records at the time of the events. (Yes, you are becoming a handwriting analyst too!) This is one of my greatest interests, that of finding the handwriting of all the ancestors! Note: if you have a copy of a deed taken from a deed book at the courthouse, or a will ; this is normally the handwriting of the CLERK, not the individual. The Clerk hand-wrote the deed or will into the official books. You need to look at the original document to see the "real" signature many times! Thus ….. in order to use the Family Bible as a source, you must do some double-checking. I have found some Bibles where marriages, or births, or deaths were entered twice in different sections - and the dates don't agree! They are in different handwritings, different ink. That makes it great fun! The Family Bible is a wonderful source for obtaining information that we so badly need. I always try to buy a Bible that I find at a garage sale if it has family information in it. Then, playing detective, I try to find who that family was and contact a descendant or donate the Bible. It's words, both inspired and genealogical are worthy to be saved! (c) Copyright 27 August 1998, Sandra K. Gorin, All Rights Reserved, sgorin@glasgow-ky.com Sandi Gorin - A Kentucky Colonel PUBLISHING: http://members.tripod.com/~GorinS/index.html BARREN CO WEBSITE: http://ww4.choice.net/~jimphp/barrenco/ ARCHIVES for ROOTSWEB: http://searches.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/listsearch.pl KYBIOGRAPHIES: http://cgi.rootsweb.com/~genbbs/genbbs.cgi/USA/Ky/Bios KYRESEARCH: http://cgi.rootsweb.com/~genbbs/genbbs.cgi/USA/Ky/Tips PRAYER&PRAISE: http://www.listbot.com/subscribe/prayerandpraise