Business and City Directory Projects

Paul Catmull

I am in the process of reviewing a batch. I am really not sure how the indexing of this file is helpful to a researcher. There is no real conclusive data here. All that is indexed is:

1. Year: Blank in this file
2. Directory Place: 
3. Surname:
4. Suffix: 
5. Given Names: 
6. Prefix: 

The is also room for their spouse...but this directory doesn't have any spouses.

To make this more valuable to a researcher, I recommend the following:

1. Year:
2. Directory Place: 
3. Surname:
4. Suffix 
5. Given Names: 
6. Prefix:
7. Occupation:
8. Street Address: 

Because of the limited entry, when there are two people with the same name, the indexer skipped the second one. Given that they usually had different addresses and occupations, they obviously were 2 different people. I put them back in. There are almost 400 names in the file, so I recommend cutting the image in half.

Regards,

Paul

Melissa S Himes

Hi Paul,

When someone indexes the exact duplicate name, the system automatically deletes the duplicate when the batch is submitted. It also deletes the duplicated name when you enter it on a review and submit the batch. The goal of this project is to get the researcher to the image that contains the name they are searching. They will see that there are many people with the same name and can decide which one is the person they are looking for. We are not indexing individuals, we are indexing unique names.

Index each unique name. Some names may be duplicated. When names are exact duplicates, index only the first instance of the name listed. Skip the other exact duplicates and then index the next unique name. Unique names include names with different middle initials, spouses listed with the individual, and different name spellings.

There usually isn't a year or a directory place on these. Some do have the names of spouses.

The images have already been created. They can't be split into two. Apparently whomever owns these directories doesn't want the occupation or addresses indexed. Maybe they want you to have to see the image. 😎

Dellory Matthews

They can be a rich source of information for researchers.

https://www.familysearch.org/wiki/en/United_States_Directories

https://libguides.nypl.org/genealogy/gettingstarted/citydirectories

Susan Ann Mullen

I love directories! It helps me locate family, where they were and how long they were there. It also has their occupation and often the widow's deceased spouses name. (there are a lot of these!) Knowing where and when tells me where to look for other vital records!