US, Oklahoma—Obituaries, 1963–1986 [M3D5-RXH] Omitted Items

DonnaEdwards47

I'm back - still on the same batch. I just discovered the obituary I thought was skipped (4th obit on the page) was a copy of the 1st obit on the page. They both had different obituary dates (Dec 7, 67 and Dec 6 , 67). So would I skip the 2nd obituary or does it need to be entered because the obituary date is different?

Melissa S Himes

You are correct that the instruction doesn't quite apply. But, it is true that you would not need to index the same obituary on the same image twice. You just won't be marking anything no, no extractable data.

Since there is a slight difference in the second obituary on the image, with the date being one day different, 12/6/67 vs 12/7/67, I would go back and change entry 1 to show that the obit date was 12/6/67, since that would be closer to the death date. The same would apply if there were more names or different names - they would be indexed as Others after Entry 1.

Susan Ann Mullen

When a record is a duplicate of another record on the same image just skip the second. No need to mark anything differently.

There is nothing in t his project t ha t tells us we can combine records, even of the same person. If they are exact duplicates just index that obituary once but if there are differences, even just one small difference they need to be treated as separate records and indexed appropriately as such.

Some projects have different rules, even other obituary projects, but this one does not say to combine any record or to use information from a second document to add information to the first.

Isn't indexing fun! Sometimes it is confusing but your diligent work is always greatly appreciated!

genthusiast

@DonnaEdwards47

I think the following Project Instruction could apply:

• If an obituary spans 2 images, index all of the names from both images in the data entry area for the first image. After indexing the names of all persons in the obituary, mark the second image in Step 1: Images as No, No Extractable Data.

So make sure the first image has all the names entered. And if you hadn't added the new entry in you can skip it - if you did add that entry in delete it.

DonnaEdwards47

But that is confusing - on these batches, the 1st record asks if it should be indexed (Yes or No No Extractable Data) - then you proceed to enter all the records on the page in that batch. It doesn't give the option to answer No Extractable Data in the middle of the batch

DonnaEdwards47

I just found an instruction in project instructions that may have applied in this case. That batch was already submitted with the earlier date used. For future batches, this would be the instruction to use:

• Index each obituary independently from the other obituaries even if multiple obituaries are for the same deceased individual.

Funny how I can read the directions multiple times and still find something new.

Melissa S Himes

I'm pretty sure that instruction isn't in the Oklahoma Obit Project Instructions. Did you see it there?

I think that instruction only appears on the US, Missouri, Various Counties— Obituaries, 1880–1990 collection. That is an anomaly and not how we indexed the hundreds of thousands of obituaries in the past. Multiple obits for the same person on the same image are treated as combined records.

The Minnesota Obit project now has a note to Reviewers: Images often contain multiple obituaries on the same page, including the names of the deceased persons and their relatives. Make sure all names have been indexed.  This is how we generally index multiple obits on the same image - combining all the relations under one deceased's entry.