If you are working on Obituaries - reviewing or indexing - a friendly reminder:
Titles like Mr, Mrs, Miss, do tell us the gender - they are either Male or Female and that can also allow you to chose the relationship in some cases.
If the couple has a child named Anita (Mrs. John) Johnson, then Mrs Anita Johnson is a female daughter and John Johnson is a male son-in-law. John does not get a prefix of Mr.
Given Names do not tell us the gender. Children, Matt, Alexander, Alexa, and Matilda - are children, not sons and daughters. But Mrs. Anita Johnson can be indexed as daughter (because of the Mrs. we know she is a female).
The Relationship to the Deceased is not blank. If there is no relationship stated, the field is indexed as Nonrelative. I know this difficult when a surname is the same, and people think they must be a relative. They might be, but, for the purposes of indexing, they are a nonrelative.
From Field Helps on all three projects:
Do not indicate a relationship unless a specific relationship was included in the document. Do not assume a relationship as a relative of the deceased even if the person had the same last name as the deceased.
Do not assume the sex of the relative based on given names; if the sex was not clearly indicated in the document, either directly or with pronouns or titles or terms, use the corresponding generic term to indicate the relationship. For example, if gender identification, such as "son" or "daughter," isn't given, select Child.
If the relationship of the individual to the deceased was not indicated, was written as a variation of the word "unknown," or was not a relative, select Nonrelative from the drop-down list. This field should NOT be marked blank.
Even if the deceased is not named, we still create a record!
Feb 2 1877 = The 5 year old son of James Fitzgerald of Orange died this week.
Deceased Other
Given Name: <blank> Given Name: James
Surname: <blank> Surname: Fitzgerald
Age: 5 Relationship to Deceased: Parent
Sex: Male
Residence: Orange
Obit M/D/Y fields: Feb 2 1877
Comments
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It is not a question. It is a helpful hint!
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