Is there any article that says not to capitalize whole of last name?

Paul W

Capitalization of the last name is common away from FamilySearch, but I thought I'd once read a specific instruction not to capitalize last names when working in Family Tree. I see the article at https://www.familysearch.org/en/help/helpcenter/article/how-to-enter-names-in-family-tree does not address the matter clearly. I prefer to see common practice, so have followed most other users in adopting the use of upper case for just the first letter of the surname.

However, today I have found another user has completely capitalized several of my relatives last names. I was about to contact her about this, but don't seem to have a strong enough argument to request either she refrains from doing this, or to engage in what might lead to be an "edit war" by reverting the names to how I (and others) had previously recorded them.

Any advice on how I should proceed would be appreciated!

Wayland K Adams

Hi Paul - I agree that the article you refer to is not as clear as it should be by saying use normal capitalization. That means we would capitalize the first letter and then in some cases, there are other capitalization. For example, McDowell. But I wish it would just say not to use all caps. Maybe you could suggest a change.

There is a WIKI article that flat out says not to use all caps. Here is the link. Look under 2.1 - Recording Names. Hope this helps. I have had the same experience with people changing to all caps.

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

Áine Ní Donnghaile

Using all caps for surnames was a common device before computers.

This help article is vague, to be kind: https://www.familysearch.org/en/help/helpcenter/article/how-to-enter-names-in-family-tree

In the Vitals section, enter the birth name or complete legal name.

• Capitalization—Use normal capitalization.

Gordon Collett

What's funny is that there was a time a couple of decades ago when it was FamilySearch that required capitalizing the last name for any submissions to them. That is probably what got it into common usage. Then there was the period when lines around the names were required. That is why you can still find old data in Family Tree with the name entered like /SMITH/.

The only thing harder than implementing new standards is getting rid of the old ones.

I did find this article in the Research Wiki: https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/Consistency_in_Genealogical_Format_and_Use_of_Abbreviations_-_International_Institute

This seemed like it could be a good test of the new FamilySearch Helper so I put in a question:

You do have to love AI. The reference it gave for not using all caps is the article I found that said you should.

Paul W

Thank you all for your responses. The main problem I believe I have here is in dealing with someone who is very "old school" and has a very English upper-class looking name! I feel certain I would offend her by querying her surname formatting, but this just makes the pedigree charts look rather messy - with some surnames in all-caps and others written the now "commonly accepted" way.

Before returning here to read your helpful responses, I came across this on a website including an article headed "8 Rules for Properly Recording Names in Genealogy". At "No.2" is:

Personally, I only write them in all-caps when sending a message / letter about a particular family branch, e.g. - "Thank you for your note regarding our common interest in the THIRKETTLE surname."

Otherwise, I prefer to go along with the approx. 95% of Family Tree users (including "FamilySearch) that just use a capital for the first letter - excepting surnames like van der Kamp!

Áine Ní Donnghaile

What is the date of that article, Paul? I know I've read older books or sets of guidelines that recommended using all caps, but newer ones often do not have that admonition.

Paul W

@Áine Ní Donnghaile

It's found at https://www.thoughtco.com/properly-record-names-in-genealogy-4083357 and I just noticed it was, "Updated on October 01, 2019" - certainly not the format in which I would have recorded the date!

Julia Szent-Györgyi

All caps loses information (is it Van De Kamp or van de Kamp or ...?), but it's easy to tell a computer to display a mixed-case field in all caps. Thus, as long as the fields are separate and clearly labeled, as they are on FS, there is no reason to deliberately lose capitalization information. Perhaps what we need instead is a suggestion for a per-user "display surnames in all caps" option?

For Paul's question, perhaps an appeal to the lossiness of the format would be convincing? And/or a request to FS for some examples or a clearer explanation in the Help article. ('Cause, like, define "normal".)

Paul W

Here's one reason why I'm not happy with inconsistency here - although the way this lady is going all the surnames here are likely to be in all-caps before too long! Probably me being too fussy and other users wouldn't even notice the difference in the chart I'm illustrating:

BTW - about to remove all those "United Kingdom" suffixes for pre-1801 events.

Áine Ní Donnghaile

That would bother me as well, @Paul W.

Gordon Collett

Hope you don't mind @Paul W but you have given me a real idea to attempt posting to Suggest An Idea. We'll have to see if it ever shows up.