How to Indicate Name Changes on FamilySearch
My grandfather's family, including my mother as a small child, changed their names in the early 50's. So all census records show their former surname, but everything after is their new name. When I use their new name (the name they used most of their lives) someone edits "my" tree and puts the other name back since that is the name that was on the census records. What is the proper way to show that there was a name change and that both names are correct?
Dawn
Answers
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@Dawneekoz There is no absolute hard and fast rule about what the Vitals Name and the Alternate Names should contain in the event of a name change. For years, the rule among family historians was that the main name (i.e. the name on the Vitals section) should be the name at birth. Even then, there were exceptions.
These days the guidance on FS is more pragmatic and permanent name changes might be entered in the Vitals Name if it seems appropriate. But that's very much a value judgment…
It appears that your "someone" is following the old rule and frankly trying to persuade them otherwise is not a hill I'd be prepared to die on… What I would do for each person is this…
- Set the Name in Vitals to their birth name (like the "someone" wants, if I understand correctly);
- Put the changed name in one of the Alternate Names;
- Create a Custom Event with a Title of "Name Change", Description of (say) "Changed after the 1950 census for ease of pronunciation";
I've never used the Name Change event but I've never had this disagreement. If you do both 2 and 3 then you have covered it all ways.
If you have both names - one in the Vitals and one in the Alternate - then FS will search on both names and find hints for both names (though ignoring any date considerations).
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@Dawneekoz I globally agree with @Adrian Bruce1 having many of my Scottish ancestors subject to multiple name variants (family name and/or forenames) though not actual names changes. I didn't know that there was an "old rule" and I freely admit that I tend to follow the birth certificate version of a person's name - however, I'm not a die hard on this and have due to certain considerations not used the spelling on the birth certificate/registration. I've extensively used under the section Other Information the Alternate Names. In two cases as there were so many variations between various official documents, and after checking that they were all the same person, drew up a list of document type + date + plus spelling variation and uploaded this to memories. But I strongly believe what's most important is that whatever you choose this is fully explained in the section "Reason This Information Is Correct" or add explanatory notes to the Sources or Memories.
Thank you @Adrian Bruce1 for the idea of creating a Customn Event to explain a name change as one of my ancestors when immigrating to the States changed her name from Tennent to Tennant - one of her descendants pointed this out in a letter.
Regards
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So I ran into this a couple years ago and found out that the policy for FamilySearch actually seems to be to use the individual's preferred or legal name, not necessarily their birth name. The exception is if their name changed through marriage.
"Legal name changes—If a person legally changed his or her name, other than through marriage, enter the newer legal name.
Most commonly used name—If the person did not use his or her legal name in life, enter the commonly used name in the Vitals section. Enter the legal name in the Other Information section."
Here's the link: https://www.familysearch.org/en/help/helpcenter/article/how-to-enter-names-in-family-tree
It's the third and fourth bullet points under "Enter the correct version of the name in the Vitals section."
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My practice has been to use the predominant spelling convention in the majority of attached sources. My favorite is my reason statement: "By his own signature" (from WW1 or WW2 draft registration). Kind of hard to argue that.
Andrew and Adrain have really nailed your specific question in that there are multiple ways to address the two (or more) names used in an individual's life.
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and we should also consider history - people change names for a variety of reasons - notoriety, fame, ethnicity during wartime etc —- please pay attention to the alerts as to why something should not be changed —- and give brief explanations for such changes, whenever possible
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