Elizabeth Shown Mills

The first substantive page of this book begins as follows:

"As history researchers, we do not speculate. We test. We critically observe and carefully record. Then we weigh the accumulated evidence, analyzing the individual parts as well as the whole, without favoring any theory."

This high-minded description is reminiscent of the neat-and-tidy descriptions of the Scientific Method that appear in the opening chapters of high school science textbooks. Its relationship to the way professional show more historians actually work is, based on my quarter-century in the business, akin to the relationship between textbook descriptions of scientific method and the work habits of real scientists. In a word: tangential. Most working historians begin with a question, a problem, or a speculation and then gather data that seem likely to shed light on it.

Evidence Explained is a reference manual for people interested in swimming in a sea of historical data. Serious genealogists (the audience at which it seems, implicitly, to be aimed) will find it valuable, as will serious amateur historians compiling the histories of towns, counties, and local institutions or organizations. The opening chapters provide a useful synopsis of basic historical-research concepts (the short of thing you'd get in a methods course as a senior history major or first-year graduate student). The subsequent chapters give detailed, comprehensive guides (with multiple models) to how to cite just about any type of historical source you can possibly imagine.

These guides-to-citation chapters are strongest where they deal with the ins and outs of birth and death records, military records, church records, and other materials that are bread-and-butter to genealogists. This kind of information is simply not available in most general-purpose academic style guides (like the MLA Manual of Style or Chicago Manual of Style), and readers who use it regularly will find this book invaluable. Undergraduate or graduate history students or professional historians will--unless they do extensive work in vital records--have little reason to embrace this book. The MLA or Chicago manuals (as well as software like Endnote or the superb, free Zotero) handle 99% of archival and common non-archival sources economically and clearly, and Barzun & Graff's The Modern Researcher is a better primer on research methods. show less

This book is a style guide/handbook for citation and analysis for a genealogist. The first part focuses outlines the basics of each, while the second part shows examples of formatting your citations.

Unfortunately, I didn't find this as useful as I'd hoped. The citation suggestions are primarily for a family historian or a genealogist hoping to publish their work. Though she gives some examples of citations on a family group sheet or an ancestral chart, much less time is spent discussing how show more to analyze records. As a beginner just starting to look into my genealogy and not currently planning publication, I need a little more hand-holding than this provided. Others have mentioned the lack of online citation examples - the book was published in 1997 before there were clear standards for online citations, but as I have done primarily online searches, I would find it much more useful to have those clearly explained as well. I will definitely be able to use her examples of cited family group sheets, but I will continue my search for an introduction to analysis of records. show less

This book is written as a reference book, and not one to be read for general genealogical information or entertainment. It delivers succinctly and clearly a clear guide on both how to record and present sources in genealogy as well as how to assess the validity of sources. A great reference for an important area of genealogy.

Elizabeth Shown Mills and her granddaughter Ruthie teamed up to provide genealogists everywhere with a book of quotations pertinent to the field. The quotes are attributed not only to genealogists, but also to authors, entertainers, historians, and other persons, even fictitious characters, such as "Frasier Crane." The book will be an asset for genealogists and genealogical speakers for years to come. While the quotation categories are too numerous to include, the quotes are show more wide-ranging--from accuracy to writing--including such categories as document analysis, family trees, genetic genealogy, maps & mapping, plagiarism, and standards. Some quotes were included more than once under different relevant topics. Each attributable quotation is cited in the endnotes. An index of persons quoted is included. Keywords to locate relevant quotation sections are also provided. It fills a void in genealogical reference. Its creation by a granddaughter-grandmother team, particularly when the grandmother is one of the world's most respected genealogists, is a bonus for genealogists. show less