Southwest Virginia Project:Data Extraction Background

Southwest Virginia Project

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The Southwest Virginia Project collects information about various persons who lived in South West Virginia. The current focus is on those who came into the area during the Early Settlement Period, roughly through the beginning of the Revolution. Data for persons who came to the area subsequently is not rejected out of hand, but the initial focus is on the Early Settlement Period.

Each data collection page includes information extracted from a number of specific sources. The sources selected are a) those which are readily available (preferrably with an online version), and b) are used repeatedly by those interested in persons in southwest Virginia. Some of the major sources used include

a) Source:Summers, 1903

b) Source:Summers, 1929

c) Source:Addington, 1932

d) Source:Kegleys Western Waters Series

e) [[Chalkley, 1912]

A number of other works are also included here for convenience, though they are focused outside of the primary Southwest Virginia Target Area, or are not readily available. The standard works are set up in a sequence, and space provided to record data extraction. The data included in the extraction are:

a) page number

b) Person's name

c) Date

d) Location

e) summary of content.

Initial, the data extraction pages were focused on specific individuals. It quickly became apparent that this was not very efficient, and that an extraction was more productive if all individuals of a given surname were extracted at once. For this reason, a series of articles was created in the form [[XYZ Family in Southwest Virginia]], where XYZ was the surname of interest. Thus, pages were set up such as Carter Family in Southwest Virginia, Walker Family in Southwest Virginia]] etc. A summary of the family pages set up in this way is given at Family Lines in Southwest Virginia. Currently, data capture from any of the standard sources is confined to the "Family in Southwest Virginia" Pages. Dat from less commonly encountered sources is given on the individual pages, unless so much information is available in such a source about different individuals, that it makes sense to include it in the Family page for that particular surname.