Talk:Citation needed

Sources, Primary [16 March 2025]

Are Birth Registrations available from governmental vital resource agencies primary sources? Why is there no reference to them in your pages of instruction regarding primary sources?

Having entered about 75 people into my tree without sources, I have now obtained information which will allow me to provide birth sources for a great many of them. Most of these come from the records of one Canadian province. I have provided the repository details in full and these have been accepted. I believe I have provided the title of the file precisely as it is given on the repository website. I have quoted the full birth registration and its reference number.

Other people appear to have used these records as sources but refer only to their availability on Ancestry and at Family History Sources. I am endeavouring to cite the source through which these organizations have obtained their data.

But, the little red question mark still comes up next to the name of the man I am trying to give the sources for. Since I want to employ the same routine many times I would like to get it right before I go on.

Example: Harry Wilmer Lyle in Goldenoldie Tree HWLyle

--goldenoldie 04:27, 25 February 2012 (EST)

Hi Goldenoldie, I edited the page for Person:Harry Lyle (1) as an example for you. You just needed to attach the birth event to the source record (which I did by placing S1 in the source box next to the birth record). You can also add a new source for an event (say his death) by clicking on the little + sign that is next to the Source box near where you enter the death date and location. --Jennifer (JBS66) 07:35, 25 February 2012 (EST)

Thanks, Jennifer. Just a case of tying the two bits together, eh? Gotcha!--goldenoldie 11:31, 25 February 2012 (EST)

These comments are with regard to the death of Chandler Arthur, son of Joel Arthur. These pages list his death as Greenbrier County WV, but was in fact Fayette County WV. I have a cemetary listing of the Arthur family cemetary at Fayetteville, and he and his son Alexander are both burried there. They are my 3rd and 4th generation Great Grandfathers.--George17 13:11, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps you intended these comments to be placed on the person page of Chandler Arthur son of Joel. Currently they are on the talk page for the template "Citation needed". For the most part the only ones who are likely to see this information are those interested in the template itself, and they are unlikely to have any particular interest in the Chandlers. I myself know nothing at all about the Arthurs, but will note that a cemetery listing does not necessarily indicate where a person died. Nonetheless, documenting the burial place is usually a good indication of where in fact they died, particularly in the 18th and early parts of the 19th century. A good choice might be to add your information as a note on the appropriate Arthur page, perhaps including a link to a cemetery transcription, or citation to a published record. A link to something like FindaGrave also works, though as a source FIndaGrave has some limitations. Q 16:39, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

this article needs an update [16 August 2012]

Can someone update this article please. I found it looking for examples of the template "Citation needed". The article gives two links to 'good examples' but apparently someone has now provided the citations and the template is no longer on those page; so we need some new examples. It would also help if this page showed the actual template so it could be readily copied. It is difficult to find in that long list of templates. --Janiejac 01:46, 13 August 2012 (EDT)

Hi Janie

Perhaps what's needed here is to place an image of a "currently good example", rather than a link to a page that (with luck) will soon have better sources. I'll see what I can do. Q 13:47, 14 August 2012 (EDT)

I am the user who asked the question in the first place. Person:Henry Lyle (1) was my grandfather and the very start of the tree I had brought in by GEDCOM. His page was the very first I attempted to sort out on WeRelate.

Jennifer answered my primary question: how do sources tie up to the events you enter for a person? Like any newbie I was in a hurry to complete my first entry. In doing so I had missed the instructions as to how the numbers attached to the sources tied up to the events. That was basically what the topic "Citation needed" was all about.

Now, what better sources can one obtain than an image of an original birth registration complete with the signature of the person who came into the registration office and advised the powers-that-be that a child had been born? The signatory was the child's maternal grandfather. The registry office was a good 5 miles from the birthplace and the child's mother was already a widow with three older children. And the year was 1876! From what I have found in searching for other birth registrations up to ten years later in the same area of Ontario, I was very lucky to find that the birth was registered at all.

I would appreciate if Quolla6 could tell me what better source I could cite. --goldenoldie 15:26, 16 August 2012 (EDT)

You may have been thinking you were asking about getting a good source for the article of interest, but where you put the question was on the talk page for "citation needed". So what you were asking for was to update the citation needed template, not updating a specific article that happened to be used as an example. However, I'm glad that your real question has been answered. For future reference, questions pertaining to a specific person artile should most likely be placed on the talk page of the person article. Q 21:54, 16 August 2012 (EDT)

Purpose? [23 August 2013]

Many of the pages on WeRelate contain facts that do not have any sources next to them. What is the difference between that and one that has this template? In other words, don't all facts without sources need citations? AndrewRT 13:17, 21 August 2013 (EDT)

I believe this is OBE. The idea was (originally) to mark a data entry that needed a source. The template was created for that purpose. Somewhere along the line the template was deleted, though the page remains. The question mark is now inserted automatically, no need to emphasize the issue with a separate template. Or at least that's my interpretation of what I now see on this page. Currently when you attempt to insert the template you get a the "empty" message "Template:Citation Needed". The page could prbably be marked for speedy delete with no loss. Q 16:50, 21 August 2013 (EDT)

Template:Citation Needed

Dallan added the little red question mark next to Birth/Marriage/Death fields. The question mark, when clicked on, directs to this page. The template {{Citation Needed}} never existed, because I would be able to see that it had been deleted in the past. There is the {{Template:cn}} that produces this: ^{Citation needed}. --Jennifer (JBS66) 09:35, 22 August 2013 (EDT)

ok thanks. Seems I'm getting the templates confused - I've removed the deletion request from here and moved it to Template_talk:Cn#Delete_.5B23_August_2013.5D. AndrewRT 13:13, 23 August 2013 (EDT)

Why would you want to delete the :cn template, and retain this page? Q 15:45, 23 August 2013 (EDT)

Actually, this isn't really a template. its in Article name space.

Q 15:49, 23 August 2013 (EDT)

Misdirection [30 September 2013]

For some reason people wanting to comment on something related to a page containing the {{cn}} template, tend to place their comments on this page. I think this is likely a problem for "passerby's" rather than for people who are actively working on WeRelate. The template concept is probably NOT something the average genealogists is going to be familiar with. So they end up clicking on the {{cn}} on the page they want to comment on, and end up on this page. Perhaps its a small matter, but I think there's an advantage in not frustrating folks, especially folks new to the system who might other wise "stick" and do some useful work with us. Perhaps something might be added here to redirect people to placeing the information on the appropriate article page. Q 16:51, 30 September 2013 (UTC)