CONUNDRUMS

I ran into one of those examples of “Things to Watch
Out For In Online Genealogy” tonight and it involves
my West grandfather.

Over on the FamilySearch website under the Pedigree
Resource File heading there are several entries for a
“Floyd J. West” whose birth date and place match my
grandfather’s. The trouble is, his name was Floyd E.
(Earl) West. The contributor also lists his marriage to
a “Clora Berthella Barker” instead of Cora Bertha
Barker. We appear to be related through the marriage
of my great granduncle Paul Leroy West or his brother
John Cuvier West to relatives of the submitter.


I can see how he might mistake an old fashioned
written “E” for a “J“, though.


So, how do I deal with this? There’s no date for when
the entries were posted, so I’ve no idea if the submitter
is still alive. There is an address there however so I’ll
try writing to it.

I had a similar experience a few years back when I first
made some tentative steps in online genealogy. I found a
website for a related family and there was an entry for
Grandpa West who was married to “an unknown person”
and it lists the children as only my aunt Florence and an
uncle Stanley who died in infancy. I emailed the owner
of the website but it remains unchanged. I have to wonder
if there might be some personal reason for the way it gets
the date of my grandparent’s marriage correct but
refers to my grandmother as an “unknown person”.


What’s that saying? Caveat emptor?