How does one validate, or build off, a source that is hidden behind Ancestry's paywall?

Question

Daniel Dunn-9963 has but one "source" which links to Ancestry. His son, William Dunn-9962, again, has but one Ancestry link as a "source". And the page for William's son, John Dunaway-554, has only a single source - that of a findagrave link which only connects John to his son. Without something considerably more tangible than links that cannot be viewed, where are the connections? The sources? How does one verify or build upon such "sources"?

Comments

You can always check FamilySearch (it is free) for similar records - such as this one for the marriage between William and Joanna :

"England Marriages, 1538–1973 ", database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:N6SG-FNG : 13 March 2020), William Dunn, 1781.

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Which is pretty much my point. If one has to retrace the search from nothing more than a name, the Ancestry link is not a source. And one can never know whether or not one is retracing the Ancestry "citiation". I do routinely use familysearch because the citations I use from there are viewable by everyone, for free. In this situation we have a single Ancestry link effectively "asserting" a parental connection between father, last name Dunn, and child, last name Dunaway.

Answer 1

Perhaps somebody who has an Ancestry account can look for you, then generate a free sharing link that they provide.

Comments

There are some 26 "sources" attached to the FamilySearch profile for William.  Of course they would need to be checked to ensure they actually do belong there and not some other William.

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This familysearch profile, does appear to be the same William, but it does nothing to validate the Ancestry link between father, last name Dunn, and child, last name Dunaway. As a side note, the many mistakes within familysearch trees is the reason I chose to ignore those trees and construct my tree, using documents available from familysearch, on Wiki's clean sheet.

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I think it is almost certain that the profile for John Dunaway has been incorrectly linked to William Dunn and Joanna Marson, as his parents.  Apart from the name change, there is also the fact that William Dunn appears to have lived in Kingswinford, Staffordshire, and John Dunaway born in Bosham, Sussex, though both of those places will have to be confirmed with reliable sources.

The image of the gravestone on FindAGrave cited on John Dunaway's profille, looks like he died aged 17, so is possibly not the same person as John Dunaway, born in 1785.

Answer 2

If the link points to an Ancestry record, the citation might contain enough info to find the record elsewhere (like FamilySearch).  If the link points to a tree or an Ancestry person profile, you can probably view it without a subscription at a public library.  Even then, if the link is to a Private tree on Ancestry, you are out of luck.

You could also try contacting the profile manager to ask for a screen shot of the Ancestry page, or make a similar request on G2G for an Ancestry member to investigate for you.

Answer 3

Ancestry has free 30-day trials for a look se behind the curtain. I have been to the local library which has free access to a few pay sites. Ancestry is often one of them. Family Search is open to all as well  https://www.familysearch.org

Comments

Unless you have an LDS member Family Search account, you must be at a FHC or affiliate to use Ancestry through Family Search.

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LDS membership is not required for access.  Free access is available to all

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My point was, if you do not have an LDS account, you must be at a FHC to use it; non-members do not have remote access. At the FHC it is available to all patrons; it is considered a premium resource that is available through the FHC Portal.

Answer 4

Unfortunately, the link alone isn't enough info. It isn't really a citation; you just know  that there is something on Ancestry in this man. I have a worldwide subscription but because mine is 'UK' I just get a redirect and no answers when it sends me from the Canada site  to the UK one.. When I search for him, I get some trees and some indexed records for his marriage and perhaps his death.

So look elsewhere. Family Search has some indexes and occasionally images  In this case Freereg has 'transcribed'/ indexed the Kingswinford records.Their index often gives a few more details than  FS and also provides good citations

Unfortunately, I can't easily link using a phone. Maybe this will work. https://www.freereg.org.uk/search_queries/62151dbdf4040b1fb9db3171?locale=en#5ff4fb63f493fda0cd7c5624

 Search Freereg. William Dunn,,Staffordshire, Kingswinford. Theres a baptism and Marriage record. You can generate a wikitree citation from each record.

(now is your Joanna Marson a relative of my brickwall Richard Marson from Birmingham?)

Comments

Just for future reference, you can actually use your UK Ancestry login details to login to any of their other sites worldwide. You can still only see whatever records are covered by your subscription, but if somebody has linked to one of those records from a different country's site you can then use their link without being redirected. Doing that in this case showed that the source on William Dunn's profile was just the Ancestry copy of the FamilySearch transcription of his marriage record to Joanna.

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Thanks, Helen. My interest came by way of a Dunaway activity email; a change to the profile of a Dunaway lower on the tree. Clicking the ancestors button link led to Dunn... and the single "citation" asserting the parental connection, Dunn to Dunaway????

Although I am certain that this Dunaway tree is not related to my tree - I'm also the Admin for the FamilyTreeDNA Dunaway name project - I have encountered this unsubstantiated Dunn to Dunaway assertion elsewhere in the past... And there is a Dunn in the Project and he is not genetically related to any of the four, distinct, Dunaway lines.

Answer 5

Thanks to Covid my local library allows access to genealogy pay sites on line. It used to have access only if you were physically present.

Comments

Are you certain that's still the case? My understanding is that the free, COVID-originated, remote access to the Ancestry Library Edition ended December 31st. Many libraries, especially those not part of a very large institutional network, use ProQuest as the access gateway to Ancestry and other services like Bowker and Ex Libris. Here is their advisory to libraries from last December. Ancestry no longer makes any mention of the free remote access on its page for libraries, schools, and institutions. Some special, individual arrangements may have been made between certain library systems and Ancestry, of course.

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Edison, you are correct.... After enjoying the at-home availability for so many months, I am now keeping a list of things I need to go to the library to look up. There is no access from any of the libraries where I have cards, including my (smallish) hometown library and the much larger libraries in Los Angeles and San Francisco. It was nice while it lasted....

A friend who works at the local library told me she's pretty sure I will be able to access Ancestry from the library on my own laptop, since I'll be using the library wifi and thus the library's IP address. But I haven't yet tried it. I sure hope she's right, as it will save me the trouble of signing up for time on a library computer and then have to get off after 30 minutes or whatever amount of time they allow.

Has anyone tried getting into Ancestry from the library on your own laptop (or other device)?

Answer 6

Hmm.  People are telling you how to work around the problem...go to the library!  

You shouldn't have to.  The PM is still active.  i suggest you contact him.

Edit:  I see now that someone has already added sources to the profile.

Comments

Thanks, Julie. There are quite a number of sources on the Dunn profile, but none relating to the Dunaway as son. And just the one Ancestry link on that son's profile. Have sent a message to the PM and await his assistance in verifying the connection  - or not.

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When this happens, I will add a section to the narrative under a == Research Notes == header that says something like:

"A previous version of this profile claimed, citing only "ancestry.com", that xxxx Dunn was son of [father Dunaway] and [mother ....]. There appears to be no reliable sources to support this set of parents and they have been detached. If you have a reliable source to support these origins, please provide it."

Then be sure to link to the disputed profiles from the narrative.