Is it better to create a proflie when the LNAB would be Unknown or wait.

Question

I am working on a family and came across a source record for the mother of an existing profile. I can add the information but I only have the married name and not the LNAB at this time and it will probably be a long time until I start to research this new person in depth so should I create the profile as an Unknown along with the married name or just leave a hole in the line until I can eventually get back to it?

Answer 1

There is an Unknown project that has been started.  Have you done a system search to see if one is already there, or you could look at  the Unknown Category for recycle profiles?

http://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Category:Recycle_Unknowns

Comments

I always try a search first and if there's no profile , will recycle an Unknown for these kind of profiles , this way there's not again an Unknown created and the last name already is Unknown (to prevent any future confusion, you can add a hidden note to the profiles Bio explaining this was a recycled Unknown profile, with your name and date stamp =four tildes )

Answer 2

I would enter the first name now, and look for the LNAB to be added later.

Answer 3

Dale, you must have been reading my mind yesterday - I was grappling with the same decision!  I can't tell you which is better - I'm certainly no kind of authority on anything non-technical!  I can share with you the mental process I went through.

I'm working on my husband's family right now.  After going back to his 3-g grandfather, I started coming down from him, adding all his children first, then systematically going to 1 of them and adding their spouse and children, then going to 1 of them .... down to all dead family members, with names of living ones in their parents' profiles.  There was one spouse whose LNAB I couldn't find, although I did have a lot of information about her life.  Initially, I had decided to skip adding her because I didn't want to create another Unknown, but after I finished with her children, their spouses, and her grandchildren and their spouses, I changed my mind and added her.  I didn't want to leave that big a loose end hanging in the family.

it's Mary A (Unknown) Lynch in case you want to see it.

Comments

I would do what Gaile did as someone may know her LNAB. This is the beauty of collaboration in genealogy (-:

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I think part of what tipped the balance of "to add or not to add" was the almost-connection I felt.  This is the wife of my husband's second cousin once removed, but I discovered that she lived 1 block away from where I lived in 1962/1963.  I told my husband that we're almost related.  Of course, he just scratched his head a little about that!!!

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I've been through a similar thought process, Gaile -- sometimes I add them; sometimes I don't. It all depends on how much information I have to add to their profile.

Also, I selected Sandy's answer as the "best" answer because she suggested recycling an Unknown, and I think it's fantastic to put these profiles back into circulation as often as possible, especially if there's a good chance we'll be able to add a last name to them in the near future.

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Julie, while I agree that recycling the Unknown profiles is a worthy cause I did not do it that way, I created a new one. The reason for this is I just do not like spending the time to search that projects list and run the risk of changing direction when I am on a roll with one family. I will not change your selection of "Best Answer" but I personally would not have chosen that one as best because of the three answers that all said to create the profile it was the only one that said to go to the unknown project and go that way.

Answer 4

I tend to add an Unknown profile if I have a first name.