26 Genealogy
This digital record was created as if we were creating it from a physical copy of a historical document. This is why the format is indicated as “print,” but this could change depending on how you choose to create your record and/or your source material. We completed this record for Louisa (Louise) May Alcott’s death record, which is listed on this page from Deaths in Boston, from the Massachusetts Town and Vital Records, which we accessed via ancestry.com.
We chose one subject heading to describe this death record: the name of the person who is deceased; listed as “Alcott, Louisa May 1832-1888.” This death record is of a famous author; in your community archive, you may create your own system of subject headings for local events, places, families, or public figures.
The description was derived from key information provided in the death record: where Louisa May Alcott was from, how old she was when she passed and on what date, and where she was buried.
The type for this document is a death record. Other types you may see for genealogical documents may be birth or adoption records, or marriage records. “Death record” also conveys that we are specifically describing the death record of Louisa May Alcott, not the entire page or book of Deaths in Boston. Rather, we will list Deaths in Boston as the source that the death record was derived from.
We used “Boston, Massachusetts” as the coverage for the record because the death record is derived from a source that has cataloged deaths in the city of Boston. The date included is the “death date” that is indicated in the death record.
We did not include a creator or contributor for this item since it is a public record with no creator or contributor indicated.
This item is in the public domain. Many birth, death, and marriage records are considered public record after a certain length of time, but this may vary by your specific state laws–when in doubt, make sure to investigate any copyright restrictions on the item and indicate if there are copyright owners or restrictions in the rights section.
The identifier was created by the people creating the record, and is not information derived from the item–when we created this identifier, we imagine this record is being created amongst a collection that may include different genres and formats. We chose this identifier to start with “index” to signify _____. We then used “death” to signify that iwas a death record, and the following number indicates the unique number assigned to this death record. Since this is the first death record we’ve created a record for, we have it a number of 001. The next record we created for a death record would have a number of 002.
The language is listed as English because the death record was written in English.