Global surname change?

[Robert Jacobs 0]

Is it possible to change, for example, all occurences of the surname "Livingston" to "Livingstone?" I adopted one spelling quite early in my research and now I am convinced that another is the more commonly used. I'd hate to have to go through and change them all individually.

 

Thanks for any suggestions.

 

 

formerprof

[nbradley 0]

If in doubt - consult John Cardinal's TMG Utility. Yet again John comes up trumps. I had a quick look and it will do what you want.

[Robert Jacobs 0]

If in doubt - consult John Cardinal's TMG Utility. Yet again John comes up trumps. I had a quick look and it will do what you want.

 

Thanks so much -- I should have thought of that!

 

formerprof

[retsof 0]

The TMG utility will do that, but I have found that surnames are spelled different ways at different points in time. My 4th-great grandfather's will has it spelled three different ways IN THE SAME DOCUMENT: Forester, Forster and Foster.

 

I am also dealing with one line of Rexroad, Rexrode, Rexroth, Von Rexroth, Recksrodt, which tells me quickly by inspection in which period it was used.

 

For example, current German use for cousins is Rexroth only. Southern WV use is Rexrode. Northern WV use is Rexroad. It's all fathers and sons of the same ancestral line.

 

In Europe and Pennsylvania, another line runs through M'Kie, Mackay and McKee. Changing to any one would trash the other sections and make them illogical.

 

Another line starts out with some unpronouceable Galic, continues with Colclough, gets anglicized to Coakley, and then regionalized to Cokeley.

 

The worst situation I have seen for name changes is the "Ditto" family. The word ditto was originally written out before ditto marks were used. "Ditto" meant whatever name preceded it in the passenger list, but some other enumerator read it as-is.

 

I have another ancestor named "George Rex". It's Latin for "King George" but I don't think I will change George Rex's name to George King. It could have actually started from one of King George's illegitimate relationships, but I have not proved the connection.

 

My vote is to leave the names as they are as they are found. TMG makes it easy to create multiple name variables if more than one style is located and you need more. I'd hate to look at a file in which any original spellings were removed.

What "else" was changed?? Multiple spelling give clues to future searches.

 

I have a lot with the presurname modifiers like von, de, d', ap. I will make another tag with that as part of the surname so I can find the person either way.

Edited December 23, 2007 by retsof

[Robert Jacobs 0]

The TMG utility will do that, but I have found that surnames are spelled different ways at different points in time. My 4th-great grandfather's will has it spelled three different ways IN THE SAME DOCUMENT: Forester, Forster and Foster.

 

I am also dealing with one line of Rexroad, Rexrode, Rexroth, Von Rexroth, Recksrodt, which tells me quickly by inspection in which period it was used.

 

For example, current German use for cousins is Rexroth only. Southern WV use is Rexrode. Northern WV use is Rexroad. It's all fathers and sons of the same ancestral line.

 

In Europe and Pennsylvania, another line runs through M'Kie, Mackay and McKee. Changing to any one would trash the other sections and make them illogical.

 

Another line starts out with some unpronouceable Galic, continues with Colclough, gets anglicized to Coakley, and then regionalized to Cokeley.

 

The worst situation I have seen for name changes is the "Ditto" family. The word ditto was originally written out before ditto marks were used. "Ditto" meant whatever name preceded it in the passenger list, but some other enumerator read it as-is.

 

I have another ancestor named "George Rex". It's Latin for "King George" but I don't think I will change George Rex's name to George King. It could have actually started from one of King George's illegitimate relationships, but I have not proved the connection.

 

My vote is to leave the names as they are as they are found. TMG makes it easy to create multiple name variables if more than one style is located and you need more. I'd hate to look at a file in which any original spellings were removed.

What "else" was changed?? Multiple spelling give clues to future searches.

 

I have a lot with the presurname modifiers like von, de, d', ap. I will make another tag with that as part of the surname so I can find the person either way.

 

In my case the "original spellings" really represent different transcriptions of the same Russian name from Cyrillic to Latin characters. Jankelewicz, Janklewicz, Janklowicz and at least six other versions may result from the same Russian name at the hands of different translators of the original documents. I have chosen to use the most common -- which also sounds most like the way I heard my father pronounce it many years ago. I just have to be sure that the data relates to the person I'm interested in. To make it worse, the town was in the so-called "Congress Poland," part of the Russian Empire after 1848. Earlier records are Polish, 1848-1919 are in Russian. It's an orthographic nightmare.

[retsof 0]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transliterati...an_into_English

 

I see several transliteration systems here...another wrinkle is letters before and after 1918...