How do you define a "name collector"?

[chris_49]

There's a lot of opprobrium directed at people who copy others' trees wholesale, and "name collector" is one of the insults used. But what exactly does this mean? I agree that I despair of people who put people completely unrelated to them in their trees - why?

I found one of these on Ancestry, and eventually traced the connection to my 2nd cousin Alex.  He's related on Alex's father's side, but not at all on his mother's side which relates to me. I emailed Alex and he said he'd never heard of the guy, who it seems had copied Alex's tree and then found my (larger) tree and copied much of that wholesale. I wrote to this other guy but no reply, unsurprisingly.

But what of those of us who trace our ancestors' siblings forward through censuses and BMD records? The "Lost Cousins" site is all about finding such people, but before that started i had found several cousins - I've met some of them - who'd done research on their own ancestors and we were able to swap certs and prove links. (I don't attempt to find very distant relatives where I'd be relying on pre-census and pre-registration records - too dodgy),

So because my tree is big, am I a name collector? Everyone on it is believed to be related to me,though you can't 100% prove each paternity, even in the C19th.

This thought came to me when I found a tree which had a lot of my relatives on it. My great grandfather William Davies married my great grandmother Annie Fellowes in Liverpool, though they were from Wallasey (this confirmed by family tradition). William's half-brother Enoch Davies married an Elizabeth Howard, and Annie's sister Ellen Fellowes married a Frederick Howard who turned out to be Elizabeth's sister - not an unusual occurrence.

The tree I found contained this Howard family (both these branches and many others), and though this person isn't my relative, we have cousins in common, and the tree tallies for both Davies and Fellowes lines. However, they also have a branch from Edward Howard (1853) who they believe is a brother of Liz and Fred.

I'm pretty certain that of the two Edward Howards born in Wallasey around then, this brother was still at home in 1881 and unmarried - and not found thereafter. It was the other Ed, probably a cousin, who married my Davies relative Ellen Webster and had a family by 1881 - and up to 1911. More detail can be supplied if needed.

I was going to write to this person and point out their mistake, but as I studied the tree I became more uneasy. It seemed to resemble mine too exactly. When I found that an Enoch Davies descendant who died in Argentina was also in the tree, I knew it had been copied from mine. This info came from a relative in Canada who doesn't have an Ancestry tree any more, and it's not the sort of detail you can research.

So do I contact the tree owner? They don't knowingly have any non-relatives in it as far as I can see (except possibly those from this Edward Howard mistake) so if this is a "name collector" then so am I! What do Rootschatters think?

[suey]

Interesting question chris_49 - I think to some degree we are probably all guilty to some degree. 

I think that the motive behind "collecting names" is what is important.

I am guilty as charged  for example I have a John Fry born 1821 in my tree, no blood relationship whatsoever. However, one of his children married into the Stevens family, the father of that child was a James Stevens who married one of my 3 x great grandfathers sisters.   Sounds bonkers? well, when I began looking into my family history some years ago I had no responses to any of the names in my direct line so went off sideways and suddenly began to make contact with descendants of some of those "twiglets" as I call them.  I was a total novice with very few resources at that time but found that people were very happy to help with advice, look-ups etc.

Why is he still in my tree?  easy, I just haven't bothered to delete him or his family 

Suey

[Guy Etchells]

A "name collector" is a term of abuse coined by archivists to describe genealogists in the 1950s who cluttered up their archives "destroying" their precious artifacts by having the audacity of being interested in them.
Cheers
Guy

[Marmalady]

For me, a "name-collector" refers to someone who is just interested in numbers of connections on their tree, with little regard to accuracy. They just find someone with the right name and assume its their ancestor so add them to their tree. Usually places don't fit and very often timescales don't fit either! You see some trees with a wife born 100 yrs after her supposed husband. Or siblings that are born, married & died on different continents etc etc

If you have researched all the people on your tree, and are as sure as you can be that the facts are accurate, then I would not consider you a name-collector, no matter how remotely connected those people are.

[RJ_Paton]

If you have researched all the people on your tree, and are as sure as you can be that the facts are accurate, then I would not consider you a name-collector, no matter how remotely connected those people are.

I would agree.

[lizdb]

If you have researched all the people on your tree, and are as sure as you can be that the facts are accurate, then I would not consider you a name-collector, no matter how remotely connected those people are.

I would agree.

I would agree too.  A "name collector" to me is someone who is more interested in quantity of names than quality of research.
If you ensure your research is thorough and of top quality, then you can have any quantity of names without being a "name collector"

It is one of those things that if you are worrying you might be one, then more than likely you aren't ! !

[IgorStrav]

I think a name collector is someone who copies trees wholesale.

For example, someone who is remotely connected to me copied my tree - but not just the bits which concerned our mutual family, but my research into my partner's family too.

He could, of course, have just taken the name of my partner - that would have made sense and completed my part of his tree. 

But he did not need, nor should he have taken, in my view, all the details of my partner's family, siblings, ancestors etc etc back several generations.  What relevance did it have to him?

I had to write to Ancestry to get him to remove all the living people from his public tree which he had gathered from my private one when I was silly enough to give him access.

[Sharon01]

I had to write to Ancestry to get him to remove all the living people from his public tree which he had gathered from my private one when I was silly enough to give him access.

Hi,

That's why I do not let anyone access my tree, help when needed, yes, share info, yes but that is as far as it goes.

I agree with all the comments on here, there are many things in other trees concerning my brickwalls but until I can prove the facts they will be staying out of mine. By the sound of things you are not the name collector but others have taken advantage of your research and have became so.

Sharon

[chris_49]

Thanks for all your comments. The first person I mentioned fits the description perfectly. The 2nd is more marginal - 3 seemingly unrelated branches of my tree seem to have been copied -  two cases happen to be correct, one  isn't. I'll sleep on whether or not to contact them - not that anyone on Ancestry ever replies to this sort of message from me. Thanks again,

Chris