Reports

Below, the various parts of a report are described, but nothing beats a picture. A sample report is provided so that you may see a finished product. The elements that reports contain may be the same, but no two reports ever look alike. Research problems vary widely. When you look at the sample, remember that the basic elements described will be the same for a report created for you, however, the way a report looks in the end is defined by the individual problem to be solved.

REPORTS ...

DEFINE AN OBJECTIVE. What is your question? This may seem clear, but let's take a couple of examples. Say you would like to discover who your maternal great-grandparents were. Each generation grows exponentially, so this actually involves tracing four lines. This creates the need for four reports—each with a different objective—to trace a particular great-grandparent.

How many times have you moved in your life? How many homes have you lived in? Now, apply that to your ancestor, but put him on foot or horseback or in a contasoga wagon. He may have fallen in love with the land while away from home in the military or taken the word of a neighbor that the grass was greener and not seen it until he arrived to 'tomahawk' a claim. What began as 'trace my ancestor' becomes more complicated as discoveries are made about you ancestor's life. Having a clear objective for each report is important.

SUMMARIZE BACKGROUND INFORMATION. If this is a first report, then the background will likely summarize the information you, the client, have provided. This is what the research process is built upon. It is a clearly definded starting-point. If this is one in a series of reports, then it will most likely be the key findings of the previous report that would provide the starting point.

STATE KEY FINDINGS. These summarize the most important research discoveries and provide the conclusions reached in a short-form. The key findings are up-front, so that the answer to the question can be found promptly.

PROVIDE RESEARCH NOTES. These are the 'guts' of a report. They include the resources consulted in a bibliography (source list) and proceed with a discussion of what was found and how conclusions were drawn. Research notes are always cited. Humanities-style citations are based on Evidence Explained by Elizabeth Shown Mills and the Chicago Manual of Style, 15th Edition. The importance of citing the sources and describing any particulars that affect their use cannot be understated. Sources allow research to be verified and is valuable to later researchers. As Kenji Eguchi states, 'Research is long—life is short.' New sources o material come to light everyday, especially in the age of the Internet. We leave a trail of sources and an explanation of conclusions so that future researchers do not have to duplicate our research.

INCLUDE EXHIBITS. Every report contains the documents that are used to draw each conclusion. Census records, court records, tombstone photographs, derivative evidence from books—any evidence is included in an exhibit along with a citation.