Talk:Alabama Vital Records

Information for discussion pages
Help:Talk pages or discussion pages are for comments concerning the workings of the article. Information about the page's subject should be on the page it's self or on a new linked page. For more information see: Help:Talk pages This is great information, it belongs on a main page. FamilyJournals 21:41, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Last week I was able to find direct links for the film number of Alabama vital records and some indexes at the Family History Library on this page, where have they gone? - Joan

They are on their own pages under Marriage and Death - click on statewide indexes - they are all there. CK Whipple

The Alabama Department of Health has a unique way of handling vital record certificates. You can go to any health office and get a copy or you can go on line at http://www.adph.org/vitalrecords/ and get the information.

Proposed article move
If you review Category:United States Vital Records you will see that all the other pages that have been created use the style "state Vital Records".

There has been a discussion about this issue at Talk:United States Vital Records.

I propose that this page therefore be moved to Alabama Vital Records --Steve 16:09, 7 August 2009 (UTC)


 * The Vital Records Team is in the process of changing the names from State Vital Records to State Birth, Marriage and Death Records. There was an initial vote on naming the pages, but there really wasn't a choice as 3 of the 4 choices included the words "Civil Registration" which does not apply to the United States.  Another vote was taken (and not recorded initially on the discussion page) where the members of the Vital Records Team chose "Birth, Marriage and Death" for the title.  There are a number of reasons, including the use of search engines on the wiki and elsewhere. CK Whipple


 * When someone moves all of the articles to the new names, they need to remember to change all of the corresponding links to that article. That can be found under what links here on the right side of the page. Changing all of those names is no small task as each page is linked to many others. For an experiment I searched for Iowa births and it brought up the Iowa Vital Records page. Then I tried Iowa deaths and again it brought up the Iowa Vital Records page. I know that it was a concern that a researcher wouldn't know to look under vital records, but the other words, i.e. death, birth etc. seem to be working fine. When I changed all of the state pages from civil registrations, I didn't change Alabama as I could see that someone was working on it. I still think that Vital Records fits the best, but it is up to you all. I did this all weeks before I was introduced to this great team. FamilyJournals 23:31, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Thank you! We could use some help with this as if it is not done correctly it brings up a problem with accessing the pages. If you can help with it and/or teach us how to do it properly, it would be very appreciated! CK Whipple


 * I'll have to bow out of that one, I've got plenty to keep me busy right now FamilyJournals 01:03, 10 August 2009 (UTC)


 * I recommend an article Michael Ritchey sent to us this morning regarding coming to a consensus for major changes on these projects. Currently, there are two teams of consultants in the library working on census records for each state and vital records for each state.


 * If you are interested in working with the Vital Records team, we would love to have you and include you in our work. You can read our meeting minutes on the discussion page of US Vital Records.


 * Thanks for responding. Now that has been explained, I withdraw the proposal to move this article.


 * My interest, is to help by making the wiki more accessible to users, helping to categorizes and standardize how information is presented. Important decisions like the one the Vital Records Team have made on article titles should be documented in the wiki so that others can help work towards achieving your goal. I have made a note of this on the FamilySearch Wiki talk:WikiProject U.S. Vital Records page. --Steve 21:53, 7 August 2009 (UTC)Thank you so much for your interest. When I first joined the team I did not realize some protocols and am trying to clean up the aftermath. If you would like to help move all of the vital records pages, we need someone who knows what they are doing.  Michael created a process to clean up these pages and they will be deleted. You can read about our meetings on the US Vital records discussion page. CK Whipple

State flag has no genealogical value
The state flag should not be included because it lends no genealogical value whatsoever. Therefore, it pushes further down on the page those items that are of genealogical value. Ritcheymt 16:01, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Will records?
I find the inclusion of links to will records in the chart on the top of the page confusing and inconsistent. If will records are to be linked from this page, why not cemetery, Social Security Death Index, funeral home records, family Bibles, and obituaries? When the page includes links to one type of substitute for civil death records, the reader is left either 1) assuming there are no other substitutes, 2) assuming the wiki doesn't cover the other substitutes, or 3) wondering where to find information on the other substitutes in the wiki. The fact that this page links to one kind of substitute but not all kinds makes it inconsistent and confusing. I propose another page be created which includes a bullet list of substitutes for civil death records, each item on the bullet list being a link that leads to the appropriate article. I'd then put a See Also section on the bottom of the Alabama Births, Marriages, and Deaths page which links to this substitutes page or put a see also link at the top of the article, which is sometimes done in Wikipedia. Ritcheymt 16:01, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Good online records section
I like the section on Alabama b, m, ds online. Ritcheymt 16:01, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Good info on Ala birth records chart
I like the chart. Nice! Ritcheymt 16:01, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Adoption section helpful!
I like what was done with the adoption records section. Quite helpful info. Ritcheymt 16:01, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Marriage records online?
Having read the Marriage Records section, I am under the impression that no Alabama marriage records are available online, but I am left unsure. If there are databases online, I would find it more helpful if this article linked to them individually, even if the maintenance of such a links list were to render this page slightly outdated much of the time. As a user, I can always check the sites listed in the Alabama Birth, Marriage, and Death Records Online section to see if any have a new database I couldn't otherwise find in this page's listings. But I don't want to have to search all the sites in the Alabama Birth, Marriage, and Death Records Online section every time I want to find any record, even the ones that have been around for a long time. Ritcheymt 16:01, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Bullet lists need consistency
The bullet lists on this page vary in the use of white space between bullet items. Could use some cleanup. Ritcheymt 16:01, 26 August 2009 (UTC)