Quote Originally Posted by fortinian View Post
The stuff I found wasn't particularly 'hidden' or 'lost'. So much stuff is online these days that it's quite easy to do specific searches across vast spectrums of documents from all over the country - an idea that probably seemed fantastical twenty years ago.

I've noticed that many Histories of Liverpool seem to be built on... Histories of Liverpool, i.e. taking the words of previous writes as 'fact', without any actual original research.

It is for reasons such as this that I give local 'historians' (or people who claim to be) a bit of a wide berth. Anyone can pick up William Moss, James Stonehouse, Richard Wittington-Egan, Derek Whale, Mike Royden et al and quote it verbitam - doesn't make you a historian.

Most stuff on-line isn't to be relied upon.
Who and where are the sources?
Wikipedia (good name, because it is Wicked) is a compilation of anonymous entries which anybody can alter.
It's frightening how it's becoming the first source for most people.



Which Local Historians do you give a wide berth to?
At least you know who to blame if a particular book has a named author.
None of us are perfect.

I like to find original sources, and will never repeat what somebody else has said without checking it for myself.