Match up facts from an oral or written account to the known historical record
Wikipedia is key for validating historical accounts
Recently I have been learning about the experiences of a family member during the Holocaust by carefully reviewing a video recording of her memories made fifty years after the events described.
Besides the fallibility of memory, there are many reasons that her recollection of names, locations and events might not have been precisely true. My task in evaluating her story was to validate key points against the known history. Could I find the places on the map? Were the people named actual historical figures cited in sources? Did the timeline of her account track to the dates of known events?
It occurred to me that this kind of validation is a general technique that researchers use to evaluate any kind of historical account, whether a written text or an oral history as in this case. So it makes sense to use this instance of applying the method to draw out any general lessons or principles.
And the good news is that for a quick first pass through this kind of material, the researchers best friend is...Wikipedia. Just about every notable person, place or event in history has a listing in the online encyclopedia, with links to all information related to the subject.
In this case the subject is Jewish resistance in the Krakow ghetto, and we learn right away that Shimon (Szymek) Draenger was a known leader of the Akiba movement of zionist Jews that allied with other factions in an active resistance movement in Krakow. He is the brother-in-law of the narrator, Margot Dränger, so her proximity to historical events is established.
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