Talk:Fitzgerald Collection

Spelling and year of donation

The name of the family is spelt in the sources as:

• Fitzgerald - Times, 1951
• FitzGerald - Some British Library documents, such as the annual accounts
• Fitz Gerald - In the public exhibition catalogue (as I recall)

In this article and in the article title I have opted for The Times spelling as this was contemporary with the timing of the donation. There would need to be something pretty convincing to move to a later spelling, such as verification with the BL records at the time of donation.

The timing is also problematic, as currently footnoted in the article. The Times reports the donation in 1951, while the BL website reports 1947 and Harris' book says 1942. It may well be that 1942 related to a bequest date (speculative) and that the donation was discussed over the years and perhaps materially held but not announced as a donation until 1951. By default I have conservatively taken The Times report date as the first public document publishing the donation as received. I am open to further discussion about the sources or suggestion as to more definitive sources to include if they can be verified. Fæ (talk) 12:49, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

I have updated the related footnote based on Schoolley-West's book "Stamps" which I managed to verify in the British Library. The 1942-47 hiatus was due to everything being in secure war storage. Fæ (talk) 17:49, 25 January 2011 (UTC)