Hi Stephanie,

At the CCA we have a general "Unknown" constituent and then 123 other more detailed "Unknowns" (eg. "Unknown, Italy, second half of the 15th century". We limit ours to the nationality and date of the unknown person and enter this in the "Last Name" field (since our "unknowns" refer to personal Constituents), which is useful since that field is long enough to accommodate this data. We also enter the dates and geographic details in the appropriate fields in the module to facilitate searches.

If I knew that there was an "Unknown" from "Costal New England, probably Salem, Massachusetts, or Portsmouth, New Hampshire", I would probably use the general "Unknown" in the title and then add a Historical Note in the specific object record saying something along the lines of "Creator was likely from New England, probably Salem...". That way, the Constituents module remains standardized and the pertinent objects still keep the data related to them.

Good luck.

Alexis Lenk
Coordonnatrice, Documentation des Collections
Centre Canadian d’Architecture
Montréal, Québec
(514) 939-7000 ext. 1520

-----Original Message-----
From: The Museum System (TMS) Users [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Milby, Jessica
Sent: April 21, 2009 9:49 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: 'Unknown' Constituent Records

We use one constituent called "artist/maker unknown" for everything by an unknown maker and add our regional information to the object Geography.  We use Geography Types like "probably made in" and "assembled in" etc. to describe our certainty or otherwise for the place made but still allow for consistent searching based on location. This method arose from the need to display the geography in a semi-narrative format that satisfies the curators but still allows for logical searches.
--Jessica

______________________ 
Jessica Milby 
TMS Systems Manager 
Philadelphia Museum of Art 
Phone: 215-684-7283 
Fax: 215-235-0035 
[log in to unmask]

-----Original Message-----
From: The Museum System (TMS) Users [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Diane Lee
Sent: Tuesday, April 21, 2009 9:17 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: 'Unknown' Constituent Records

I don't know if this will help with your situation or not as your system is
probably already well established, but thought I'd share anyway.  
We actually have 'Unknown' as a constituent, and we link that to
artist/maker etc.  For the place name, we don't use the geography assistant,
we use the Thesaurus feature and use Geography xrefs and have Types such as
'Place of origin' where we link the place name.  If there is a possible or
probable with it, we can add it to the remarks field.  
So if we don't know who did it, but know it's probably from Hartford,
Connecticut, we'll do Maker=Unknown constituent, and GeoXrefs=Place of
origin Hartford\Hartford County\Connecticut etc., and in remarks add
'Probably made in Hartford'. 

Hope that helps a little bit. 

Diane 


========================================
Diane Lee, Collections Manager Ÿ 860-236-5621 x242
Connecticut Historical Society


-----Original Message-----
From: The Museum System (TMS) Users [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On
Behalf Of Stephanie Hansen
Sent: Monday, April 20, 2009 6:26 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: 'Unknown' Constituent Records

Dear TMS list-serv,

I'm hoping we can pick up on this old topic again to help me make a decision

on how which field(s) to use for our decorative arts/sculpture "unknown" 
constituents. We wouldn't normally display "unknown" for dec arts-but 
rather "Costal New England, probably Salem, Massachusetts, or Portsmouth, 
New Hampshire" for example. Does anyone else list a place instead of 
an "unknown" constituent like this?

The problem is-that most of them are more than 48 charaters 
(prefix/suffix/culture) and most of them have qualifiers 
like "possibly", "probably", "or", etc.-so they don't work in the geography
fields 
either. I'm also afraid it will get too "out of sight/out of mind" in text
entries or 
a udf.

Do any of you have constituents that refer to a place-or has anyone come up 
with a good solution to listings such as the above?

Many thanks for any advice!!

Stephanie Hansen
Milwaukee Art Museum