Alice,

Names are always complicated because there is more then one naming methodology: in China the family precedes the given name, unlike in Anglo-American formats. I did a quick survey of ULAN and LOC, and in most cases the name of the form "Last, First" moved the "von" to the end of the name:

ie: Brink, Herman van den; or Vecht, Nicholas van de.

This is not a hard and fast run as, there is also "Van Vorhees, Tracy" in the ULAN.

Even famous names, such as "Gogh, Vincent van" and "Vinci, Leonardo da" run counter to collective recognition.

So, in short, there is no right or wrong answer. Keep in mind that the First and Last name fields are for searching purposes, and that unless you have some very customized reports, TMS uses two fields for displaying names: Display Name and Sort Name. If these are done properly, you can have "van" in either the First, Middle and/or Last name fields, and TMS will still function properly.

Hope this helps.

~Chad