What colour was soldiers’ hair? Find out as we test our aggregation workflows
As we process our first large batch of data (thank you for the great progress made!) we’re interested in evaluating the accuracy of the work, and testing our workflows for aggregating multiple transcriptions on the same person into one. We began by looking at data for which we have verified entries—the name and the serial number.
Now we’re moving onto looking at how we aggregate text that takes on categorical values. A good rule of thumb in data processing is to start by looking at simple things first. In this case, simple is a question that doesn’t have a lot of possible answers. Hair color is an interesting one, and perhaps the results will be of interest. What color hair did New Zealand soldiers have?!
We were again encouraged by the apparent accuracy of the data. Of 3,216 transcriptions of hair color just 15 were not a hair color. Interestingly they were a religious profession which is beside it on the form. We can probably find the hair color in the entry for religion for these men. Transposition of entries from a known place is a problem, but a workable one. Of course, we should emphasize that an error rate of < 0.5% is really good.
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The example here also shows another funny issue. A couple of people transcribed this as “light possum”, and we can see why! Context suggests that it is “light brown”, and the majority of transcribers recorded it that way. But since we use “flaxen” for blonde, why not use “possum” for grey hair.
To the data! We find that New Zealanders were a dark haired people, with 80% of the soldiers being described as having “brown,” “black,” or “dark” hair. The “fair” including flaxen were a small minority.
| Hair colo(u)r | Frequency | Percent | Cum. Pct. |
| Brown | 414 | 57.50 | 57.50 |
| Black | 97 | 13.47 | 70.97 |
| Fair | 80 | 11.11 | 82.08 |
| Dark | 72 | 10.00 | 92.08 |
| Other | 22 | 3.06 | 95.14 |
| Red or auburn | 21 | 2.92 | 98.06 |
| Grey | 14 | 1.94 | 100.00 |
Working through this data was a useful trial for our aggregation of more complicated fields. We hope you found it interesting, and look forward to sharing more results with you as we continue our research. Thanks for all your hard work, and lets keep transcribing!
Evan Roberts for the Measuring the ANZACs Research Team (@evanrobertsnz).
Measuring the ANZACs 