![]() Family History Detective: 3 Pro Tactics for Finding and Using Obituaries.Valuable Genealogy Resource: Recent Obituaries Collection.To learn more about using obituaries to connect with your ancestors, read these FamilySearch blog articles: Next time you’re looking for more information about an ancestor or clues to help you break down brick walls, why not look for an obituary? It may have just the information you need. Where else can you find so much information about one family all in one place? The result looks good, so I open the obituary and find that not only is it for the right woman, but it provides a detailed list of her children and siblings, including married surnames for the women. Using this information, I decided to search Genealogy Bank: She died 14 April 1983 in Georgia, United States.Later she married a man surnamed Stephens.Vera was born about 1900 in Georgia, United States.Suppose I’m looking for an obituary for the Vera Webb mentioned above. The Periodical Source Index (PERSI), available on, can help you find these types of publications.Įxample: Finding Vera May Webb’s Obituary In her 2019 present a tion at the BYU Conference on Family History and Genealogy, Cara Jones suggested trying publications such as alumni magazines, church newsletters, professional employment publications, historical society publications, and more. You may be able to access a microfilm or even a physical copy of the newspaper you need. This directory lists libraries and other repositories for newspapers that have not yet been digitized. The Chronicling America website provides a directory of newspapers in the United States from 1690 until the present.Don’t be discouraged if you don’t find an obituary right away. We get so used to finding information online that it’s easy to forget how much information isn’t yet available there. Memorial sites such as host obituaries from newspapers in addition, users can publish obituaries directly to the site.Your public library website may have a family history or genealogy section that includes access to digital newspapers.For example, to find obituaries for Hungarian ancestors, search for “Hungary Obituaries.” The FamilySearch Research Wiki can help you locate obituary collections.The Chronicling America website, maintained by the United States Library of Congress, provides access to digitized newspapers from 1789 to 1963.You can locate sites such as these by searching online. These sites can be a goldmine for finding ancestors who lived in the newspaper’s publication area. And don’t forget smaller newspaper sites, such as Halton News or New York State Historic Newspapers. If you’re researching in Australia, try Trove. Look at newspaper sites such as Genealogy Bank and Newspaper Archive.Individual grave records may include obituaries added by users. Visit cemetery sites such as Find a Grave and Billion Graves.Check FamilySearch partner sites such as and findmypas t.That way, you get all titles with “Obituary” and “Obituaries.” Filter the list by typing “obit” in the Filter by Collection Title box. Try the FamilySearch Historical Records Collections.Online searching is simple and quick, so it’s a great place to start. Particularly when you are researching a common name, information about known family members can help you determine if you have the right obituary. We would expect to find her obituary under the name of Vera Stephens. Then she married a second time to a man surnamed Stephens. For example, a woman named Vera Webb married a man surnamed Brantley. If you’re looking for a female ancestor in a country where women usually changed their surnames at marriage, try to determine the woman’s surname at the time of death. For women, the surname at the time of death.What was the person’s last known residence according to church, government, or other records? Where do you find the person’s family after he or she died? Sites such as Online Searchable Death Indexes and Records can help you locate death information for an ancestor. Again, you might have this exact information, but even if you don’t, you can usually make a good estimate. For example, if your ancestor appears with her husband in the 1851 England census, but her husband appears as a widower in the 1861 census, your ancestor most likely died between 18. But even if you don’t, you can usually estimate a death date range from other records. Sometimes you may have an exact death date from a death certificate or family record.
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