Obituary Collection - Family History & Genealogy Message Board

OBITUARY INDEXING DOES NOT WORK PROPERLY

GBaragona — 2009-09-07 22:02:16Z

In the obituaries on Ancestry, I suggest you look at the actual obit, and not depend on the indexed version. My mother's obituary is in the United States Obituary Collection, Everything in the actual obituary is correct, but the indexed version is so messed up. She was born September 4, 1909; yet the index shows her birth date in April, 1909. Also, her husband's (my father) name is not mentioned in the obit, but the indexing picked up the word "husband" from the survivors which included me and my husband. So, they have my mother's husband's name as George, which is not correct. I supposed in the scanning, that is the first time the scanner found the word "husband." ANCESTRY NEEDS TO FIX THIS!

Re: West grave

clhammond_1 — 2009-08-11 06:51:43Z

Thank you for the research sites I will look into them. The one that I posted on find a grave is his grandson. I appreciate the tips. You never know what may pan out on different venues.
I will post of any new findings.
Thank you again,
Darlene

Re: West grave

chatterchit — 2009-08-11 03:56:57Z

I thought I'd post some resources, just in case you hadn't tried these:

The Monroe County Clerk has probate records back to 1825. You could look for his records in order to narrow a date down.

The Tennessee State Archives also has many records that might help you. See: http://www.tennessee.gov/tsla/Collections.htm

They have an excellent summary of what's available for Monroe County:
http://state.tn.us/tsla/history/county/factmonroe.htm

The Vonore Historical Society has many books for sale AND will search cemetery records as well. See:
http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~vhgs/vonhst5.htm

Note: I noticed you have posted a record at findagrave -- Is that his son?

West grave

mac6409Darlene — 2009-08-08 01:41:32Z

I am looking for the grave of my 3rd great grandfather.Joseph V.West. He died in around Monroe County a town called Tarriffivlle. Last known date of him is in the 1890's.He married an Elizabeth Taylor in the 1890's also. He was in the 59th Tenn. Mounted Infantry of the civil war. Anyone that has any info on his last years or his grave please email me privately at mac6409@comcast.net Darlene McLemore Hammnd

Re: Banks aren't human and can't die

AGHatchett3rd — 2009-06-04 01:04:11Z

Banks may not be human but they can indeed die.

Just look at all the banks that died in the Great Depression- and those recently dead (IndyMac, Wa-Mu, etc).

Banks aren't human and can't die

PriscillaR — 2009-05-01 17:34:51Z

search result:
Name of Deceased: State National Bank
Death Date: 6 Apr 1945
Obituary Date: 17 Jun 2007
Newspaper Title: News-Sun, The
Newspaper Location: Waukegan, IL, Us
Locations Mentioned in Obituary: Crivitz, WI
Evanston
Milwaukee
Kenilworth
Chicago
Vero Beach
Commerce,
Glencoe,
Pittsburgh
Culver, IN
Other Persons Mentioned in Obituary: Autos
We
Constance Patterson
Media Kit
Frances Taylor Lillian
John Taylor William
Bruce Goodman
======================
I think there's something wrong with this???

Re: copyright laws

ecss12830 — 2008-12-27 04:32:20Z

Could you elaborate on the comment regarding Homeland Security and what exactly they are doing?

Thx

Re: Preferred Format for Obit Uploads to an Ancestry Family Tree??

inwolfepak4 — 2008-08-03 05:59:26Z

I have the same question. Additionally, if I find an obit on the web, what is the best soln. I have been coping and pasting the text as a COMMENT, but then I lose all the formating. Should I instead copy and paste into a Word or rtf doc and attach as a story document? Thanks.

Preferred Format for Obit Uploads to an Ancestry Family Tree??

mfsinback1 — 2008-07-19 23:56:46Z

Would be interested in Pros and Cons for formating uploads of scanned newspaper obits to my family tree on Ancestry.

I have two choices:
1. Scan as a JPG and upload as a photo.
2. Scan as a PDF and upload as a story document.

Hopefully, both would be searchable. I feel the PDF would be more useful/flexible to the recepient but I have noticed that the new Ancestry Home Page has broken links when displaying recently added content that are PDF files.

Re: Unknown child

sbgjs — 2008-05-09 20:55:31Z

Where are you seeing the info? In someone's Public Member Tree or in the OWT? In which state did this occur? Sometimes when infants die the same day they are born, especially back in the 1920s and 30s, there were only birth certificates and no death certificates, and sometimes they have a special category of death certificate for fetal deaths. Depending on which state you're researching, there may have been neither a birth or death cert. during that time period. Check nearby cemeteries to see if they have an infant buried with that name.

And if you saw this on the OWT, yes, its very likely a mixup.

Unknown child

AutumnTObuchowskiSmith — 2008-05-09 19:54:23Z

This site says that my great grandma had three children. Betty my grandmother and Kathy who died a year after she was born. but they also say she had a son named Lennie Charles Blackmer on 28 th Feb 1937 and died that same day. It makes sence because my greatgrand mothers fathers name was Lennie.

My family has no idea who this boy could be. There has never been any thing said about him and I can not find a death certificate. Is it possibel there is a mixup?

Re: Problems with past Houston Chronicle Obits

pascalroger — 2008-02-24 13:40:45Z

Hi from France
Origin of Carmouche is Lorraine France
Please help me for Carmouche of Us
Data base for Carmouche is at:
http://gw.geneanet.org/rogerpascal
thanks
Pascal ROGER
Normandy France
carmouche@roger-net.eu

What names to include

GordonGrening — 2007-11-05 13:12:56Z

When one posts an obit, should one include the name of the minister/priest/rabbi, etc. who conducted the service in the list of surnames? What about the name of the funeral home?

Personally, I think one should include the minister to help people searching for a particular family name. This would help them find where a relative was assigned at a particular time.

Re: Obituary Hunter

Lyndy113 — 2007-04-24 00:35:19Z

Since I posted my original message I called them again. I was told, "Sorry, but that is no longer a feature". I have been vocal in the past about how the search engine "picked" names. Some years ago I found a few obits and was able to make connections, but that is long gone. The newspapers for that area are no longer associated with Ancestry.com for whatever reason. No use asking and getting a "canned" answer. Their search engine capacity is not compatible to finding what "exact" information you are looking for. When I check "exact" that's what I expect it to be...and it's not.

I just went to the Obituary Collection...Typing in death for the first name and notice for the last name - nothing else - brought up 5,154 hits. Typing in guest for the first name and book for the last name - nothing else - brougt up 20,913 hits. Too bad they couldn't be that "exact" on names that people are searching for.

Re: Obituary Hunter

RedRoseWhiteRose — 2007-04-23 20:44:54Z

Nearly a month after you posted . . . sorry!

I hadn't received any Obit Hunter messages for quite a while, either. Today I received one and started checking some of the entries. What a mess!

One entry was for "Catherine D. Formerly." Her name was actually McMichael. Looks like they used a bot to pull the information, so "Formerly Her-Last-Name" (can't remember what it was) was pulled instead of her surname.

Found a lot of entries that didn't relate at all to my search criteia. Upon closer examination, the actual obits contained my first name, but couldn't find anything else that related to me or my search which was for a particular location.

Some other gems:
Under Other Names Mentioned: Copyright and Full Story
The deceased White Oak Striffler was listed six times. There is no such person (well, there may be, but not in this particular case). It was actually the Striffler Funeral Home in White Oak.

Clicked on View Obit for one entry and was taken to Wikipedia!

I left comments and reported problems for some of these, but there were just too many of them for me to report them all.

Re: copyright laws

meadows23834 — 2007-04-18 23:24:05Z

Obituaries are not free in Virginia. An obituary printed for my Mothers` death 2004 cost me $90.00 and I gave all the information. So the newspaper does not own what they have not paid for. We the people pay for a service that provides us space in their newspaper. The newspaper does not own our personal information.

Re: Finding someone from 1/10/2003 (date of death)

spra100076 — 2007-04-03 02:51:59Z

You can go to the ssdi(social security death index) and do an advances search. Do you know where this person was born? If you have a first name and a date of death you will get pages but you can search by that. There is also a site called obituary times daily that can search by a maiden name also. E-mail me what you have and I may be able to help you.

Sandy Spra100076@aol.com

Obituary Hunter

Lyndy113 — 2007-03-18 16:42:06Z

Is the My Alerts/Obituary Hunter working for anyone? I've not had any results for quite a while. I have family names listed that use 2 pages...I am able to access the names on the first page, but get an error message when I try to go to page two. My email to customer support received a reply that really did not cover my question (what else is new). On February 2nd I called and asked about the My Alerts/obit feature. I was put on hold and told that they reported it. Just wondering if anyone else is having problems.

Re: copyright laws

jeffjahn — 2007-03-14 18:22:05Z

When it comes down to it who owns the right to a obituary. Is it the newspaper that publishes it. Is it the funeral home that submits it, or is it the person who gives then the info such as relative to begin with. In somecases a individual pays for a obit. in the paper is it theirs or the newspapers? To me obituaries should not be the newspapers property. In most cases their dont even right them anymore the funeral home does. They only submit them. Some dont even do it for free anymore. They charge for it hence the funeral home passes on to the subject.

US Obituary Collection gave wrong date

flomuse — 2007-03-12 01:11:18Z

Many times, the full obit page does not load.

So, we are left with the summary given by Ancestry. It should be better than nothing, right ?

WRONG.

I thought these dates were weird - died 1961 ???

Charles H. Dunkelberger
Age at Death: 80
Birth Date: abt 1881
Death Date: 21 Jun 1961
Newspaper Title: Reading Times/Reading Eagle [PA]
Obituary Publication Date: 8 Dec 2003

I was lucky: the Reading Eagle pages load - so I know that the summary above was bogus:

Birth Date: abt 1881 NO: abt 1923
Death Date: 21 Jun 1961 NO: 4 DEC 2003

the obit says: his wife died in 1961.

I can now throw away all the obits I have collected where the full original obit is not given.

Thank you again, Ancestry.

US Obituary Collection gave wrong newspaper

flomuse — 2007-03-12 00:26:34Z

United States Obituary Collection

I was already annoyed that over half of pages gave me "Sorry, this cached page is not available. ", I got ever more annoyed when I noticed a case where it was the wrong newspaper:

my search was "Haas - PA"

understandably, I found newspapers in FL, other in OH [mention of born of PA, or relatives in PA],....

Then I was quite surprised by this one:

Newspaper Title: Daily News-Record
Newspaper Location: Harrisonburg, VA
Obituary Publication Date: 4 Aug 2005

... Born in Lancaster...., died in Pottsville.... he worked in the "Haas Amish Hat Store ..... for 73 years.".

A Amish store worker mentioned in a Harrisonburg, VA newspaper ???

Did he retired there ? did he have relatives in VA ? did he go in vacation once in VA, maybe ?

None of the above. NOWHERE in that obit can I see mention of other places but PA (and one FL).

So, I checked directly the Daily News-Record (Harrisonburg, VA) , where they state:
"dates in archive: 6/10/1993-Current"

search down to one single word "Haas". [ I found a Ethel Haas in 2003. ] . That's it.

No "Obituary Publication Date: 4 Aug 2005". ZERO.

I could be wrong - my only explanation: ANCESTRY sold me the wrong paper.

This was my FIRST visit to the "United States Obituary Collection".
From that I deduct that this is not the only such error in there.

Re: copyright laws / homeland security

aurina — 2006-12-14 17:30:21Z

please post further info re: taking anyway gen. research rights -we must spread the word, and i am sure most have heard nothing on this. sounds like something npr or 60 minutes should do stories on

Re: copyright laws

cantorjoeocho — 2006-12-14 01:52:08Z

In case you haven't heard, Homeland Security is using Identity Theft as an excuse to ERADICATE GENEALOGY anD FAMILY HISTORY RESEARCH!

I have written my elected officials in Washington, DC and asked them to allow genealogists, family history researchers and persons with a legitimate need to know to have access to the materials that only pertain to our families!

At the rate they are going, I WILL BE UNABLE TO GET INFORMATION ON MY OWN GRANDMOTHER!

Re: copyright laws

nanablue2007 — 2006-12-07 10:12:01Z

Thanks so much for your reply..since the posting of the my original query..I came to the same conclusion....I also want to say that this is one of the most well written post I have seen...again thank you for responding...

Regards,

Connie

Re: copyright laws

cantorjoeocho — 2006-12-06 21:42:02Z

I took a class in this in college and if the information that is alleged to be copyrighted is being used for educational and non-profit purposes, it is OK to use it. I also attribute where I got in most of time. Also, as long as you do not claim authorship of the material.

Genealogy is a branch of history which is educational and about as non-profit as it gets!

Obituaries are in a rather unique category.

A newspaper cannot copyright something that the funeral home gives free of charge to them.And if a funeral home pays to have the obituary in the newspaper, it is my understanding that the newspaper can only copyright the form of the ad and NOT the contents!

Deaths are a matter of public record.I dont' think that public record can be copyrighted.

Also, in Texas, deceased persons have no right to privacy because their death is a matter of public record. At least that is how that was explained to me.

If I was to take a news story generated by Houston Chronicle reporters and try to sell it to another newspaper and claim that I wrote it, then I would be in a world of trouble!

But to post obituaries, I think not.

Most of the funeral homes that I know about like the publicity and several e-mail me obituaries that also appear in newspapers that claim to be copyrighted so I take the obituaries and post them. If the funeral home does NOT want me to include something in my post, then they include a "for further information, please contact --then list their name and phone number. " And I respect their wishes and include that message in my post.I am posting the obituaries but I do NOT have the right to know anything else because I am not a relative. This way , the privacy is guarded, there is dignity and respect and there is control over what gets onto the website.And the information still gets onto the website for relatives to find.

It works out fine.

Most newspaper obituaries are considered "stepchildren" anyway. The most inexperienced, newest reporter or copy editor is the one who takes and ormats the obituaries.

I am NOT making a profit from the obituaries that I post. I am educating interested persons in this surname.

Re: strange matches

makz3d — 2006-11-13 06:41:17Z

Yes,

I've noticed problems. I took a copy of a previous obit and using names in it did a search with just a surname and Texas. There were about 5 results and none of them had Texas or the surname on the page. I did an Edit, Search this Page and neither word was found on the whole page of the newspaper the obit is in. I put in Kortis and Texas in Search from Home Page. It says there are 3 results and when you click on it there are 2 results. Click on either one and search (Edit, Find on this page) for Kortis and/or Texas and neither one is there. I did a search for my Dlabay in Texas and all of the correct obits showed up.

I have not found a pattern of when they show up and when they don't so I haven't contacted Support.

Kathy

strange matches

jmasoner4859 — 2006-11-12 12:49:56Z

Is anyone else having trouble with the obituary database?

I am getting some strange matches when I do a search. I do a surname search, exact match. On some of the matches the surname is not even listed at all in the obituary nor is it found anywhere on the page that comes up.

Tried searching using the surname as family member mentioned--again matches that do not even come close to having the surname listed.

Also the number of hits changes when I change pages. For example when I search from Ancestry's main page then click on obituary database it shows something like 126 hits. First page shows 121 hits, then go to another page and the number changes again.

Apparently there are some sort of gremlins in the search engine.

Obituary's

RaeBreckenridge — 2006-10-28 12:31:02Z

I'm trying to look through some obits and I am recieving this message.
Sorry, this cached page is not available.
I have tried several different ones. Anyone else having this problem? Maybe they are just working on it.
Rae

Re: Obituary's

RaeBreckenridge — 2006-10-28 12:31:02Z

Nancy,
I can't even pull up one from last week.
Rae
PS: I see they have moved our messages. Maybe some one does work on the week-end.

Re: Obituary is Fixed

RaeBreckenridge — 2006-10-28 12:31:02Z

Kathy,
Thanks for letting us know.
Rae

Re: Obituary's

dh_2000 — 2006-10-03 15:45:42Z

I had the same problem.

Obituary Collection

dh_2000 — 2006-10-03 15:45:42Z

The Virgil S. Schultz obituary is listed 271 times! Seems to me that one listing should be sufficient unless there are multiple sources.

Re: HELP: with Obituaries

kh440 — 2006-08-07 14:25:49Z

copyright laws

nanablue2004 — 2006-08-05 18:59:50Z

I was going to post a obit today for someone's query and when I went to the Houston Chronicle Obit Archives I noticed that they had a very strict copyright against posting in anyway on the internet ...etc..

What do you think about this and is this the standard at all newspapers...Want to help but don't want trouble...

Re: Obituary's

nanablue2004 — 2006-08-05 18:59:50Z

THIS IS HAPPENING TO ME TOO...EVERY SINGLE ONE I SEARCH COMES BACK CACHE PAGE NOT AVAILABLE...

Not receiving notifications

xandervan — 2006-02-18 03:04:17Z

I have not received any obituary hunter notifications since September 18, 2004. Is there a problem?

duplicate Obituary Hunter results

xandervan — 2006-02-18 03:04:17Z

Today I received the following 6 "hits":

Neil L. Imel 84 Hutchinson, KS, US
http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redirect.asp?targetid=3755&so...

Neil L. Imel Dodge City, KS, US
http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redirect.asp?targetid=3755&so...

Neil L. Imel 84 1921* 2/24/2005 Fort Dodge Hutchinson, KS, US
http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redirect.asp?targetid=3755&so...

Neil L. Imel 84 1/21/1921 2/24/2005 George Hutchinson, KS, US
http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redirect.asp?targetid=3755&so...

Neil L. Imel Dodge City, KS, US
http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redirect.asp?targetid=3755&so...

Neil L. Imel 84 1/21/1921 2/24/2005 George Dodge City, KS, US
http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redirect.asp?targetid=3755&so...

Links no's 3 & 4 take you to the same identical newspaper page; no's 5 & 7 do the same. Why the duplicate hits?

Incorrect newspaper links from Obituary Hunter

xandervan — 2006-02-18 03:04:17Z

Today I received the following 3 "hits:

Cynthia Kay Imel 61 Judy Correll Richmond, IN, US
http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redirect.asp?targetid=3755&so...

Cynthia Kay Imel 61 Judy Correll Indianapolis, IN, US
http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redirect.asp?targetid=3755&so...

Cynthia Kay Imel 61 Judy Correll Lafayette, IN, US
http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redirect.asp?targetid=3755&so...

Link #1 should be to the Richmond Palladium-Item newspaper.

Link #3 should be to the Lafayette Journal-Courier newspaper.

ALL THREE links go to the Indianapolis Star.

Re: Is anyone getting answers?

xandervan — 2006-02-18 03:04:17Z

Not a word here ..... but then, since this an Ancestry "freebie", I can't imagine them putting any effort into fixing problems. They don't even do that for their paid stuff.

Re: Obituary Collection

patcreel — 2006-02-11 17:29:13Z

Re wayne county
thank you.
pat

Re: Obituary Collection

patcreel — 2006-02-11 17:29:13Z

Hello, could you add http://www.decaturdaily.com/
Decatur Daily Newspaper, Decatur, LA to the Obituary Collection webpage?

thank you, pat creel

Obituary is Fixed

makz3d — 2005-10-18 12:39:10Z

Rae and all,

Just checked the Obituary Collection and the database seems to be fixed. Didn't receive any Cache messages.

Kathy

Re: Obituary's

Lyndy113 — 2005-10-17 23:37:36Z

Rae -

That was on mine too...just didn't "cut and paste" that part. I think that statement is a "one size fits all" type message that is with every response Ancestry sends out.

Hadn't planned to respond again, but it might not be a bad idea. I suppose a miracle could happen and it would be fixed in the 72 hours, but based on past performance in other areas that's not always been the case.

Nancy

Re: Obituary's

2005-10-17 21:56:07Z

I also sent an e-mail. I got word for word what you received. But also this came through.

"We will assume your issue has been resolved if we do not hear from you within 72 hours."

Are we suppose to e-mail every 72 hours, or is once enough?
Rae

Re: Obit Collection acting Weird!!

Lyndy113 — 2005-10-17 18:13:45Z

Check this board:

http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/board/an/topics.ancestry.a...

Obit Collection acting Weird!!

meinstammbaum — 2005-10-17 15:15:57Z

I hadn't checked the Oituary Collection at Ancestry for my most common surmanes for awhile...so, I thought I would do that this morning and every one that I tried to look at it tells me ...."Sorry, this cached page is not available. "
I could understand it if it were one or two of them....BUT it was the whole page....

I MEAN EVERY ONE OF THEM....Some that I KNOW I looked at about a month ago....and printed out at that time!!

Is there a New Reader I need to download, OR is there a temporary glitch in the system or what!!!!

Re: Obituary's

makz3d — 2005-10-17 00:08:03Z

Nancy,

Thanks for the info on ObitsArchive.com. I've used it many times before and had my computer reformatted recently and hadn't bother to look for it again.

Hopefully this will get fixed shortly.

Kathy

Re: Obituary's

Lyndy113 — 2005-10-17 00:02:07Z

Hi Kathy -

Some things seem to never change...if it's not hunting through a Guest Book to find someone it's not finding the obit at all.

Just thought I'd let you know that I contacted Ancestry about the problem when I couldn't access the obits the other day. At the same time I suggested that if they couldn't provide the obits they might think about using ObitsArchive.com (as an alternative for what they are not providing) us. Sure would give a wider range than we are now getting.

I received the following response:

"Dear Nancy,

We appreciate your message.

We are currently addressing the issues you are experiencing. The inconvenience is a temporary situation and hopefully will be corrected shortly. Feedback from you, our valued customer, helps us correct errors and improve the website. Your patience and efforts to assist us in this matter are appreciated.

If there is anything else with which we might assist you, please let us know.

Ryan
Member Solutions"

We'll see just how much of a valued customer we are.

Nancy

Re: Obituary's

makz3d — 2005-10-16 20:03:37Z

Rae and everyone else,

I've been trying various newspapers in various states, current and old obits and I get the same message every time.

Some of the obituaries are available at the newpapers websites but I don't feel we should have to pay for them when they are supposed to be available at Ancestry and there appears to be something wrong with their database.

I've considered contacting Tech Support and I may still email them.

Kathy

Re: Obituary's

Lyndy113 — 2005-10-16 14:30:17Z

Sad to say...I don't think it's something that can be "fixed" at Ancestry. I believe what it means is that the newspaper no longer has it cached...not Ancestry. Take a look at the Ancestry board http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/board/an/topics.ancestry.a... ... where this posting and the threads may be moved eventually ... for other problems.

When I contacted Ancestry in January 2004 about an obit link that was shown could be accessed (and I could not access without paying for it) I received this reply (in part):

"It looks like this page was crawled without our automated process digging down to that specific obituary. Sometimes our system grabs the obituary further up stream than down stream. Regardless, I'm sorry we do not have that specific obituary for you to view.

I noticed since my reply to your posting that someone is arguing we should pull down this collection until it is 100% perfect. Our system is an automated finding and extraction system that's trying to be accurate on thousands of sites which vary widely in the way they display obituary data -- and it will be wrong a certain percentage of the time; but there's enough good that it's better to have this online than to keep all of the data offline just because there is an unavoidable error rate. Does that make sense?

We actually noticed this particular paper earlier in January and have now fixed the problem. Unfortunately, we cant go back and get old obituaries since most websites (as you can already see) delete or charge people to view them."