Obituaries are a good source of information for genealogists for a couple of reasons. One reason is that an obituary provides a snapshot of what your deceased ancestor was like, thus adding depth to your knowledge about your family’s history. Also, an obituary for one of your ancestors can provide information about other ancestors. Copies of obituaries (or the real thing, cut from the newspaper if you have it) also make good additions to family scrapbooks.
A few days ago, I remembered that if my favorite uncle were still alive, he would have celebrated a birthday this month. Unfortunately, he passed away three years ago. As a tribute to his memory, I decided to look up his obituary because I could not remember what I had read in it when I first read it around the time that he died. Fortunately, I know a great deal more about my uncle than was published in his obituary. However, there was information in there that I did not know prior to reading it, such as my grandfather’s first name, and my uncle’s dates of service in the United States Coast Guard. Also, although I knew that my uncle was a very good golfer, I did not realize that he had actually gotten a hole in one at the country club where he often played.
There are many databases of obituaries online, as well as many digitized, searchable newspapers from recent years. Since I knew that there were many potential places that my uncle’s obituary could be located, I decided to start with the simplest of all inquiries – a Google search. I got lucky, and quickly located the obituary in the online version of the local newspaper in the city where he lived. I hope that when I go looking for the obituaries for some of my other ancestors, I have the same luck.