MICHIGAN DEATH RECORD IMAGES FOR 1940 NOW ONLINE! Here’s how I found my family’s certificates

The website https://michiganology.org/vital-records/ has many wonderful records & historical information for Michigan researchers. 
Certainly the one I’ve used the most is their death index and images. The images for records from 1897-1920 have been online for a while now.

The images for 1921-1952 are being released as the 75 year restriction rolls around.  As of today, they have uploaded the images up to and including 1940.

So, today, I’m going to use my Legacy search function and see how many, if any, of my ancestors have deaths in Michigan in 1940.

To accomplish this I will go to the “Search” tab and then “Find.”
I want two criteria in my search:

• Place of death = Michigan
• Date of death = 1940

(CLICK ON ANY IMAGE TO ENLARGE IT)
 

And, here is my list



Let’s go over to seekingmichigan.org (UPDATE Oct 2019 - the seekingmichigan website if closed down - the new site is michiganology.org) and see how many of those four certificates I can locate.

NOTE:  As you know, uploading and indexing are not perfect sciences.  So, just because we hear that records are available, doesn’t mean they ALL will be.

How many of these death certificate images did I find?

FOUR OUT OF FOUR!!!

DEATH CERT FOR WILLIAM W. BUSH	DEATH CERT FOR WILLARD B. GOULD
DEATH CERT FOR MINNIE ERB	DEATH CERT FOR KATHERINE MARTZ FORSYTH

Wonderful!  I’ve downloaded each of them, cropped and corrected them and now I can add them to Legacy and source them.  That’s what I call 15 minutes well spent online.

TIP:  I do not like the look of images as they appear in our downloads.  I don’t like the black surrounding them and I don’t like them to be crooked or too grey.  I fix all of this before I ever save the digital image to my computer.  I takes about one minute to perform the task and makes your images look so much better in any report or if you upload them online.  See my “Other Posts” below for a post I wrote about this process.

Time to go work on those records.  Please let me know how many new records you find in this collection.

OTHER POSTS THAT MAY BE OF INTEREST

MICHIGAN DEATH RECORDS ONLINE - Where can you find them?

Legacy 8 - THE SEARCH FUNCTION - What Can You Find?

EASY DOCUMENT EDITING - How to Straighten & Correct Images

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2010-2016   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

DETROIT FREE PRESS NEWSPAPER NOW ONLINE - 1837 to September 2015

This could not be a bigger headline for all of us with ancestors in Michigan.
 
There has been limited access (outside of Michigan) to any online issues of the Detroit Free Press until now.

Available issues from 1837 to September 2015.  I spent last evening entering names & finding articles.  I found 15 news articles in an hour.  Everything from engagements to marriage announcements to obituaries and just every day who is visiting from out of town articles. 

Here is the link Detroit Free Press.  Go to Archives in the left column and you will be taken to the page to search.  Even if you are already a subscriber to newspapers.com (as am I), you will have to pay for an additional subscription to access the Detroit Free Press.  There is a yearly option for $59.95 and a monthly option for $7.95, which is what I opted for at this time.

If you aren't familiar with how Newspapers.com works I highly recommend their tutorial video.  It's only about two minutes long and I just learned a whole lot by watching it. Tips on how to Search on Newspapers.com website
.
Here are a three of the articles I found last evening.

Have fun fellow Michigan descendants.  Off I go to look for more articles.

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2015   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

DETROIT TURNS 314 YEARS OLD TODAY

A quick shout out to my home city.  I still have many family members in and around Detroit.  Grandparents, cousins, uncles & aunts, nieces and nephews are buried in Detroit.  Many spent their whole lives there.

Detroit was first settled in 1701.  To read about it, please click on this link History of Detroit 
 
I ran a search in my Legacy program and there are 196 people in my database that are associated with Detroit by birth, death or event.

Here are those people, both living and dead.  No dates have been included in order to protect those that are still living.

MY DETROIT FAMILY MEMBERS

(Click on any image to enlarge it)

This isn’t a huge percentage of the 4665 people in my database, but many of these people are very closely related to me.

PLEASE contact me if you think you might be related, even remotely, to anyone mentioned in this blog.

OTHER POSTS THAT MAY BE OF INTEREST (All these posts have links to Detroit)

MYSTERY MONDAY-Who's Your Daddy? Brick Wall Post #1 - John C. Gould

AN EXACT DATE OF DEATH IN A DETROIT CITY DIRECTORY

BIRTH RECORDS WITH INCORRECT NAMES - What Would You Think?

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2015   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

CHECK THOSE RECORDS CAREFULLY - Look what I found!

Make sure you check every entry on the pages of records you find.

HERE'S WHY.......
 
I was reviewing the PRATT section of our family today.  I noticed that I didn’t have a death record image for a death that occurred in 1888 in Michigan.  I had the index information, but not the image.

I know the images are available on Family Search in the Michigan Deaths, 1867-1897 database.  I located the record right away.

Here is page 1 showing Mary Sumner nee Pratt who died 21 Apr 1888.  Notice she uses “P” as her middle initial.  It was and still is common for women to use their maiden name or the first initial of that name for a middle initial, once they marry.



From previous experience I know that there is usually a PAGE 2 for these records on Family Search.  So, I went to the second page and there it was.  Showing her cause of death and her parents, Josiah Pratt & Rachel aka Rebecca, whom I already knew of. No surprise there.



BUT WAIT!  What is the record just below hers?  It shows the exact same information for:

• Cause of death – consumption
• Birthplace – Canada
• Occupation – Housewife
• Parent’s names – Josiah & Rachel Pratt
• Residence – Dead
• Date of record – June 7th 1889

NOTE THE CIRCLED ITEMS below Mary's information.



Is this some sort of clerical error? A duplication? Or what?

I went back to the first page to see what name was listed under my Mary Sumner.

The next name on the list is Sarah P. HUNT who died 28 Feb 1888 a married woman, age 57 yrs. 11 mos. 4 days, who died in Armada.

Here is that first page.



What did I do next?

I looked in my database at the children born to Josiah Pratt & Rebecca “Rachel” Jackson.  Did they have a daughter named Sarah who married a man named Hunt?  I have 3 children born to Josiah & Rebecca.  A son, John and two daughters, Mary born 1822 and there she is Sarah born about 1832 in Canada.
Who did Sarah marry?
- - -  She married Ashley HART

Here is what my Legacy database shows for Sarah Pratt. 



In this case I do think a clerical error was made when they recorded her last name on that death record.  Since every other item fits, I am concluding that I have found her death record.  And, no wonder I wasn’t able to find it before.  I would have been looking for HART not HUNT.

Isn’t this awesome?  I was looking for one record and found two.
 
Our lesson for today – PAY ATTENTION TO EVERY OTHER PERSON ON ANY REGISTER WITH MULTIPLE NAMES.
  
I get pretty excited when things like this happen.
 
What surprises have you found in records?  Let me know in a comment or with a link to your own blog post.

OTHER POSTS THAT MAY BE OF INTEREST
SURPRISE! A birth record where is wasn't supposed to be
FAMILY SEARCH - Going back & getting those "other" pages

PLEASE contact me if you think you might be related, even remotely, to anyone mentioned in this blog.

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2015   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION

HOW TO CONDUCT A LOCATION SPECIFIC SEARCH ON FAMILY SEARCH

FamilySearch and the FamilySearch logo are trademarks of Genealogical Society of Utah

Maybe you’ve used this site for years.  Perhaps you are new to genealogy and have only recently begun using this site?  There are usually many methods used by genealogists to get the most from their searches.  We learn these over time, by trial and error or from someone else with more experience.

This is the method I use when I want to search a specific set of records on Family Search.  Whether you want to search in one of the 50 states, Canada, Europe or Asia, the method is the same.

From the home page, click on “Search” and then “Records.”

You will see this screen (Click on any image to enlarge it)



Now go to the map and hover over an area you want to search.  You will see that the areas will change from grey to yellow.  Click on the yellow area you want to search.

I chose the United States and this is how my screen now looks:



Once you click on that yellow area you will see a drop down list with all the locations for that area.  In this case all 50 states.  I chose Michigan and this is what I see.



Next I selected “Start researching in Michigan.”

You will see the screen shown below.  Notice that only a few records are shown on the list at the bottom.  I want to see all the Michigan records, so I select “Show all 58 Collections.”  This will take you to a complete list.



Here is a sample of a portion of that complete list.  As you can see you can use the boxes on the left of the record collection to select only one or several of the collections in which to conduct your search.

 
Here are the things you learn from viewing this complete list:

• Which records are available
• How many records are in the collection
• When the collection was last updated
• Whether the collection has images or not (by the little camera on the right of the last column)

As you scroll down this page the next thing you will see is a list of the Michigan Image Only Historical Records.  This means there is no index for these records and you must browse the entire collection page by page.  Again, you see how many images are in the collection and when it was last updated.



This is an excellent way to check the site from time to time and see what collections have been recently updated.  Maybe it’s time to go back and look through the collection again?

TIP:  Make use of the Wiki on this site.  You find it from the home page, by clicking on “search” and then “wiki” in the dropdown list.  I went to the Wiki and put in the word Michigan.  Then I selected “Military Records.”  What I got was an incredible list of resources, links and information.  Since it is too long for me to include on this page, here is the link so you can see what I’m talking about https://familysearch.org/learn/wiki/en/Michigan_Military_Records

Another great resource for finding specific records is Cyndi’s List.  You can search the site alphabetically and she has, as of this date, 333,397 links.  The site is constantly being updated.
I hope you’ve found this post helpful.

OTHER POSTS THAT MAY BE OF INTEREST
Family Search - Going back & getting those other pages

How to Find Probate Records Online

Happy hunting,

Michigan Girl

Copyright ©  2015   Diane Gould Hall

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.  NO USE WITHOUT PERMISSION