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Do all deceased Americans have obituaries?

In England only notable and famous people will get an obituary in the newspaper. The rest of us may get a brief death notice in the classifieds if our relatives pay for it. I think this is a fairly recent innovation for ordinary people and I don't know what proportion of the population will get even this much. Most of our ancestors deaths will not be recorded in the newspapers, unless the death was newsworthy by reason of accident, murder, etc. On the US board people are often advised to look for obituaries of their ancestors online. This suggests that most if not all deceased persons will have one. Is this so, and when did this practice begin? What are your chances of finding an obituary for your ancestor who was not famous or notable? A link to an obituary as an example will be appreciated, the earlier and more unremarkable the better.

Public Comments

1. Obituaries are a completely valid genealogy resource. I don't have it online, but a sample of one ancestor is a death notice (in a Methodist publication) in the mid 1800s. Suggesting that people LOOK for one, is not to say that you will automatically find one, of course. And, many many obits will be published, but not necessarily online. The access to it, will be through newspaper archives, which can be at the paper itself or a local library. It is gravy if online. It all depends on the person, and a lot is relevant to their residence. Small towns routinely have "good" obits, since they don't have much else in news, and everyone knows each other. Large areas are more like what you are getting "used to". One liners.. if that much.
2. I look up obituaries in my county for people who ask for them on http://genforum.genealogy.com/ca/stanislaus/ There are eight years worth of obituary look-up requests and answers there. In my experience, most, not all people have an obituary; 90% or so, roughly. I've seen them as early as the 1920s. With rare exception, all of the people I've looked up have been ordinary.
3. To answer the question No. In the US, Obits are published in the papers by the family, and are very common, but not every one has one. It can be easy to locate an obit for someone if you know what area of the country (and which paper - there are thousands) to search. It can be very time consuming, but the hints can be very rewarding because often the names of parents, siblings and children are included as well as a general bio of the person. An obit is not considered to be a valid Genealogical source, per the Genealogical Professional Society, because they are often incorrect. An example is that my Stepfathers indicates he served in New Guine during World War II, when according to his stories and his picture album it was New Zealand. His Obit also stated several "facts" that I know personally are not true, like dates (after he married my Mother) the obit was written by his neice, who really had little knowledge of the last 30 years of his life and wrote something she wanted to be published. Obits are not validaded by the paper-they are somewhat like the classifieds in that they are not considered to be news and there for the paper is not responsible for the content. Obits like Bios, should be taken with a grain of salt and used as additional research sources to document and not as absolute truth.
4. As far back as I can remember, obituaries listed the immediate surviving family. So they can be helpful in locating cousins that might have valuable information. It use to be our paper had a standard obit for everyone with the immediate surviving family and the family had to pay if they wanted a memorial. In a memorial they could put as much information in it as they wanted. The information in the standard obit came from the funeral home. Also in the standard obit it would tell when the deceased died, where and when the funeral would be. Usually in a memorial they will give the names of the parents. Now, they pretty much combine all of that. Most of the obituaries online start after 1990. Now some might add on to their family tree those that are older. Ancestry.Com has lots of newspapers online so it is possible to find one that goes much further back on their website. Hopefully the day will come when they will get more.
5. Yes and no. I once wrote obituaries. I wrote thousands. Different newspapers have different policies. My county-wide newspaper printed obits in 12 pt. type so the older subscribers (the main base of readers, even back in the 70's) could read them. We wrote them ourselves, and did not accept "obits" written by the family. We also printed "Vitals," which were in 6 pt. type at the beginning of the Classified Section. The vitals were paid for by the mortuary. Information for obituaries was supplied through the mortuary or legal authorities only. If families called in information it got vetted (too much mischief can happen.) If something was amiss, I called for verification. Now days, any obits are generally paid advertisements, or for famous people. In the old days, everybody got the same treatment, even if their obit only amounted to name, date of birth, place and date of death. If you are looking for an obituary on someone, it is best to start with the small community newspapers, who still print local obits, and have done so for a couple hundred years. The major metropolitan dailies can't afford the ink and paper anymore, it would appear. They only print celebrities. Obituaries are not primary sources; but they are genealogically legitimate sources of information and should be accessed and vetted. Primary sources, themselves, are not necessarily correct either, and can't be blindly trusted. There are no unremarkable people, incidentally. There are only people who are not remarked about. Here's one person I researched (and the obit is amazingly accurate): http://www.mainstreet-marketplace.com/pages/People/caldwell,%20columbus01.htm If you work back to the main page, there are lots of old obits about the people who lived and worked in the town, many who just ran local businesses. This obit, once you read it and understand the history behind his adventures, does tend to make him look quite remarkable, though he wouldn't get a notice had he lived in London at the time. BMD records do not list cousin lines: obits do. Through a few obituaries, I was able to contact distant cousins who were also involved in genealogy. Obits are useful tools.