Louis Buys the Farm

Via mental_floss:

Louis J. Casimir Jr. bought the farm Thursday, Feb. 5, 2004, having lived more than twice as long as he had expected and probably three or four times as long as he deserved.

Although he was born into an impecunious family, in a backward and benighted part of the country at the beginning of the Great Depression, he never in his life suffered any real hardships.

Many of his childhood friends who weren’t killed or maimed in various wars became petty criminals, prostitutes, and/or Republicans.

Lou was a daredevil: his last words were “Watch this!” [Link]

Priceless Obituary Cost $650

Terry sent me a link to an obituary that (according to folo) "kicks butt and takes names."

Ida married High School friend, Karl Hadaway. On January 31, 1953, a child was born named Mary Denise. The marriage decayed and the couple divorced in 1954. Ida's marriage to Karl was a three ring circus, engagement ring, wedding ring and suffering.

Ida met and married Albert Sills in 1960. Ida said "I never knew what real happiness was until I got remarried, then it was too late."

The obit earned an article of its own in a later edition of the newspaper:

It not only recalls his mother's one-liner jokes, but begins with the revelation that Ida Mae began life as Betty Jean Cherry, a child given up by a single mother for adoption and sold by infamous baby broker Georgia Tann through the Tennessee Children's Home Society in the 1930s.

That is one reason why some family members were not "thrilled" with the lengthy obituary, which ran Sunday in The Commercial Appeal. It cost $650, but, "I didn't care," says Lee. "It's important how people think of you after the fact."

No Shirt, No Shoes, No Obit

The Swedes enjoy adding personalized drawing to their death notices.

[Christer Larsson] pulls out a booklet showing a selection of drawings and symbols suggested by funeral homes, categorized by religion, animals (pets are as popular in death as in life), flowers and plants, sports team logos, and miscellaneous, including a lute, candle, grand piano, treble clef, saxophone, heart or teddy bear.

Families' own drawings are rarely refused.

"Once," he recalls, "someone sent us a picture of a guy barbecuing and he was not wearing a shirt and barbecuing a hamburger. We couldn't accept that. It would have been shocking." [Link]

[Thanks, Nancy!]

Man Killed by Own Obit

Warning: Reading your own obituary can be hazardous to your health.

After suffering a stroke in 1940, black nationalist leader Marcus Garvey became incapacitated. Rumors began to circulate that he had died, and before Garvey could quell them, he ran across a premature obituary for himself in the Chicago Defender which described him as a man who died “broke, alone and unpopular.” According to people close to Garvey, upon reading it he let out a loud moan and collapsed to the floor, where he suffered a second stroke. By the following morning, he was dead at fifty-three. [Link]

Genealogy Hack: Obituaries in Google Blog Search

Lots of newspapers publish RSS feeds of their obituaries, and many of those feeds are indexed at Google Blog Search. As of today, there are more than 340,000 posts indexed from sites with "obituaries" in the title. You can add a surname to the search and find just those obits where the name appears.

Instead of a surname, you can add the name of your hometown, or even a phrase like "world war ii" to search for veterans of the war.

There are a few ways to monitor these search results and be alerted whenever an obituary is published that meets your criteria. Over in the left sidebar, click on Blogs Alerts to be notified by email. Or click on Atom or RSS to monitor this search with your favorite feed reader. If you use a personalized iGoogle homepage, you can also add a blog search gadget for your keywords by clicking the appropriate link at the bottom of any search results page.

A "genealogy hack" is a tip or trick that solves a specific problem and increases one's productivity as a genealogist, whether online or out in the real world. If you have a hack to share, submit it here or send it to hacks [at] genealogue.com.

Anne Is Alive!

Anne Hathaway of Orono, Maine, was surprised to read in her local newspaper that she had died.

The information in the short obituary and the list of death notices was correct, except for the part about her being dead.

The deceased was actually Ann Hathaway of Bangor.

At 92, Hathaway admits she’s no spring chicken but said that she’s not dead yet.

"I just laughed," Hathaway said. "I went to the pearly gates and opened the door and they didn’t have any strawberry shortcake and they didn’t like the way my hair looked." [Link]

This woman is also alive and well. This woman is almost certainly dead.

[Thanks, Sharon!]

Somebody Doesn't Like Ike

obituary forum has dubbed this the "Worst obit headline ever." I must agree.

All's Fair in Love and Obituaries

A young woman in Massachusetts lost her boyfriend to another girl. So she did what anyone would do: she caused a couple of newspapers to publish notices of her own death, then blamed her rival.

City Marshall Stone and Officer Mears, of Lynn, arrested a young woman named Ida M. Eddy at one of the hotels in Nahant yesterday afternoon upon a charge of publishing her own death in the Lynn Record of Aug. 29, 1878, and the Lynn Item of June 6, 1879. The notices purported to be sent from Abington, Mass., in each case, and were accompanied by letters signed in the first instance by "Deacon Gilmore," and in the second by the "Rev. Samuel Lee." The first notice stated that Ida M. Eddy died in Abington, of heart disease, Aug. 26, 1878, at the age of 21 years; the second, that Ida M. Eddy died in Abington, June 4, 1879, at the age of 21 years and 10 months. The accompanying letters gave a detailed statement as to the sufferings of the deceased during her last illness.

Immediately after the last publication in the Item, Miss Eddy herself called at the office of the paper and upbraided the editors in no measured terms for publishing the announcement of her death, when she was still in the land of the living. She, at the time, intimated that a Miss Jennie Bessom, a respectable young woman residing at Woodend, had caused the publication of the notices by forging the letters in which they were sent. [The New York Times, Aug. 14, 1879]

Can't Quit the Obits

Marilyn vos Savant may or may not be a genius, but she's definitely not a genealogist.

My husband and daughter read the obituaries daily, which I find strange. Why do some people like to do this?
—Merla Long, Morristown, Tenn.

I’ve wondered the same thing, so let’s ask. Readers, if you scan obituaries often, e-mail marilyn@parade.com and say why. A few sentences will do. For example, “I enjoy looking for my ex-husband’s name.” I’ll print the results. [Link]

Bill Henry Still in the Bullpen

Bill Henry claimed to have been a major league pitcher right up until his death last week in Florida.

Naturally, his obituary made headlines nationwide. After all, Bill Henry had been in the majors for 16 years, even pitched in two games of the 1961 World Series while playing for the Cincinnati Reds.

His obituary (now retracted) caught the attention of the real Bill Henry, who is very much alive, and of genealogist and SABR member David Lambert. It was Lambert who noticed that the deceased Henry's vital stats didn't add up: the ball-playing Henry was born 1927 in Texas, not 1924 in Missouri.

Henry left behind a handful of honest-to-goodness Bill Henry baseball cards, one of which is autographed, although no one's sure if it's authentic.

His widow and third wife, Elizabeth, said her husband was fond of showing the cards to friends, even though the biographical information on the back of the cards didn't match his own.

She said he just told everyone that the printing company made a mistake on the cards by saying that he was born in Texas in 1927. [Link]

Meat Shop Merits a Mention

I was tipped off today about this must-read post at The Ancestry Insider. I wonder if Ye Ol' Geezer Meat Shop sponsored the obit.

Levity in Brevity

St. Patrick's Day passed by without notice here at The Genealogue, so allow me to offer belatedly this story of the death of an Irish gentleman named (not surprisingly) Paddy.

His wife went to the newspaper to place his obituary. The newsman said the cost was $1 a word.

"I only have $2," Mrs. Paddy said. "Just print 'Paddy died.'"

The newsman decided that old Paddy deserved more. He gave her three extra words at no charge.

"A kind man you are," said Mrs. Paddy. "Print me husband's obituary this way: 'Paddy died. Boat for sale.'" [Link]

An Obit Fit for Two

Stephen at obituary forum asks, "how would you like to have your obit combined with somebody else's just because you worked for the same lousy employer?"

Thomas Jefferson and John Adams probably suffered the same indignity in many newspapers.

The Scribe of Death Retires

Winnie Walsh retired from Spartanburg County Library Headquarters on Friday. Her work indexing tens of thousands of death notices and obituaries earned her the title "Scribe of Death."

"One of my favorite obits said that some man died 'unexpectedly' at the age of 96, and I thought, how long do you think you can cheat death?" Walsh quipped.

The politics of death gave particular pause to Walsh, who noticed that during the civil rights movement, the obituaries of black people gradually went from looking like "tiny want ads" to including the names of relatives and identifying details considered standard in a white person's obituary. She also realized that in 1968 the Herald-Journal's obituary page became integrated a few days after Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination, without much fanfare. [Link]

He Died With Tongue in Cheek

It's a relief to learn that Mr. Fontenay penned his own obituary.

Charles L. Fontenay, most of whose half century-plus as a newspaperman was spent with The Tennessean, surprised himself and delighted many of his colleagues by dying yesterday. [Link, via Obituary Forum]

Kids Took Three Years Off Her Life

Some obituaries are incorrect through ignorance or accident. Others are intentionally incorrect, like that of dance-studio owner Joan Harris.

Her obituary says she was 73, but [her son] Sean said that’s not entirely correct. The fudging on the obituary is par for Joan’s course.

“That’s not her true birthday,” Sean said of the printed April 14, 1933. “The date is right, but the year is off by three because Mom would have wanted it that way.” [Link]

Say, Isn't That Charles de Gaulle?

Marilyn Johnson is the author of The Dead Beat: Lost Souls, Lucky Stiffs, and the Perverse Pleasures of Obituaries—described in one review as an "uplifting, joyous, life-affirming read for people who ordinarily steer clear of uplifting, joyous, life-affirming reads."

Some of the qualities that show up in obits go beyond raising tomatoes. They can be rather charming, in a quirky kind of way. Johnson has collected some beauties.

"There's just so many," she said. "'He used his penis to do impressions of Charles de Gaulle' is a pretty good one. There's one [professional obituary writer] Larken Bradley did recently about some guy who was famous for swatting all the flies at the bar. They'd leave a fly swatter next to his stool at the bar." [Link]

A Genealogical Life Well Lived

The "Local Life" featured in today's Washington Post is that of the recently departed Edna Somers. Not only was she a member of genealogy's embattled old guard ("Never a convert to computers, she wrote everything longhand"), she also was a friend to overturned turtles.

Years ago while driving on the Dulles Access Road, she saw a turtle on its back in the middle of the road. She found the first turnaround for emergency vehicles and went back to rescue the reptile. "She later said that if she had been stopped by a police officer, she would simply explain that for the turtle it was an emergency -- a matter of life and death," [her daughter Janine] Gates said. [Link]

What Happens to Obituarists in Vegas, Stays in Vegas

If you're an obit writer, the good news is that the Eighth International Obituary Writers' Conference will be held June 15-17 in Las Vegas. The bad news: it's being held in Las Vegas, New Mexico.

The conference is put on by The International Association of Obituarists, whose website is kind of a hoot. There's an archive of Great Obits, with titles like these:

Jimmy Rae
Pilot, Diver, Inventor - Performed Handstand Atop the Eiffel Tower

Louis Heckert
Ex-Mayor Dies From Run-In With Moose

Iris "Fluff" Bower
Nurse who did not Neglect to Apply her Lipstick Before
Tending the Wounded Troops on D-Day

They also sell for $15 an Obit Kit-"designed as a guide for gathering information to be used in the preparation of an obituary—either for you, a family member or friend." Here's a free tip: It's considered bad manners to fill in the date of death in advance.

Democrat Gets Last Laugh

From The Chicago (Ill.) Tribune of Oct. 10, 2005:

Theodore Roosevelt Heller, 88, loving father of Charles (Joann) Heller; dear brother of the late Sonya (the late Jack) Steinberg. Ted was discharged from the U.S. Army during WWII due to service related injuries, and then forced his way back into the Illinois National Guard insisting no one tells him when to serve his country. Graveside services Tuesday 11 a.m. at Waldheim Jewish Cemetery (Ziditshover section), 1700 S. Harlem Ave., Chicago. In lieu of flowers, please send acerbic letters to Republicans. [emphasis added]

[Hat tip: BoingBoing]