Perce, what you have been given (and what you almost always get from the Ryerson Index) is a death notice, not an obituary. It is a paid classified advertisement, usually inserted by the next-of-kin of the deceased (often with the assistance of the funeral directors). There is no legal requirement to publish such a death notice, but it is done for probably the great majority of deaths. Often, the relatives will insert the notice in several newspapers if the deceased had been known in several areas. It used to be the case that a death notice would be inserted by the family and a funeral notice would be inserted, perhaps a day or two later, by the funeral directors. Probably due the increasing cost of classified advertising in the print media, these days the death and funeral notices are often combined, as in the case of your John Oscar. For the major city newspapers, obituaries (which are much more detailed and, as in your USA example, will often give quite a comprehensive life history of the deceased) are published only for people who were well-known in public life, eg, politics, commerce, the arts etc. In smaller rural newspapers, obituaries are more common and will generally be published for people who were known within that rural community. The Ryerson Index does include obituaries from a few of the country newspapers, but very rarely are obituaries from the major daily newspapers included. That is because it is designed as an index of death notices, not obituaries. If an obituary is likely to have been published, the researcher will need to go to a relevant library and search the relevant newspapers for a few weeks following the date of death. Hope this helps -- and if anyone in Australia has additions or corrections to any of what I've said, please feel free ... Lindsay Graham Canberra, Australia Percival P. Cassidy wrote: > wollar1914 wrote: > >> BENNETT, John Oscar - John passed away peacefully on August 31st 2003 at >> War Veterans Nursing home, Narrabeen. Dearly loved husband of Marcia, >> dear brother to Elaine and Marle, father and father-in-law of Paul, Mark >> and Lesley, Keren and Peter and loved grandfather of their children. >> Aged 76 years. >> A Memorial Service will be held on Wednesday (Sept 3 , 2003 ) at St >> Columba Pres. Church, corner Warringah Rd and Sharkey Street, >> Forestville commencing at 11 am Privately interred at Frenchs Forest >> Lawn Cemetery. >> > > Thank you very much -- and also for the image file you emailed me. > > I am sorry that I did not understand that the Ryerson Index is a > volunteer-based operation; I am so used to blocking out the advertising > on the right of the Google results screen and on one or both edges of > other Web pages that I had overlooked the links on the left of the > Ryerson Index page. > > The obituary-indexing systems here in the USA where I am now living all > seem to be commercial, and my original assumption was that the text of > the obituaries would be on line somewhere so that I could simply copy > and paste. In addition, when I had Googled the name I found in another > Ryerson Index obituary, I had found the full text on a message board; I > was assuming that the text of other obituaries would be on line too if > only I knew how to find it. > > I don't know whether you have ever looked at any US obituaries, but they > seem to be far more comprehensive than those in the Australian papers. > Some are mini-biographies, with birth details (when, where, parents' > names, including mother's maiden name), marriage details (when, where, > to whom), church membership, military service, employment history, > details of deceased and surviving family members, etc. Even the briefer > ones are a few column-inches in length. Some are published more than > once in the same paper. > > "Perce" >