> I have searched the index for many names that were not there. I knew them > to be dead, with ss#s, and no one collecting any benefits from them. It was > my understanding from what I had read about this index, that any death > benefit issued for a social security number holder would be included on the > list. I would be curious to know why so many are missing from this index. The following is an explanation from a Dear Myrtle column found at http://www.ancestry.com/columns/myrtle/july98/my980706.htm >From these references one can see that while the SSDI is an extensive listing of deaths in the US, it is far from complete. Whether due to human error, or the fact that the death simply wasn't reported to the SSA, millions of names do not appear on the Death Master File. In such cases, researchers will move to other records created at the time their ancestor lived in order to reconstruct major events in his life and to provide clues to earlier generations. "Rule Number One - Genealogy is Supposed to be FUN!" -- Sharon Thomas Cobb County Georgia GenWeb http://www.rootsweb.com/~gacobb2/ Cobb County Georgia Genealogical Society, Inc. http://www.rootsweb.com/~gaccgs/ Thomas Family Homepage http://www.stsi.net/~semper73/