Hi Everyone, I am new to the list after a long hiatus and would like to start with a general question. I have my grandmother's and her brother's marriage license application from Scranton, PA. The license if from the Clerk of the Orphans' Court of Lackawanna. Both my grandmother and her brother were adults at the time of the marriage and their parents were living so they were not orphans. My grandmother married in 1897 and her brother in 1902. Question: Were all marriage licenses issued through the Clerk of the Orphans' Court of Lackawanna County or should I look for another reason? I guess the next question is why would the Orphans' Court handle marriage licenses? All help is appreciated. Regards, Lynn Eivers

Lynn, The Lackawanna County Marriage License Bureau is part of the Orphan's Court of Lackawanna County. I suspect the reason has to do with the fact that, in olden days, when the breadwinner (The man) died the children were considered Orphans..Women did not work outside of the home. Having the marriage documents in the same office as the Orphans court records made it much easier to prove the claim of the brother of the deceased man as to his right to be declared guardian of the minor children.thereby keeping the widow and her children from being a burden to the county. Or, as was often thought, preventing her from falling into the oldest profession to support her children. Consider, the widow and her children were evicted from their company home if the deceased was a cola miner living in company housing...The brother, who may have also lived in company housing was able to have the widow and her children live with him in company housing since he was the guardian of these children. I hope this answers your question. Joe Bryer Genealogical Research Society www.grsnp.org/ Lynn Eivers wrote: > Hi Everyone, > > I am new to the list after a long hiatus and would like to start with a > general question. > > I have my grandmother's and her brother's marriage license application from > Scranton, PA. The license if from the Clerk of the Orphans' Court of > Lackawanna. Both my grandmother and her brother were adults at the time of > the marriage and their parents were living so they were not orphans. My > grandmother married in 1897 and her brother in 1902. > > Question: Were all marriage licenses issued through the Clerk of the > Orphans' Court of Lackawanna County or should I look for another reason? I > guess the next question is why would the Orphans' Court handle marriage > licenses? > > All help is appreciated. > > Regards, > > Lynn Eivers > > > > > > > > > > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to PALACKAW-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message > >