Momma's obituary is running in the Houston Chronicle tomorrow (finally after a big mix up with them for last week). My brother says we have to buy a lot of copies of the paper so we'll have a bunch of the obituary's.

It's just a very simple obituary leading a person to her Alz.org memory tribute page with no real instructions.

It says:

Madeline Patricia Scarbrough Everitt
Her long battle with Alheimer's end 9/6/09. She was born on 11/15/35. For the full obituary, please see her momorial tribute fund at www.alz.org in her name.

Now really, do we HAVE to buy a bunch of papers to keep this? Is that the proper thing to do?

Sorry guys, it's all new to me and I just felt that any of mom's old "friends" who really cared would try to search for the obit there rather than some big old print page. What I had originally written was going to be over $700 and I just can't afford that.

Thanks
Sharla

Sharla,

I'm not sure I understand what your brother wants you to do. Does he want to buy them so that you can hand them out at the funeral and/or mail them to people? I believe the Funeral Home usually distributes little "remembrances" which include the Obituary. If not, you can print some up yourself on special paper, you don't need to buy the newspapers.

Hope this is what you needed,

Felicia

I believe his thinking is that we save a bunch of them for future generations. I'm not sure, but I know when her obituary was not in last weeks paper, he was upset that he could have spent a lot of money buying a bunch when it wasn't there.

Maybe it's just a little more of his "weirdness".

Sharla

Hi, Sharla. It's good to hear from you. Not a stupid question at all! I don't know your brother, so this is a really out-there kind of guess, but could wanting to buy all those papers be his way of trying to "hold on" to her?

When dad passed away, we waited until the day a new paper was to come out and then hit the stores and they let us have the "outdated" ones that had dad's obituary. But that was not the Chronicle and was in a much smaller town. We held on to the papers until distant relatives quit asking if we still had any copies and then took the papers to the recycle bin at the nearest school. I was a bit surprised at the number of our cousins, etc. that asked for them.

Do what you need to do to give you peace!
Sending lots of hugs..........

Thanks for the insight Memaw. No wonder I love ya so much. He could be trying to hold on to her since he was there much throughout the years--only hospital stays and "the waiting period".

Also, the thought about people asking for them kinda makes sense (even though the obit is extremely basic information).

Thanks for insight again Memaw!

Sharla

Houston Death Notice

Continue to check this link and the attached Guest Book and print it out. The Guest Book are usually deleted after 30 days.

Why can't you just run copies?? Why "originals"...not sure what you are asking either...sandie

Some people just like to have clippings of the original obituary. My mother and brother do. They have clippings of all the various relatives who have died over the years. I've never understood it--I don't even want a copy. But I guess it doesn't hurt anything.

Obituaries are very important to anyone doing family genealogy research, but they do not have to be originals. Copies with the date and name of the paper written on them work just as well.

Print out the longer one online and send that to relatives who request a copy.

After reading this again, I was wondering.
Are you getting Death Notice mixed up with Death Certificate.

Death notice is NOT necessary, but most people feel acknowledging the passing is important.

Death Certificates are for legal purposes, like when closing the late person's accounts or making a claim on insurance policies.

Create a tribute on The Alzheimer's Wall. I created one for My Mom Clementina Perez

The brother said to buy the paper...I think that's clear he means the obituary/death notice.

What a lovely and loving tribute, Sarah!

Iris L.

Most major newspapers run o bits online these days and people can even leave comments there and you can respond to them. I found that to be very helpful for my mother as she died rather suddenly and was buried on a Sunday. Not everyone got a chance to see her obit. I don't think I'd bother buying a lot of copied. My Mom's funeral home included copies of her obits for me. It was very thougtful.

Why not just let him handle that and pay for the papers himself. You can refer anyone who asks to him. You will need a jillion certified copies of the death certificate of course, but nowadays those are not usually too costly.

I got five copies of Mom's Death cert. I still have three of them. SS wanted one and other than that, everyone else returned them to me after looking at them, like when I sold the house and the van, which was in both my parent's names. She didn't have any life insurance, though, and I had settled their affairs when I got them on Medicaid.

With my stepdad, who died in 2004,the banks, etc., were good about copying them themselves and then returning them, but the most unexpected folks kept one. When my Dad died in 1993, the lawyer said to get 20 of them, at that time they cost $20 each for certified copies and I used all but the one I kept for my files. Can you believe it!

Mom's were rolled into her funeral expenses. I think they were five dollars a pop. Mom didn't have a lot, so I didn't need a lot.

We went through similar decision making last month with my mother's memorial service programs and her obituary.

There's no set format for this; it's just about what your own family members would like to have. Matters of this nature at the time of a funeral take on a bit more detailed importance because we're not quite used to handling such bits and pieces and also because there's alot of internal emotion surrounding things.

The newspaper sent me four copies of the newspaper. Neighbors and friends saved me their copies of the paper.

However; after realizing how thin the news paper was and how easily the print rubbed off, I commenced to make photocopies of the obituary so they would last longer in good condition, and we have plenty to go around.

After about ten requests for obituary copies, I have ten more copies I filed in the memorial service file I made.

If more copies needed to be made for future greatgrandchildren (who may or may not be interested), we can make more copies.

For my family, this sufficed.

Johanna C.

Thanks for the replies everyone. I did go off and buy two papers with Mom's obit in it.

It was a good thing I did! The first one I opened had a "no print" line upwards through her obit that obscured everything. No other bad marks on the newspaper page but there. So the 2nd one was clean and crisp.

Brother dearest did go buy himself a few papers, but Mom's tribute page on alz.org was pretty much what I wanted in the paper but just couldn't afford.

If you'd like to see it, it's under her name Madeline Everitt.

Thanks again.
Sharla