Thoughts On Obituaries

I see in the newspaper that my uncle, my dad's only brother, died.

Most members of a family receive a phone call telling them of such news, but our family is not a close one, so I received no such call. I haven't seen my uncle in about twenty years.

He didn't live far away, and I see from the obit that one of my cousins still lives here in Redlands. We were never close either, although for many years she lived just across the street.

Obituaries are odd things. They are the summation, a resume of sorts, of your life. They tell those who bother to read them of where you came, what you did for a living, who you married and what children you left behind. Some are long, and go on in infinite detail about which clubs the deceased belonged to, what far off locations they traveled, and how much the person will be missed. Others offer only the briefest outline of a life spanning many decades.

My uncle's obit was short; about four column inches. He wasn't a great success in life; he didn't hold any important positions within the community; he wasn't a churchgoer. So, the obit stuck to the bare facts. Birthplace, jobs, children, the name of his wife.

Usually a good obit contains the names of the parents of the deceased. This helps future relatives conducting a genealogical search make sure they've found the correct family. My uncle's obit left this information out. For the record, her name was Fayette, and his name was Ray. They were born in Missouri, and lived most of their lives here in Redlands. They were good people.

Another item a proper obit should contain (and my uncle's didn't) is where the deceased is to be buried, although it is increasingly common for the family to choose, say, scattering their loved one's ashes at sea. I think that noting this decision in an obit is a good idea, so that the aforementioned genealogists don't waste their time searching local cemetery records.

What with newspapers in decline, I wonder where future generations will post obituaries. Cyberspace seems too tenuous a location for such an important record.