NWIGS - Porter County Obituaries and Death Notices

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PORTER COUNTY, INDIANA, DEATH NOTICES AND OBITUARIES

We are pleased to announce two publications that are now available from NWIGS. One of our members, Steve Shook, has recently published:

Porter County Obituaries and Death Notices: Volume I
A Collection of Newspaper Death Notices and Obituaries Transcribed from The Chesterton Tribune, Chesterton, Porter County, Indiana, Prior to 1900
A 429 page book; more than 2,300 completely transcribed and sourced death notices and obituaries; includes an every name index consisting of more than 6,700 names

Porter County Obituaries and Death Notices: Volume II
A Collection of Newspaper Death Notices and Obituaries Transcribed from the Western Ranger, Practical Observer, Valparaiso Practical Observer, Vidette and Republic, and Porter County Vidette, Valparaiso, Porter County, Indiana, Prior to 1900
A 406 page book; more than 2,300 completely transcribed and sourced death notices and obituaries; includes an every name index consisting of more than 6,500 names

Each book has been organized with transcriptions of death notices and obituaries presented in alphabetical order of surname. A citation containing the source newspaper, publication date, volume number, issue number, page number, and column number is included with each transcription.

While every effort was made to find and include every death notice and obituary published in these newspapers, there are bound to be some that were inadvertently overlooked in the process of compiling these books. Additionally, each death notice and obituary has been transcribed exactly as it was printed in the newspaper, which means that there are often misspellings, transposed letters, and poor use of grammar rules within the transcriptions.

Note that most newspapers published prior to 1900 had several pages pre-published. Local news was then added to the blank pages or blank columns. For instance, the Porter County Vidette’s local, county, and regional news was typically published on pages one, four, five, and eight prior to 1900. The remainder of the newspaper was pre-published international and national news, advertisements, serial fiction, etc. This is important to note since death notices and obituaries from these pre-published pages, which were usually for noted national and international figures, have not been included in these books.

Many death notices and obituaries do not contain the given or Christian name of the deceased. It was often reported, for example, that “the infant son of John Doe died last Tuesday and the remains interred in the town cemetery on Thursday afternoon.” Given this common practice, it is highly recommended that the Porter County Cemetery Indices prepared by the Northwest Indiana Genealogical Society be consulted to determine the full name of the individual listed in this index, especially if the burial place is noted in the transcription. The cemetery indices can be purchased from the Society.

Occasionally, an individual will have more than one death notice or obituary published, and often using different spellings of the given name and/or surname. As such, be certain that you search for all variant spellings when using this index.

You can order these books:
Volume I - $60.00 plus $4.50 shipping
Volume II - $55.00 plus $4.50 shipping

ALL ORDERS MUST BE PRE-PAID. Make your check or money order payable to Northwest Indiana Genealogical Society (or simply NWIGS) and mail to:

NWIGS
PO Box 595
Griffith, Indiana 46319

You can use these online every name indices to see if the obituaries you are searching for are contained in these publications:

Every Name Index of Porter County Obituaries and Death Notices: Volume I
Every Name Index of Porter County Obituaries and Death Notices: Volume II

We want to a thank Steve for his great work on this project and for his generosity in donating them to NWIGS. We feel this is a great source of obituaries for Porter County and beyond.

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