Maintenance
Why do anniversaries and archives entries often leave the cause blank?
Anniversaries and archives: the blank cause line in an old record, why researchers keep trying to fill it, and what a responsible transcription does instead.
Archive
September 2026
Features
Athletes Who Died Causes: How to Check Reports
Athletes who died causes: learn how to check a reported cause by its jurisdiction, source document, confirmation date, and the limits of its evidence.
Costs
Career memorials: concerts, places, and charitable tributes
Career memorials preserve a celebrity's work through concerts, public places, and charitable tributes. Explore named examples and what each honors.
Rules
Anniversaries and archives corrections: three ways to change an old page
Anniversaries and archives corrections: the three ways to change an old page, what a family can ask for when removal is refused, and what resurfacing costs.
Guides
Why musicians' causes of death are not recorded
Musicians who died: causes of death are not recorded here. Why this archive keeps no cause field, what gets misread, and what the record holds instead.
Features
Anniversaries and archives: how old death notices resurface
Anniversaries and archives: how date-based features, reminders, round-number anniversaries, and search push old celebrity death notices back into view.
Rules
What an in memoriam notice is, and how it differs from a death notice and an obituary
What an in memoriam notice is, how it differs from a death notice and a news obituary, what families put in one, and why researchers use them.
Rules
What reliable sources report about causes of death for actors
Actors who died: what coroners, medical examiners and vital records offices publish about causes of death, and why a screen credit gap is not one.
Reviews
What a career memorial timeline records, and where it stops
Career memorials timeline: the four kinds of date a chronology confuses, where entries come from, and the parts of a working life records never hold.
Rules
How to read the cause line in a celebrity death notice
Read the cause line of a celebrity death notice in four parts: wording, speaker, date and document, and learn which sources confirm a cause.
Guides
Career memorials this week: five earlier cases, 2023–2024
Career memorials this week: five earlier cases, 2023–2024, each with the office or archive that settles it — from Georgia vital records to the Irish GRO.
Rules
How a deaths-today page is sourced: CDC counts, state certificates and memorial notices
How a celebrity deaths-today page is sourced: NCHS provisional data, CDC WONDER, state vital records, medical examiner releases and family notices, and which record supports which claim.
Rules
Celebrity deaths: checking dates for Bowie and Prince
Celebrity deaths may be announced or documented later. Use Bowie and Prince to distinguish death dates from announcement, report, and service dates.
Rules
Celebrity Funeral Home Death Announcement Basics
Celebrity funeral home death announcement basics: how families and clergy share approved service details through notices, websites, and bulletins.
Rules
Citing celebrity death records from archive pages
Citing celebrity death records from archive pages: identify the dated source, note publication and revision dates, and keep a log of changes.
Rules
How musician deaths are announced by cities, unions and venues
A guide to the three channels that announce a musician death: city memorial custom, union or guild notice, and venue tribute, with steps to verify each.
Maintenance
Publishers can be asked to correct a cause of death they never confirmed
Cause of death corrections: how to ask a publisher to remove a cause the family never gave, what the request should contain, and what to expect back.
Reviews
Cause of death guides: which records hold a cause
Cause of death guides: which records hold a cause, who may request a certified copy, and what an obituary archive can publish when none is released.
Industry
Why athletes who died this week often surface late
Athletes who died this week: why retired competitors go unreported, and how to trace one through local papers, death indexes and civil records.
Maintenance
Musicians Who Died This Week: Four Names Reported September 8–14, 2026
Musicians who died this week: four deaths reported between September 8 and 14, 2026, each with who reported it, what is known about the cause, and the five fields a record should hold.
Features
Actors who died corrections: writing a request editors can act on
Actors who died corrections: the three kinds of request, the six things a written request should hold, a sample, and what to expect back from editors.
Costs
Fake Appeals in “Actors Who Died This Week” Searches
Searches for actors who died this week can surface fake memorial appeals. Learn how to verify recipients, report impersonation, and act if you gave.
Features
Actors who died: remembering Poitier, White and Rickman
Remembering actors who died: Sidney Poitier, Betty White and Alan Rickman, with their death dates, representative roles and distinct screen legacies.
Features
California and New York obituary archives: sourcing
California and New York obituary archives include newspaper collections and memorial sites, but these are not vital-record registers. Learn how to cite sources.
Features
CDC death data Atlanta Seattle memorial notices: state view
CDC death data Atlanta Seattle memorial notices: 2024 state cause rankings for Georgia and Washington, who issues local notices, and how to log each source.
Rules
What the FTC Funeral Rule means for paid death notices and news obituaries
The FTC Funeral Rule paid death notice rules cover price lists and misrepresentation, while editorial obituaries sit outside the rule entirely.
Features
How US sports leagues, teams and unions handle an athlete death announcement
A walk through the league, team and union channels that announce an athlete death in the US, plus how to verify a report and what to do when a league stays silent.
Rules
How US libel and privacy law shapes corrections on celebrity death pages
Libel privacy law celebrity death corrections shape how US archives fix errors, balancing defamation, publicity, privacy, and copyright rules.
Features
Tracing a musician's death through Nashville and New Orleans memorial customs
Nashville and New Orleans musician death memorial customs diverge: label notices and CMA announcements versus jazz funerals and second lines.
Guides
What the National Archives holds for historical American celebrity obituaries
Federal records confirm a famous life, not a famous death. Census, military and newspaper files at NARA and the Library of Congress do the checking.
Guides
National Center for Health Statistics death records
National Center for Health Statistics death records are de-identified. Learn what NCHS data can—and cannot—confirm about a celebrity death report.
Costs
How to request a death certificate in Texas, Florida, and Illinois for a celebrity death
To request death certificate Texas Florida Illinois celebrity records, check who may apply, the fees, the forms, and the waiting periods in each state.
Guides
How to use the Social Security Death Index to check a reported celebrity death
The public Social Security Death Index is closed to most users, so a celebrity death check now runs through an SSA Numident request and a state record.
Rules
California Death Certificate Facts for Archive Research
California death certificate facts for archive research: copy types, restricted fields, the 50-year rule, and where related records may appear.
![Coroner I.L. Feinberg at the coroner's office in the Criminal Court Building, at Centre And Franklin Streets. Bain News Service,, publisher. Coroner Israel Feinberg - N.Y. [between ca. 1910 and ca. 1915] 1 negative : glass ; 5 x 7 in. or smaller. Notes: Title from unverified data provided by the Bai. Celebrity Coroner Report Search: How to Request and Read One](/covers/celebrity-coroner-report-search-640.webp?v=17997593)
Rules
Celebrity Coroner Report Search: How to Request and Read One
Celebrity coroner report search: which office holds the report, Los Angeles County and Florida access rules, fees and limits, and how to read the summary.
Costs
Celebrity Death Certificate Request California: Steps, Fees, and Forms
Celebrity death certificate request California requires Form VR-20, proven eligibility, and fees from $24 to about $39. County offices vary by wait time.
Rules
Celebrity Death Hoax Check: Verifying Reports Before You Share
Celebrity death hoax check: verify reports before you share. Steps, sources, and consequences for false death claims on US social platforms.
Rules
Celebrity Memorial Service Etiquette: What Fans Should Know
Celebrity memorial service etiquette, from bag checks and free ticket lotteries to city permits, dress codes and the records you can request afterward.
Guides
Celebrity Probate Court Records Search: What Courts Publish
Celebrity probate court records search depends on state rules. This guide covers what US courts publish, what stays sealed, and how to request a file.
Rules
State Death Record Seal Rules: CA, FL, NY
State death record seal rules in California, Florida, and New York share a 50-year cause-of-death window, but early access differs by state.
Features
Deaths by year by profession: why coverage varies
Deaths by year by profession reflect obituary selection, not mortality. Learn the four editorial tests and where US vital records come from.
Rules
Deaths by year by age: how to read the age field
Deaths by year by age: how to read the age field in a memorial record, the errors that cluster around it, and how to turn an age into a birth-year window.
Reviews
Deaths by year this week: how archives review reports
Deaths by year this week: how a celebrity memorial archive reviews unresolved reports, tracks aging claims, and decides what to publish, pursue, hold, or drop.
Rules
Deaths by month corrections: how a closed record should be fixed, with a worked change note
Deaths by month corrections: how a closed archive record should be fixed, how to submit a request, a worked change note, which vital-records offices handle certificates, and when an entry is withdrawn.
Maintenance
Why a Memorial Archive Should Not Add a Cause-of-Death Column
Why a memorial archive for celebrity deaths should leave cause of death out of its entries, how monthly groupings mislead, and what an entry should record instead.
Maintenance
How to verify an actor's death report when a stage name hides the legal name
How a report that an actor has died is checked, why stage names defeat name matching, and which sources actually settle an identity when credit databases cannot.
Reviews
Anniversaries and archives: finding and citing an old death notice
Anniversaries and archives: what an anniversary piece is for, which body holds each death record, how to find an old notice and how to cite it in Chicago style.
Rules
How to research athletes who died: a six-step guide
Researching athletes who died means matching a competitive name on a results sheet to a civil record, and citing a dated, named source for every entry.
Guides
Cause of death guides: how records differ
Cause of death guides explain how US death certificates, investigative findings, notices, and obituaries differ, and how a cause may be certified or amended.
Features
Deaths by month: where celebrity death notices belong
Read deaths by month using the date a celebrity died, not when a notice appeared. Includes named historical examples and a weekly-notice checklist.
Costs
Celebrity deaths and causes: Boseman, Trebek, and Bowie
Past celebrity deaths and causes: what was disclosed about cancer in the cases of Chadwick Boseman, Alex Trebek, and David Bowie, alongside their work.
Industry
Every correction issued against this week's reports, and why
Every correction issued against this week's reports, with the reason for each and the source document that settled it, all gathered in one place.
Costs
How to check a “deaths this week list” for errors
Deaths this week list: a seven-step method for checking celebrity death reports, confirming identities, spotting warning signs, and documenting corrections.
Guides
How a weekly deaths record is closed, rechecked, and frozen at the end of the week
The closing pass for a weekly deaths record: entries rechecked against sources, what verified means at close, what crosses the boundary, how a closed page is left.
Rules
Deaths Today: How to Make a Celebrity Death Source Note Recheckable
Deaths today: a source-note format for celebrity death entries, with details that help readers trace an announcement after a link changes or fails.
Reviews
Which sources report deaths today, and how causes are stated
News desks, coroner offices and paid death notices each report deaths today, and each states a cause differently, or omits the cause entirely.
Maintenance
Deaths Today Corrections: How to Fix a False Death Report
Deaths today corrections: how a death desk traces a same-day claim to its origin, when it holds a report, and how a false death correction is written.
Rules
5 points worth checking on deaths today this week
Deaths today this week: the states a death report passes through at a records desk, what verified means at each one, and how corrections differ from withdrawals.
Industry
Why tributes do not confirm that a musician has died
Tributes, streams and reissues follow a report that musicians died, whether it is true or false. What each signal shows, and how to trace it to a source.