Citing sources from death certs from funeral home

robren,

Your question raises questions of its own: Why would the funeral home be holding original death certificates which, by law in almost all jurisdictions, was to be maintained in an official office at the city, county, or state level? Did they actually send you the original of each—or a photocopy of a document in its files?  You state that the document is certified; what agency did that certification?

Because the certificate did not come from an official agency that creates death certificates, the issue of provenance exists here. We also have to consider the fact that even when dealing with government offices that are authorized to create and maintain death certificates, we may have differences between the certificates that exist at each level of government. For example, those created at the local level may be more detailed than those you would receive from the state office. Does the item sent to you identify the agency that created the record?

Your citation would need to reconcile these questions because they affect the completeness and validity of the information and the possibility of copying errors. It may be that you would need to cite this as a record received from the funeral home (chapter 4) rather than an official document received from a government office (chapter 9).

What you may have is a "Funeral Director's Statement of Death" or, "Funeral Director's Proof of Death". In Canada, both are issued by the funeral home and are stamped with their corporate seal. These are not necessarily extracts from their books. The information contained usually comes from a relative of the deceased, either verbally or by means of submitted documentation. Recently; funeral homes have been asking for formal documentation, such as birth certificates, as a basis of their information. That said, these usually cannot be treated as original sources.

That said; I, too, would like to know what the base EE template for citing these items would be. Is it loose certificates?

In our county (Contra Costa County, California), funeral homes obtain the official death certificates from the county recorder to give to the next-of-kin. This is done as a service (and for a fee). This is how I obtained the 10 copies of my father's death certificate.

The funeral home also asked me (as the informant) for the non-death information to be added to the certificate. I can attest that, even as the family genealogist, during a time of mourning and dealing with the death of a loved-one, it is easy to make a mistake or not remember information about your own parent.

The funeral homes in Alameda County, California does the same thing. If I remember correctly it is customary and may be part of California law for the funeral homes to file for the death certificates. I was to one that had to provide all the non-medical information for my dad and that was all done at the funeral home. Then they send everything to the county. When my dad died all the counties in the San Francisco Bay area were low on the paper for the death certificates. We got one original and had to wait almost 6 weeks for the rest. Which was a bit of a nightmare because the Air Force wanted one within 30 days. Had me jumping through hoops.

In South Carolina, the funeral homes routinely order 10-12 certified copies of the death certificate for the family. The funeral homes I have dealt with charge only the actual fee as required by the state. All non-medical information is collected by the funeral home from a member of the family or other individual. I am listed as the informant on my sister-in-law's death certificate and the relationship to the deceased is not stated.

Lately I've found more and more funeral homes provide obituaries on line. I'd like your thoughts on how to prepare the source. For example, is the funeral home considered a business? If so, do I use 4.8 which doesn't seem to fit to well even if modified, or consider the funeral home as a publisher of the obituary?

WayneDreier, have you seen the discussion at the link below?

https://www.evidenceexplained.com/content/citing-online-obituary-funeral-home-website

The topic has arisen several times. Using key words in the search box (upper right corner of every page) such as funeral home online obituary will turn up discussions from different angles.