Hints on using the new Utah Death Certificate Index:


From Glen Fairclough:

The index page can be a bit confusing to people using it for the first time. All of the Archives's electronic indices are searched simultaneously and results from each are displayed together on the same web page. A single individual or family surname may be included in a number of the indices.

To see the digitized image of an individual's death certificate, users need to go through the following steps:

Step 1. In the search box on the index search page, http://historyresearch.utah.gov/indexes/index.html, enter a name (surname only or complete name, surname first) and click the Search button.

Step 2. From the name list generated through the search, click on an individual's name.

Step 3. A List of Hits, grouped by index source, will be displayed. Click on the name of the individual you want to see.

Step 4. Search Results are displayed. This includes an abstract of information about the individual from the index. Names in the death certificate index include name, death date, sex, age, county, and a thumbnail of the certificate. Click on the certificate to enlarge the image to full screen.

In a few isolated cases, the images aren't being displayed. If you come across an index entry that isn't linked to a digitized photograph, let me know and we'll get it corrected.

Step 5. Zoom in to increase the detail.  Before printing, users may want to use a photo editing program to crop the certificate.

Hint from Dennis on the Online Consultants Discussion list:

I have been playing with this for a couple of weeks & found a way to
search by 1st name. Name followed by a comma is a surname, but with
no comma it will search all names. Useful for surnames that you
don't know the exact spelling.

Try searching by just the last name.  We found several family members that we wouldn't have thought to look for.  The images we collected were jpegs, around 300-400 kb.  We also made the jpegs into pdfs and put copies of them into our "electronic cardbox box" we wrote about in the last newsletter---our 2007 collection of new items found that we will use for our Christmas gift CD to relatives.

From JaAnna Nelson:

I found one of my ancestor's name in the hits for Death Certificates without the image.  Right below the Search Results form with my ancestor's information there was a form to request or order copies.  So I asked for a copy.  About a day after I sent the request, they sent me an email message saying that they had posted the image onto the site and I could find it there.  They said that if I still want a copy, they would send it to me for a price:  the chare for copies is $1.00 per certificate and $2.00 for mailing up to 10 copies.  So, I did the search again and was then able to see the image.

So it seems that they have not loaded all the images of the death certificates yet and if you request a copy they will load the image on the site, at no charge.

This is definitely a great site.  I've been going wild with downloading and saving the images as I have many relatives who died in Utah.