How to Publish and Find Projo Obituaries in Rhode Island
The Providence Journal has handled obituary publishing in Rhode Island for well over a century. Their system is run through Encompass Health Services, which powers their online obituary platform. If you are trying to place an obituary or search for one, you need to understand how the process actually works and where the friction points are. To place an obituary, you go to thejournal.com/obituaries and click on the submit obituary button. You fill out a form with the deceased person's information, biographical details, and any photo you want included. The Journal charges based on length and whether you want to add a photo. A standard text-only obituary runs around $150 to $200. With a photo, it is usually $200 to $350 depending on size. The exact pricing changes occasionally, so the online form will give you a real-time quote before you pay. Payment is processed through the Encompass platform. You can pay by credit card online. Once submitted, the obituary goes into a review queue. Typical turnaround is 24 to 48 hours, but if you submit after business hours or on a weekend, you are looking at a longer wait. I have had cases where a Friday evening submission did not run until Wednesday because the editorial team processes them on business days only.
The search function on the Projo site is functional but basic. You can search by name, and it will return results from the past several years. The date range filter is somewhat limited, and the search does not handle middle names or initials well. If you search for "John Smith," you will get every John Smith in their archive. If the person you are looking for went by a nickname or was listed under a married name, the search will miss it. I have found the workaround is to search using just the last name plus the approximate year and then manually scan through the results. It takes longer but it is more reliable than trying to refine the search query. One thing that trips people up is the difference between the print obituary and the online version. The print obituary is often shorter because of space constraints. The online version can be much longer and includes additional details, guestbook entries, and photos. If you need the full version, you have to access it online. The print version alone is not a complete record. Another nuance that is not widely known: The Providence Journal also publishes a combined obituary section that pulls from other Rhode Island publications. So an obituary you see in the Projo may have originally been placed through a smaller paper like the Providence Business News or a local weekly. If you are researching family history, check the Projo archive first but also know that the same obituary might appear in another paper's archive with slightly different wording or additional details. I once spent two hours searching the Projo for an obituary that was never there because it was only published in the Newport Daily News, which the Projo did not pick up that week.
For genealogy research, the Projo obituary archive is useful but incomplete. Not every Rhode Island death results in a Projo obituary. People who died outside the publication's circulation area, those whose families chose other outlets, or cases where no one placed an obituary at all will not appear. The archive also has gaps from certain years when records were not digitized properly. I ran into a specific problem trying to locate an obituary from 1998 for my grandmother. The search returned nothing, but I knew she lived in Providence County. It turned out her obituary was filed under a slightly different spelling of her middle name due to a data entry error decades ago. The workaround was to use the RhodyObits.com project, which is a volunteer-run database that cross-references Projo obituaries and includes hand-transcribed corrections. That is where I found the correct entry. If you need to request a copy of an older obituary that is not easily accessible online, you can contact the Providence Journal's archives directly. They charge a fee for research requests, and processing can take several weeks. It is not something you want to rely on for time-sensitive research. Some practical things to keep in mind if you are placing an obituary. Make sure you have all the surviving family member names ready. The Projo typically lists immediate family, but extended family mentions are at your discretion. Proofread everything before submitting. Corrections after publication usually incur an additional fee, and the correction runs separately from the original obituary, which looks awkward. A misspelled name or incorrect date is frustrating to fix after the fact. I once had a family member submit an obituary with the wrong birth year because they were using a memorial stone date rather than the actual birth certificate date. Correcting it required calling the paper directly and paying a revision fee.
Get the Full Details
The guestbook feature on online obituaries allows people to leave messages, but those messages are moderated. Offensive or spam content gets filtered, but so do some legitimate tributes that contain certain keywords. It is not a perfect system. If you want to ensure a tribute is posted, it helps to keep the language straightforward and avoid unusual phrasing that might trigger the automated filters. For people who prefer a non-digital route, you can call the Providence Journal's obituary desk directly and place the notice over the phone. The number is listed on their obituary page. This can be helpful if you are not comfortable with the online form or if you need assistance with the submission. Staff are generally patient, but they are also handling a high volume of calls, especially during peak periods. Expect to wait on hold. The Projo obituary system works well if you understand its limitations. It is not the most user-friendly platform, but it remains the primary publication for obituaries in the Rhode Island market. For comprehensive research, you should also check the Rhode Island State Archives, local cemetery records, and the aforementioned RhodyObits volunteer database. None of these sources alone gives you the complete picture, but together they fill in the gaps that the Projo archive leaves behind.
