Accessing Local Obituary Records: A Practical Guide
The Pottstown Mercury has been publishing obituaries for the local community since 1910. If you are researching family history or trying to track down information about someone who passed away in the Montgomery County area, these records can be useful. I have worked with these archives for several years, and there are some practical things to know before you start digging. The Mercury publishes obituaries through their website and in the print edition. Most people head to pottstownmercury.com and search their obituary section. You can filter by date range, which helps if you know roughly when someone passed away. The online database goes back about ten to fifteen years depending on digitization status. For anything older, you are dealing with microfilm or physical archives. I tried to find an obituary from 1987 for my grandmother once. The website showed nothing. I called the newspaper office and was told their digital archive only covers recent years. The librarian at the Pottstown Free Library pointed me to the microfilm room. I spent about two hours scrolling through film reels before finding the exact page. That process took longer than I expected, but the result was worth it.
How the Search Process Actually Works
When searching online, use full names when possible. Include middle initials if you know them. The Mercury sometimes formats obituary titles differently than what family members remember. A listing might appear as "John A. Smith" when you were searching for "Johnny Smith." I learned this the hard way when I missed a relevant entry for three days because of a nickname. Most obituaries include the person age, surviving family members, funeral home, and service details. Some include brief biographical paragraphs. The newer entries tend to be more detailed, while older ones in the digitized section may be shorter summaries. If you find an obituary that references a cremation or burial location, that can lead you to cemetery records or crematorium files.
What to Watch Out For
One issue I keep running into is duplicate listings. The Mercury sometimes publishes the same obituary in both the daily paper and on their website, and they occasionally cross-reference other newspapers. If you see an obituary that mentions "see also Philadelphia Inquirer" or "originally published in the Daily Times," follow those leads. Those cross-references often contain additional photos or longer biographical content that the Mercury version abbreviated. Another problem is spelling variations. I found an ancestor whose name appeared as "Kunzweiler" in one obituary and "Kunzweiller" in another. Both referred to the same person. Running separate searches for common spelling variants can save you hours.
Get the Full Details
Alternative Research Paths
If the Mercury online search is not turning up results, try these options: Local libraries: The Pottstown Free Library and the Lansdale Public Library both maintain obituary files. The Lansdale collection is surprisingly comprehensive for the surrounding townships. Newspaper databases: Genealogy banks and Newspapers.com sometimes have digitized issues that predate the Mercury online archive. The coverage varies by year, but these subscriptions can fill gaps.
Funeral homes: Some local funeral homes retain copies of obituaries they have handled. If you know which one served the family, calling directly might get you photocopies or references. Cemetery records: The Montgomery County prothonotary office maintains burial records. If you have a date of death, you can sometimes trace a person through cemetery plots even when newspaper records are incomplete.
A Word on Limitations
Not everyone in the area had their obituary published in the Mercury. Some families chose other publications or handled arrangements privately. If you cannot find a record, it does not necessarily mean the person died without notice. It might just mean the family selected a different outlet or kept arrangements smaller than typical for the area. Also, pay attention to date formats. The Mercury sometimes lists "born" and "died" dates in ways that do not match standard searches. I once wasted an afternoon looking for someone who lived to be eighty-six, only to realize I had misread "age 86" as a birth year because the formatting was ambiguous.
Practical Tips
Write down everything you find. Obituaries reference other family members, and those names can unlock additional records. If an obituary mentions a sibling who moved to Ohio, that might explain why that person does not appear in local Pennsylvania records. Take screenshots or print the pages. Newspaper websites change their layouts and occasionally remove old content. Having your own copy protects you from lost information. Be patient with the microfilm process. If you are visiting a library, ask the archivist about their scanning equipment. Some can produce digital copies for a small fee, which saves you from having to note down every detail by hand while squinting at a viewer.
The Mercury obituary archive is a solid resource for the Pottstown region. It will not answer every question, and you will hit dead ends occasionally, but it is a reliable starting point for local family history research. Most people find what they need within a few days of searching, though the trickier cases take longer and benefit from the alternative routes listed above.
