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From: "Bill Walsh" <>
Subject: Eastmans Genealogy Nwsletter
Date: Mon, 8 Mar 1999 06:22:48 -0600


For those that don't receicve this newsletter.

<<<SNIP>>>
- Publisher's Genealogical Coding System

David W. Dole has created an interesting coding system for
obituaries. He describes the problem of obituaries thusly:

When someone clips a family member's obit and sends it to a
relative and then-even 20 years later-that relative's daughter
starts family genealogy and finds great-aunt Susie's obit ...
she doesn't simply read:

"Susie Smith died last Thursday at her lake home.
Services Saturday, 10am at Christ Church"

...and wonder: When was Thursday? Where was the lake? What
city? Which Christ Church?

David proposes that newspapers should include a code with every
obituary, such as "A10023N1998FB18". The code would identify that
this obituary was from the Buffalo, NY News published on the 18th
of February, 1998." The example PGCS Code A10023N1998FB18 would
decode this way:

Code
Component Explanation Meaning
A Geographic area USA
10023 Name/location of paper News - Buffalo, NY
N Circulation/frequency 100M-500M circulation
daily
1998 Year 1998
FB Month of publication February
18 Day of publication 18th

Obviously the implementation of such a system will require a lot
of coordination with the newspapers. David Dole is asking
genealogists to get involved in the effort.

To learn more about the Publisher's Genealogical Coding System or
to see what you can do to help the effort, look at:
http://www.obituarycoding.com

<<<<SNIP>>>

Bill Walsh
ICQ 19386678
My World http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Prairie/4113/index.html
Cookbooks http://home.talkcity.com/EmoticonBlvd/billwalsh/directory.ht

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